Necropolis I.

• Author: Riggs, Christina
• Position: Book Review

Edited by JEAN-YVES EMPEREUR and MARIE-DOMINIQUE NENNA. Etudes alexandrines, vol. 5. Cairo: INSTITUT FRANCAIS D'ARCHEOLOGIE ORIENTALE, 2001. Pp. vii + 527, illus. 60 [euro] (paper).

This volume publishes the results of excavations carried out in 1997-98 in the necropolis of Gabbari, on the west side of Alexandria, by the Centre des Etudes Alexandrines (CEA) under the direction of Jean-Yves Empereur. In 1997, construction of an elevated highway leading to the inner port area of Alexandria chanced upon a series of catacomb tombs in the Gabbari quarter of the city, and Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities entrusted the site to Empereur and the CEA. Although the excavation began as a rescue operation, the extent and importance of the finds proved such that the Gabbari necropolis will be preserved and eventually opened to the public.

Empereur and co-editor Marie-Dominique Nenna are to be commended for the thoroughness and timely completion of both the excavation and its publications. Together with the seventeen different contributors to this volume, they present all aspects of the Gabbari necropolis, from an overview of how the excavations were carried out to specialist discussions of architecture, conservation, inscriptions and art, physical anthropology, and the artifacts found at the site. Ample photographs, plans and sections, artifact drawings, and judicious reconstructions are well chosen and complement the text, making the volume easy to use. Especially welcome is the use of color figures (4.19 to 4.33, pp. 202-7) for the publication of painted decoration in the tombs. The quality of these color images--twelve photographs, two reconstructions, and a facsimile--demonstrates that it is possible to incorporate color illustration in a reasonably priced volume, and that the inclusion of color enhances art-historical publications.

Necropolis I focuses on four tombs from the site, designated B1, B2, B3, and B8; a forthcoming volume will consider some of the other catacombs as well as burials found near the surface. Tombs B1, B2, and B3 were created in the mid-third century B.C., perhaps as small family tombs, and enlarged in the course of the next half-century; each was subsequently re-used in Roman and Byzantine times. Tomb B8, which consists of two levels joined by an interior staircase, did not remain in use beyond the imperial period. Together, the tombs housed 434 loculi for corpses, eight niches for cinerary urns, and three sarcophagi.

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