THE HARBOR OF KHUFU on the Red Sea Coast at Wadi al-Jarf, Egypt
Abstract
In 2011, a team from the University of Paris-Sorbonne and the IFAO discovered an important harbor complex from the Old Kingdom at Wadi al-Jarf. Located along the Egyptian shore of the Red Sea, this strategic anchorage was used as a departure point to the Sinai Peninsula for royal expeditions to the copper and turquoise mining areas located on the opposite side of the Gulf of Suez. The site was exclusively occupied during the beginning of the 4th Dynasty and it can now be considered the oldest harbor in the world. In 2013 the discovery of several dozen fragments of papyrus, the oldest inscribed papyri ever unearthed in Egypt, confirmed the early date of this site and revealed a final closure of this installation at the end of the reign of Khufu.