According to ancient historians, gold in the kingdom of Egypt was as common as sand in the desert.
It's true that Egypt exported large quantities for centuries, with even the Romans mining gold there, up until the 1950s.
However, over time, the locations of these ancient mines became forgotten.
Early Gold Mining | Gold | Real Vision
This map, known as the Turin Papyrus Map, is generally considered the oldest surviving map of topographical interest from the ancient world.
Reconstructed map of the Turin papyrus, image source.
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Discovered near modern Luxor (ancient Thebes) between 1814 and 1821, the papyrus/map was brought to Italy and is today hosted in the collection of the Museum of Egyptian History in Turin.
The Turin Papyrus Map: A Detailed Look
The Turin Papyrus Map is an ancient Egyptian map, generally considered the oldest surviving map of topographical interest from the ancient world. It is drawn on a papyrus reportedly discovered at Deir el-Medina in Thebes, collected by Bernardino Drovetti in Egypt sometime before 1824 and now preserved in Turin's Museo Egizio.
The map was drawn around 1150 BCE by the well-known Scribe-of-the-Tomb Amennakhte, son of Ipuy. It was prepared for Ramesses IV's quarrying expedition to the Wadi Hammamat in the Eastern Desert, which exposes Precambrian rocks of the Arabian-Nubian Shield.
The map shows a 15-kilometer stretch of Wadi Hammamat and has depictions of this wadi's confluence with wadis Atalla and el-Sid, the surrounding hills, the bekhen-stone quarry, and the gold mine and settlement at Bir Umm Fawakhir. It also includes numerous annotations (written in the hieratic script) identifying the features shown on the map, the destinations of the wadi routes, the distance between the quarry and mine, the location of gold deposits in the hills, and the sizes of the bekhen-stone blocks quarried.
The top of the map is toward the south and the source of the Nile River. As currently reconstructed in the Turin Museum, the map measures 2.8 m long by 0.41 m wide.
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Geological Significance
Besides being a topographic map of surprisingly modern aspect, the Turin Papyrus is also a geological map (the earliest known) because it accurately shows the local distribution of different rock types (with black and pink hills), the lithologically diverse wadi gravels (with brown, green and white dots), and it contains information on quarrying and mining. The draughtsman clearly and carefully distributed distinctive features in accordance with the reality of a particular area, adding clarity by the use of legends and contrasting colors.
The verso of the papyrus is inscribed with unrelated texts, in particular a letter addressed directly to Ramesses VI and pertaining to a cult statue of his setup in the temple of Hathor in Deir el-Medina. The letter asks that a certain man be put in charge of the daily offerings presented to the statue of the king.
Among origami enthusiasts, the map has been considered as the earliest known example of folding. According to origami historian David Lister, the map was mentioned by Profs. Koryo Miura (inventor of the Miura fold) and Masamori Sakamaki, from the University of Tokyo, in a meeting of the International Cartographic Association in 1980 as an example of early map folding.
However, the vertical creases on the papyrus may not be folding marks, as believed by Miura and Sakamaki.
Details of the Map
The map shows the landscape around an unknown oasis. Inscriptions describe the "Mountain of the Gold”, the “Mountain of the Silver”, but also the location of the “Village of the Miners”, the "Temple of Amun", the streets to the (Red-) Sea and a street to Ta-menti (an unknown locality).
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The different colors of the map are inspired by the real colors of the rocks, reddish feldspar-granite (Fawakhir-Granite), dark Atalla-Serpentinite and Hammamat-Formation, and yellow for the sand of the desert. A dry river runs down the entire valley, eroding and transporting the rocks, as shown by the pebbles in different colors.
A quarry of bekhen stone, a blue-green sandstone used to carve statues, is shown, as are many mines for gold. The most important indication was the location of a well near the village. Thanks to this well, archaeologists identified the area shown on the map.
Rediscovering Ancient Mines
The ancient mountains of gold and silver are situated in the Wadi Hammamat, near Bir-Um-Fawakhir, an ancient miner settlement, almost 100km east of Luxor.
Following the indications of the map into the field, the archaeologist discovered ancient signs of mining, like 50m long tunnels following quartz veins. The important veins are shown as lines in the Turin map.
The gold is found as tiny fragments in the massive quartz, almost invisible to the naked eye. That ancient Egyptians found it, is an impressive evidence for their (empirical) geological knowledge.
Already in 3,200 BC professional geological prospectors, called “sementi“, searched for deposits and veins of gold, to meet the demand of the divine pharaoh. Following the veins into the mountain, the miners extracted the rock, crushing it, and washing the heavy gold out.
Thus, the Turin-map, is more of a treasure map or topographic map with indications for miners, as it is a true geological map.
The rocks are not identified or described in detail, and the map contains no stratigraphic information at all.
The world’s oldest known geological map is a nine-foot-long papyrus from the Egyptian village of Deir el-Medina, home to the New Kingdom craftsmen who worked in the Valley of the Kings.
Created by Amennakhte, the chief scribe of the royal necropolis, the papyrus depicts a dry riverbed called the Wadi Hammamat in Egypt’s eastern desert.
The wadi had been used for quarrying and mining for centuries, and as a route connecting the Nile Valley to the Red Sea for millennia.
No map would have been needed for general travel, according to Egyptologist Andreas Dorn of Uppsala University and linguist Stéphane Polis of the University of Liège. Instead, the papyrus was created as a commemorative record of a pharaonic expedition, perhaps during the reign of Ramesses IV (r. ca. 1153-1147 B.C.), to a bekhen-stone quarry.
Bekhen-stone, or greywacke, was prized for use in high-quality sculptures. The scribe also included quarried bekhen-stone blocks with their measurements, as well as roads and directions in hieroglyphs, such as “road leading to the sea.”
Amennakhte also drew natural and built landmarks including small trees, bushes, and a well, along with a monument to Seti I (r. ca. 1294-1279 B.C.) and a temple to the god Amun, both illustrated in white at the far left.
“Amennakhte definitely had experience visualizing complex structures, as he was also responsible for drawing tombs. He was able to represent topographical information by flattening out such things as roads and the natural environment,” says Polis.
THE GOLDMINE PAPYRUS. DATE: ca. 1151-1145 B.C. MATERIAL: Papyrus. Dimensions: 9 feet by 1.3 feet.
Other Ancient Egyptian Maps
This map of ancient Egypt details the key settlements of the Ancient Egyptian civilization. Also shown are many of the important Ancient Egyptian sites and temples that remain today.
The various capitals of the period are highlighted on the map in addition to the locations of the natural resources and minerals exploited by the Ancient Egyptians.
The importance of the Nile, specifically the fertility that it brings to the land through which it passes, is also a key feature of this map.
To add further interest to the map, a papyrus texture has been incorporated into the map’s coloring scheme.
In addition to the main map, a number of smaller inset maps detail some of the key sites of Ancient Egypt. Plans of the temples at Karnak and Luxor are included along with maps of the Pyramids at Giza and the necropolis at Abusir.
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