Egypt

Catacombs

Kom es-Shogafa or The Catacombs are found if you continue on Shari' el-Awud as-Sawari past Pompey's Piller to the right on Shari' Bab el-Muluk and then take Shari' el-Nasriya to the Catacombs. Kom es-Shogafa is a rocky plateau situated between the ancient villages of Karmuz and Minia el-Bassal which are now densely populated districts of Alexanderia where the first catacombs were discovered. Mohammad Ali used the area to defend the city and the area was destroyed in about 1850. Then in about 1900 a donkey accident discovered an entirely undiscovered necropolis, an enormous hypogeum which dates to about the 2nd century AD.

The catacombs were hune out of solid rock on three superimposed levels. The dead were lowered down the central well of a spiral staircase by ropes. The vestibule has two semicircular niches, each containing a bench surmounted by a shell carved in the vaulted upper half of the niche. This opens onto a rotunda built around a central well covered with a domed kiosk supported by eight pillars.