SAQQARA - A team of archaeologists in Egypt has announced that in recent weeks they have found 59 well-preserved and sealed wooden sarcophagi, buried over 2,500 years ago.
Opening one, the team revealed mummified remains wrapped in a shroud, with hieroglyphic inscriptions in bright colors.
The discovery took place south of Cairo, in Saqqara, the necropolis of the ancient Egyptian capital of Memphis, a Unesco world heritage site.
Since the discovery of the first 13 coffins was announced nearly three weeks ago, more have been discovered in other wells, at depths of up to 12 meters.
And an unknown number of sarcophagi may still be buried there, Tourism and Antiquities Minister Khaled al-Anani said on the site, near the 4,700-year-old Pyramid of Djoser.
"So this is not the end of the discovery, I consider it rather the beginning of the great discovery," he said.
The sarcophagi, sealed more than 2,500 years ago, date from the late period of ancient Egypt, around the 6th or 7th century BC, the minister added.
In recent years, excavations at Saqqara have unearthed artifacts, mummified snakes, birds, beetles and other animals.
Preliminary studies have indicated that the sarcophagi likely belonged to priests, senior statesmen and prominent figures in ancient Egyptian society of the 26th dynasty, Anani said.
All coffins will be taken to the soon to open Grand Egyptian Museum on the Giza plateau.
The opening of the Great Egyptian Museum, which has been delayed several times, is scheduled for 2021. The museum will house thousands of artifacts, spanning multiple eras in the history of Egypt, from the pre-dynastic period to the Greco-Roman period.