Wadi el-Hudi is an area southeast of Aswan that is made up of many archaeological sites, consisting of fortified settlements, amethyst mines, and rock inscriptions. Egyptians mined this region during the Middle Kingdom and the Roman period. The state of preservation of the settlement areas is astonishing; the distribution of artifacts on the surface allows for a reconstruction of the various activities that took place at Wadi el-Hudi over three-thousand years ago. The area was first discovered in 1917 and has been intermittently studied by geologists and archaeologists since. In the 1940’s Ahmed Fakhry conducted a survey of the area, where he identified 14 archaeological sites and recorded over 100 inscriptions. In the 1990s the sites were also visited by Ian Shaw, Robert Jameson, Rosemarie Klemm and Dietrich Klemm as part of large studies of Egyptian mining operations. The Wadi el-Hudi Expedition was launched in May of 2014 to continue studying the area and to yield answers to questions of settlement planning, organization of state-sponsored projects, the mechanics of semiprecious stone mining, interactions between Nubians and Egyptians, literacy among a soldiering class, and much more. Since beginning our work, the expedition has identified new, unknown archaeological sites and a dozen more inscriptions that were previously unpublished. The hope of the initial season was to mark a beginning of a long-term effort to investigate these archaeological gems in the desert. The expedition is currently directed by Kate Liszka and Bryan Kraemer and is sponsored by California State University, San Bernardino. We would like to extend our thanks to the Supreme Council of Antiquities in Cairo and especially the Aswan Inspectorate for their continued support of and assistance with our project.
