An Egyptian team has uncovered the remains of a Roman basilica and a large marble head of the Greek goddess Aphrodite at Ihnasya, the site of ancient Herakleopolis Magna, The Past reports in its latest round-up of Egyptian archaeology. The excavation also produced terracotta coin moulds, adding to a picture of the town's life under Roman rule.
Ihnasya lies in Middle Egypt, near the entrance to the Faiyum, and has a long history stretching back well before the Graeco-Roman period. Known to the Greeks as Herakleopolis Magna, it served for a time as a regional capital and remained an important centre into the Roman era. The finds reported here belong to that later chapter, when Greek and Roman cultural forms were woven into the fabric of Egyptian towns.
The basilica was a standard building type across the Roman world, used for public business and administration and later adapted for Christian worship. Its presence at Ihnasya points to the civic character of the settlement during the period. The marble head of Aphrodite, described as large, reflects the popularity of the goddess in Egypt under Graeco-Roman rule, where she was widely worshipped and often associated with the Egyptian goddess Hathor.
The terracotta coin moulds are a particularly telling detail. Moulds of this kind were used in the Roman period to cast coins, and their discovery on site suggests activity connected to the local economy. Together with the basilica and the sculpture, they help build up an impression of a working Roman-era town rather than a single monument in isolation.
Ihnasya has drawn archaeological attention for well over a century, with earlier work by the Spanish mission and others uncovering temples, cemeteries and material from several periods of Egyptian history. Discoveries such as these continue to fill in the site's later phases, when the older Egyptian religious landscape sat alongside imported Greek and Roman gods and institutions.
The report appears in The Past's regular Ancient Egypt news in brief feature, which gathers short notices of recent fieldwork and announcements from across the country. Fuller details of the excavation and its findings are expected to follow as the team publishes its work.
Sites like Ihnasya show how thoroughly Egyptian and classical worlds mingled in the centuries after the pharaohs. For readers keen to trace the older layer of that story, the Hierolyte app teaches the hieroglyphic script that underpinned Egyptian religion long before Aphrodite arrived on the Nile.