Lost Nile Delta City Of Imet Built Around Cobra-Goddess Cult Uncovered in Egypt
In the floodplain of Egypt's eastern Nile Delta, sun-baked and desolate, archaeologists have uncovered a city once built under the watchful eye of the cobra goddess, Wadjet. Underneath a mound at Tell el-Fara'in—"Mound of the Pharaohs"—were the forgotten remains of Imet, an important center of Egypt's Late Period, now reappearing after centuries of dust and abandonment.
What they've discovered is not a single temple or royal tomb—but a whole slice of ancient life: multistoried houses, ceremonial causeways, granaries, and religious artifacts, all stunningly preserved in an area where mudbrick tends to dissolve into the ground.
Conducted by Dr. Nicky Nielsen of the University of Manchester in association with Egypt's Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities and the University of Sadat City, this latest excavation strips away the city's urban layers from a town once the capital of Lower Egypt's 19th province.
"Imet is emerging as a key site for rethinking the archaeology of Late Period Egypt," said Dr. Nielsen, a senior lecturer in Egyptology at the university, reports a press release.
Tower Houses in the Delta Imet's skyline—if it was anything at all in the 4th century BC—was vertical. The discovery of densely populated, multistory "tower houses" with uncommonly thick foundations attests to a growing population and a city engineered to accommodate it. These unusual architectural forms, rare outside the Delta, indicate Imet wasn't merely holding on—it was thriving.
"These tower houses are most commonly encountered in the Nile Delta during the Late Period and the Roman period, and are otherwise rare in Egypt," stated Dr. Nielsen in the same press release. "That they exist here indicates that Imet was a prosperous and densely constructed city with a sophisticated urban infrastructure."
Researchers discovered the remains of ancient Egyptian buildings and artifacts, including a green faience (glazed ceramic) figurine of Ushabti, and a stele.
The researchers spotted these buildings initially via satellite imaging, with concentrations of ancient mudbrick showing as eerie grids just below the surface. Ground excavation verified the scans: dense, multi-story homes and a city intricately developed around grain-processing depots and animal enclosures—proof of a vigorous, mundane economy functioning in tandem with its more spiritual aspects.
The Road to Wadjet At the spiritual center of Imet was the temple of Wadjet, the cobra-headed goddess and formidable defender of Lower Egypt. She was no docile deity—her formalized serpent headdress crowned pharaonic foreheads as proof of regal legitimacy and divine indignation.
A ceremonial avenue once connected her temple to the city outside, running through hallowed space with processional rites. But by the middle Ptolemaic period, this road was out of use—its fading footprints a reminder of shifting religious landscapes in foreign dynasties
A stone relief from the ancient Egyptian city of Imet
Adjacent to it, the excavation uncovered the foundations of a great columned building constructed directly over this hallowed way. Probably a Ptolemaic period building with ceremonial connections of its own, it attests that even as the old gods declined, new patterns of civic and religious life emerged atop the same sacred geography.
Ushabtis and Gods Amidst the Rubble The discovery doesn't stop with architecture. Among the rubble, they also found a 26th Dynasty green faience ushabti figurine, still glistening on its surface with the glazed promise of the afterlife.
Nearby was a carved stele of Horus, the falcon-headed god, standing victorious over crocodiles—a compelling symbol of divine control over chaos. Carved alongside him is the plump and smiling figure of Bes, the dwarf god of childbirth and protection, as if he were a mythic door guardian emerging
Bits of a musical sistrum that have twin Hathor heads decoratively carved on them—the goddess of music and joy—indicate that ritual feasting, as well as state power or household drudgery, lined Imet's streets.
Unlike the eternal beauty of Thebes or Giza's monumental geometry, Imet is a narrative of lived life—of individuals piling floors on top of each other, keeping livestock, grinding corn, and praying along ceremonial avenues that gradually grew still. Here, cobra goddesses guarded not only the pharaohs, but also the greengrocers, midwives, and stonemasons of a city that thrummed with everyday vitality.
"Imet is becoming a critical location for reimagining the archaeology of Late Period Egypt," Nielsen declared. It is indeed less an imperial showplace and more one of efficacious enchantment—a city of gates and spires, constructed aloft on mudbrick aspiration and divine blessing.
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