The Serapeum of Saqqara

The visit to the Serapeum begins at the Saqqara necropolis, near the remnants of the avenue of sphinxes that once led to the site. The complex is an underground catacomb used for the burial of the sacred Apis bulls from Memphis.

You descend into the rock-cut tunnels of the Great Vaults. This main gallery is functional and immense, stretching for approximately 350 meters. The air is cool and still.
The primary feature is a series of side chambers carved directly into the limestone walls. Inside these chambers rest the megalithic sarcophagi. These boxes are made of highly polished granite or basalt and are staggering in size—each weighing between 60 and 80 tons.

Historically, these huge sarcophagi housed the mummified bodies of the Apis bulls, which were worshipped as living manifestations of the god Ptah and, in death, became the fused deity Serapis (Osiris-Apis). The site was used from around 1400 BCE until the Ptolemaic period (30 BCE).
The Serapeum was rediscovered in 1850 by French archaeologist Auguste Mariette, who followed an ancient Greek description to find the sphinx avenue and the buried entrance. The scale of the hard stone sarcophagi and the precision of their construction remain an engineering and religious marvel of ancient Egypt.Read more