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Modern Description: The German Archaeological Institute has been conducting surveys and excavations at Watfa since 2010. In November 2017 a German-Egyptian archaeological team announced the discovery of the foundations of a small Hellenistic gymnasium, unique for Egypt. Watfa, ancient Philoteris, was one of the many villages founded under the first Ptolemies in the middle of the 3rd century BC. In the beginning, it had around 1,200 inhabitants, two thirds of them Egyptians, and one third Greek-speaking settlers. In the Delta and Fayoum in particular, new villages were founded, in which the indigenous population lived together with the Greek newcomers. Such villages were equipped not only with Egyptian temples, but also with Greek sanctuaries. Inscriptions and papyri had already witnessed the existence of gymnasia in the countryside of the Ptolemaic period. They tell of of payments for parts of the main buildings being made by rich inhabitants of the villages, and of the men who governed the institutions.
Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philoteris
Wikidata ID: Q42834453
Trismegistos Geo: 1780

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(JBK)

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