Specials - an album on Flickr. Specials - an album on Flickr. Unique Neolithic child cemetery found in Egypt. Article created on Sunday, January 5, 2014 A burial ground containing the remains of dozens of children and infants has been uncovered in Egypt by a Polish team led by Prof.
J Kabaciński of the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnology in Poznan. Deep in the desert region of Gebel Ramlah, located near the southern border of Egypt, about 140 km west of Abu Simbel, the archaeologists examined a unique necropolis dated to around 6500 years. To date, there are no known cemeteries in the Western Desert intended almost exclusively for children, infants and foetuses – some of these fragile and poignant remains were found during recent excavations. Mother and child burial at Gebel Ramlah. Home Page. Careful observations of the heavens appear to have been important for nomadic pastoralists who moved across the Western Sahara Desert during the Late Neolithic.
Evidence for their interest in astronomy is found in the ceremonial complex they built on the western shores of Nabta Playa some 2000 years before construction of similar megalithic structures at Stonehenge and elsewhere in northern Europe. These nomads moved across trackless oceans of sand, and they must have found the stars to be as useful for navigation as did those who attempted to find their ways across the Pacific and Atlantic oceans. Ultimately they were drawn to Nabta playa because of the promise of water, which began to accumulate in Nabta Playa around the time of summer solstice. From about 65,000 years ago until about 12,000 years ago the Western Desert was hyper-arid, at least as dry as today and perhaps even drier.