Antiquities ministry starts inventory of artefact storehouses throughout Egypt

Egypt’s Ministry of Antiquities has only now launched a campaign to make an inventory of all store galleries in archaeological sites around Egypt.

The galleries consist of three types of storages; museological storehouses, subsidiary storehouses, and those belonging to archaeological missions. Mostafa Waziri, secretary-general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, told Ahram Online that the committee in charge of the inventory campaign, established in 2017, has inventoried 34 museological storehouses in early January and has found no missing artefacts. The ministry started yesterday an inventory of the subsidiary storehouses and those of archaeological missions that had not been opened or cataloged for several years.

Already evidence of poor stewardship has come to light, for example in a mastaba in Saqqara that was used as a store gallery and had not been inventoried since 1997: 

Upon entering the mastaba, the committee found evidence of attempts to remove some of the iron beams from the metal ceiling of the mastaba’s open court. The door of the mastaba was closed and sealed with stamps marked 1997. The committee has reported the attempted break-in to the Tourism and Antiquities Police and will continue with the inventory procedures to check if there are any missing objects.

(Antiquities ministry starts inventory of artefact storehouses throughout Egypt)