In Halloween, here are Egypt’s most famous haunted places

CAIRO – 31 October 2017: Halloween is upon us, and though the originally Celtic tradition seems very foreign, Egypt has its fair share of spookiness! Join us but be warned, for we are going on a tour through the most famous haunted places in Egypt.

Baron Empian’s Palace:


Baron Palace - Hoba offendum - Wikimedia commons

Located in Heliopolis, a breathtaking beautiful Indian-inspired structure in the morning but once night falls, the building shows its other facade. Whenever the subject of haunted houses comes up in Egypt, the Baron's Palace is the first place that comes to mind.

The palace belonged originally to a Belgian Baron named Empain who wanted to build the most beautiful structure in Egypt, a miracle of architecture which would stand as a symbol for magnificence. Alas, the building now stands as a symbol of fear and evil.

It is said that a lady of the house, the Baron’s sister or his wife, has fallen or was pushed from the palace’s tower for unknown reasons. After the Baron’s death in the late 1920s, no one seemed interested in claiming the palace. Witnesses have claimed seeing fires break out from the building’s windows and then disappear, and hearing the angry voices of the baron and the lady of the palace arguing and screaming. The lights of the house have been said to go on and off at random times while the palace is empty.

In the 90s the palace’s evil reputation spread wide, and attracted reckless young men and women, who were believed to be Satan worshipers, to practice black magic and blood rituals there.

Since 2009, the palace has belonged to the Ministry of State of Antiquities and there are plans to re-open it for visitors as a museum.

Tiring building’s attic:


Tiring building 1925 - Ziad – flickr

Located in the middle of Ataba, Tiring building was one of the oldest clothes malls in Egypt, with a distinct design of a dome topped by four statues of men holding a globe on their backs in an atlas like position. Years went by and the building which was named “the building of Jews” as its residents were mainly Jewish Egyptians, turned gradually into a messy place. The residents and owners left and in their stead came traders and clothes' merchants who turned most apartments into storage places; however, one room stayed untouched… the attic.

Said to be sealed with chains and locks, right under the dome is a room believed to have been a hanging room with a loose noose right in the middle and a great space underneath it. No one knows many details about the hanging room, and no one seems to dare open it.

Said Halim Pasha Palace or Champollion palace:


Champolion palace - Fadyhesham0 - Wikimedia commons

More than a hundred years old, the palace is located in down town Cairo. While it is abandoned and forgotten right now, it was built originally by Mohammed Ali’s grandson Said Halim Pasha for his wife who, for unknown reasons, refused to live in it. Halim Pasha then gave the palace to the Ministry of Education which turned it into a school for a while before the palace was claimed by the government and abandoned. The palace looks quite scary whether in daylight or darkness.
Roshdy buildings:


Roshdy Street’s haunted building


If you ever visit Roshdy Street in Alexandria, you will pass by a 50 year-old building covered in grey vehicle exhaust and the main entrance of which is sealed shot with a wall of red bricks, as a sign of warning; do not come close or try to enter.

The story goes that a construction worker fell down to his certain death while working on the building after the owners had an argument leading one of them to put a curse on the building. Another narrative says that the building had an Italian owner, who just after finishing it, drowned with his children while on a fishing trip which led his wife to sell the building and leave the country.

It was also said that one day at dawn neighbors woke up to the screams of a resident of the building, before they saw him throwing himself from the window of the last floor. Another pair of residents, a newlywed couple woke up to find the taps leaking blood and their belongings thrown out in the street, while others heard screams of excruciating pain and agony at night.

Dahab’s Blue Hole:


Dahab Blue Hole 2005 - Nowic - Wikimedia commons

While it may look gorgeous and it certainly attracts many of the world’s professional divers, challenging them to explore its mysteries, the Blue Hole is merely a death trap. It is said that while trying to navigate through the hole and cross its “Arch,” which makes divers feel as if they are in an underwater palace; over a hundred divers have met their death. These are their memorials.


EGYPT Dahab Blue Hole memorials - D T G - Wikimedia commons

One of the latest deaths at the Blue Hole was that of

Stephen Keenan

, a professional free diver, when he rushed to the rescue of another free diver but lost his life. His body was found in the distance.


Technical diver passing under the Arch of Dahab Blue Hole in 2009 - Tommi Salminen via Wikimedia Commons

Sycamore trees:


Branches of sycamore tree - Occidentalis - Hagerty Ryan, USFWS - Pixnio

Wherever this infamous tree is located, passersby pick up the pace. This comes from some old Egyptian superstitions around the tree as some say that you can hear whispers coming from the tree but whenever you look around, there is nothing there but darkness cast by the tree's intertwined thick branches. The tree was mentioned in many children's tales associated with evil and dark spirits.