Ismailia museum celebrates 83rd anniversary

CAIRO - 2 March 2017: In celebration of its 83rd anniversary, Ismailia Museum is is hosting a celebration Saturday, the Antiquities Ministry said in a Wednesday press release.


The festival will be inaugurated by Antiquities Minister Khaled al-Anany, Ismailia Governor Gen. Yassin Taher, Elam Salah, Head of Antiquities Sector and Museum Director Mona Shaaban. All four are expected to deliver opening speeches.


The festival will include programs for children, other entertainment and folkloric troupes playing “semsemya,” the most commonly-known musical instrument associated with the city’s heritage, the statement said, citing Salah.


The statement added that Ismailia Museum is the second-largest regional museum in Egypt, following the Egyptian Museum in Tahrir Sqaure. In its collection are an estimated 3,800 rare artifacts from the Romanian, Islamic and Coptic ages, alongside some pieces discovered during recent excavations around the Sinai Peninsula and the Suez Canal and entrusted to the museum, Shaaban said in the press release.


She also shed light on the growing importance of the museum as more artifacts dating back to the digging of the Suez Canal in 1859 are being unearthed.