Since 1998, the Polish Archaeological Expedition to the Eastern Nile Delta has conducted excavations at the site of Tell el-Farkha (‘Chicken Hill’). It first came to light during a survey carried out in 1987 by an Italian mission from the Centro Studi e Ricerche Ligabue (Ligabue Research and Study Centre), Venice. Located about 75 miles to the north-east of Cairo, Tell el-Farkha covers an area of around 45,000 square metres and consists of three mounds or koms: the Eastern Kom, Central Kom, and Western Kom, each rising to about five metres above the surrounding Delta farmland. An abundance of archaeological evidence pertaining to the Late Predynastic and Proto/Early Dynastic societies of the Nile Delta has been unearthed there.
The earliest evidence: a lower Egyptian ‘residence’ and breweries
The earliest inhabitants of Tell el-Farkha were people of the Lower Egyptian Culture (previously known as the Buto–Maadi Culture), which has often been viewed as inferior to the contemporary Naqada Culture of Upper Egypt. Sites such as Tell el-Farkha, however, have begun to change that perception. Its Lower Egyptian communities occupied the site from around 3700 to 3300 BC, which roughly corresponds to Phases I and II of the Naqada Culture.
