The oldest pottery workshop:

The Archaeological Mission of the Ministry of Antiquities, working on the groundwater reduction project at the Kom Ombo temple in Aswan, succeeded in uncovering the oldest pottery workshop of the ancient state.

The ceramics workshop dates back to the 4th dynasty (2630-2510 BC – Antico Regno) and is today the oldest pottery workshop discovered in Egypt.

Inside the laboratory, the archaeologists have found several terracotta vases and the relative clay molds consisting of semicircular perforations, as well as a limestone wheel of an ancient potter’s wheel which is the most interesting find.

Secretary-General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities:

Dr. Mustafa Waziri, Secretary-General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, said that the location of the workshop is located in the area between the entrance of the Crocodile Museum and the Nile River. It dates back to the period of the fourth Egyptian Dynasty (2613-2494), the period of the pyramids.

 

Al-Waziri explained that the workshop consists of semi-circular drilling for the manufacture of pottery in the form of the “pottery bowls”, which were designed in a continuous manner in the floor of the workshop, in addition to the presence inside the drilling blocks of stone circular shape to knock and hit the clay to be set in the form of pots.

The oldest stone wheel:

The mission also found inside the workshop the oldest stone wheel for the pottery industry in ancient Egypt in the form of a rotating table and a hollow base, which is a kind of wheel that was administered by hand and scientists called it the name of the simple wheel.

He pointed out that despite the large number of scenes depicting the development of the types of calf used to make pottery, but it has not been found any real pottery wheel dating back to the era of the old state, pointing out that the archaeologist Werner has already reached «verner», to find a wheel head made of Burned clay inside the temple of the Queen “Khantkaus” the second area of the ruins of Abu Sir inside the pottery workshop attached to the temple.