Tell el-Retaba
Dates of work: 30 August–28 September 2015
Team:
Director: Dr. Sławomir Rzepka, archaeologist (Institute of Archaeology, University of Warsaw)
Deputy director: Dr. Jozef Hudec, egyptologist (Slovak Academy of Sciences, Bratislava)
MSA representatives: Khaled Fareed, Eman Awad
Archaeologists: Bartosz Adamski (Institute of Archaeology, Jagiellonian University), Veronika Dubcová, Lucia Hulková (both Institute of Egyptology, University of Vienna), Barbara Jakubowska, Łukasz Jarmużek (both independent), Jan Marko (Masaryk University, Czech Republic), Agnieszka Poniewierska, Agnieszka Ryś (both independent), Dr. Květa Smoláriková (Charles University, Prague), Piotr Sójka (independent)
Pottery specialist: Dr. Anna Wodzińska (Institute of Archaeology, University of Warsaw)
Anthropologist: Dr. Alena Šefčáková (Slovak National Museum)
Archaeobotanist: Dr. Claire Malleson (independent)
Archaeozoologist: Dr. Anna Gręzak (Institute of Archaeology, University of Warsaw)
Geologists: Dr. Jerzy Trzciński, Małgorzata Zaremba (both Faculty of Geology, University of Warsaw)
Pedologist: Dr. Emil Fulajtár (Soil Science and Conservation Research Institute, Bratislava)
Civil engineer: Miroslav Černy (Aigyptos Foundation)
Photographers: Renata Rábeková (Aigyptos Foundation), Piotr Witkowski (independent)
Surveyor: Dr. Eva Stopková (Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava)
Student trainees: Lukáš Kováčik (University of Trnava), Katarzyna Kasprzycka, Katarzyna Trzcińska (both Institute of Archaeology, University of Warsaw)
(Joint description of seasons 2014 and 2015)
The excavation at Tell el-Retaba in 2014 and 2015 comprised three seasons of fieldwork, carried out in sectors of the site already opened in previous years. The earliest archaeological remains date from the Second Intermediate Period and represent a Hyksos settlement and cemetery. Ruins of an early Eighteenth Dynasty settlement, fortresses from the Nineteenth and Twentieth Dynasties and from the Third Intermediate Period settlement continued to be excavated as well. Of note are some archaeological remains from the 17th–19th centuries, presented for the first time in the fieldwork report.
The mission operates under the auspices of the Polish Centre of Mediterranean Archaeology, University of Warsaw, in cooperation with the Institute of Archaeology, University of Warsaw, Slovak Academy of Sciences and the Aigyptos Foundation, Bratislava. Support has come also from a Polish National Science Centre grant 2012/05/B/HS3/03748 and the Slovak Research and Development Agency grant APVV-5970/12.
Text: Polish Archaeology in the Mediterranean 25