ArtDependence | Beautiful Mosaic Dated To Graeco-Roman Times Discovered In Alexandria, Egypt

Monday, July 22, 2019

The ancient urban complex of Kom el-Dikka has been excavated by Poland’s Centre for Mediterranean Archaeology (CAS since 1960. Polish archaeologists work in cooperation with the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities. Kom el-Dikka is a neighborhood in Alexandria, Egypt. Now an important archaeological site, Kom Al Dikka was a well-off residential area in Graeco-Roman times, with impressive villas, bathhouses and a theatre.

Image: A new mosaic was found by a team of Polish archaeologists in Kom el-Dikka site in Alexandria. Image credit: Poland’s Centre for Mediterranean Archaeology (CAŚ)

Kom el-Dikka is a neighborhood in Alexandria, Egypt. Now an important archaeological site, Kom Al Dikka was a well-off residential area in Graeco-Roman times, with impressive villas, bathhouses and a theatre.

The site still have many artifacts that can be unearthed. Digging has uncovered successively a vast fragment of the Late Antique city (4th–7th centuries AD) including a small theatre, the grand Imperial bath and a unique group of twenty-two lecture halls – apparently the remains of an ancient “university”.

In recent years, excavation work concentrated on the study of the still mostly unknown residential architecture of Roman Alexandria (1st–3rd centuries AD).

A new mosaic was found by a team of Polish archaeologists in Kom el-Dikka site in Alexandria. Image credit: Poland’s Centre for Mediterranean Archaeology (CAŚ)

“The buildings of that period are known to have often been lavishly decorated – a rule that found confirmation in Alexandria this season: in one of such houses we have discovered a fine Roman floor mosaic” Dr. Grzegorz Majcherek, the director of the team of PCMA archaeologists working at the site.

The main square field of this multi-colored pavement (measuring 2.60 by 2.60 m) is composed of six hexagonal panels featuring lotus flowers, framed by a circular guilloche pattern. Lotus buds can also be seen in spandrels. Overall, the design of the mosaic, additionally equipped with a transversal field in front decorated with astragals and rosettes, is typical for the triclinia – the most imposing of the dining rooms in a Roman house.