80% of restoration work at Wardian Cemetery completed

CAIRO – 10 June 2017: “ Eighty percent of the restoration work at Wardian Cemetery, located in the archaeological area of Kom El shoqafa in Alexandria, is completed,” said Gharib Simbel, head of the Central Administration of Conservation and Restoration of Monuments at the Ministry of Antiquities .

“The tomb was taken from the garden of the Greco-Roman Museum to be reinstalled in the historical area of Kom El Shoqafa,” Simbel stated on Saturday.

The Catacombs of Kom El Shoqafa, meaning mound of shards, is a historical archaeological area that includes a number of cemeteries, statues and archaeological pieces from the Pharaonic, Hellenistic, and Imperial Roman eras.

The Wardian Cemetry dates back to 300 BC. It is part of the of the Wardian graveyard tombs, which were transferred to the area of Kom El Shoqafa to save and protect the cemetery.

The area was named Kom El Shoqafa because it contains a mound of shards made from clay jars.