Maadi

Late Prcdynaslic scttlemenr-sitc of about 18 hectares, located 5 km to the south of modern Cairo. The settlement, consisting of watlle-and-daub oval and crescent-shaped huts, as well as large subterranean houses, flourished from Naqada i to ii; recent excavations suggest that (he eastern part was occupied earlier than the western. .At the northern edge of the settlement there were one-metre-high pottery storage jars buried up to their necks, ’rhere were also large numbers (jf storage pits containing carbonized grain, cornelian beads and other valuable items at the southern end of the site. I'he bodies of foetuses and children were sometimes buried within the settlement, but there were also three cemeteries nearb}-, that at Wadi Digla being the richest.

There was less evidence of hunting and gathering at Maadi than at earlier Lower Egyptian Predynastic sites. As well as agricultural remains, there was also extensive evidence of craft specialization, including the processing and trading of copper, the analysis of which suggests that it probably derived from mines at 'I'imna and the Wlidi Arabah, in southeastern Sinai. Over eighty percent of the pottery is of a local ware (not known from Upper Egyptian sites), but the presence of Gerzean pottery and stone artefacts also implies that there was increasing contact with Upper Egypt. It should be noted that the remains of cemeteries at el-Saff and Harageh (in Middle Egypt) contain items that are characteristic of the ‘Maadian’ culture, suggesting that there may also have been a certain amount of cultural expan. sion southwards in the late Predynastic period.

The excavation of. Maadi has revealed large quantities of imported pottcr from Palestine dating to the Early Bronze. Age i phase (including thirty-one complete jars); these mainly consisted of a globular jar with a broad, Hat base, high shoulders and long cylindrical neck. The imported ceramics also included the so-called Ware v pottery, made with unusual manufacturing techniques and, according to petrographic analysis, from Palestinian clay. The combination of Palestinian products found at Maadi (including copper pins, chisels, fishhooks, basalt vessels, tabular-like flint tools, bitumen and cornelian beads) and the presence of typical. Maadian and Gerzean products at such Palestinian sites as Wadi Ghazzeh (Site 11) and Tel el-Erani suggest that Maadi was functioning as an entrepot in the late Predynastic period. ’I’he means by which the trade goods were transported has perhaps been confirmed by the discovery of bodies of donkeys at Maadi.

M. Ami:r, 'Annual report of the. Maadi excavations, l‘>35’, CtlE ii (19,36), 54-7,

M. A. I loiTM \, Egypt before the pharaohs (New York, 1979), 200-14.

I. Rizk \ and J. Siaa ikr, ‘New light on the relation of Maadi to the Upper Egyptian cultural

Sequence', .U/>. fyA40 (1984), 237-52.

I. Cari'.r. a, M. Er gii*ari-: and A. Pai,.iu:ri, ‘Predynastic Egypt: new data from. Maadi', African Archaeological Review 5 (1987), 105-14.

I.  RjzK-XRA and J. Sekhkr, Maadi, 4 vols (.Mainz, 1987-90).

J,  Sia. iii'.K, ‘.Maadi - eine priidynastiche Kulturgnippe zwischen Oberagypten und Paleslina’, Praehisiorische Zeitschrifi 65 (1990), 123-56.