Ancient Egypt
Remnants of the world's longest-living society still stand tall...
in the shifting desert sands and rising Nile tides...
But for 1600 years
an important piece of landscape went missing...
Buried like a treasure... In the sea... awaiting discovery...
Cleopatra's palace
Egypt
For five thousand years a great civilization... flourished here...
And left a dazzling legacy filled with images of wealth
and worship power and pride
A people who held a profound belief in the afterlife
which found expression in enormous temples
and tombs and vested their faith in the pharaoh
to lead them and protect them
Each pharaoh left an indelible mark
Ramses the second the great empire builder
and Tutankhamun the boy king
But the most famous pharaoh... all but vanished
Cleopatra. The face that launched a thousand legends
Her story begins in Alexandria a city at the mouth of the Nile River
on the Mediterranean coast
It was founded in 332 BC by Alexander the Great
who conquered Egypt for his ever-expanding empire
After Alexander's death
the city fell into the hands of his general
Ptolemy the first, who established Greek control over Egypt
Within a hundred years
Alexandria was the most famous city in the world
A glorious cultural and learning center
which attracted the finest scholars and artists of the time
It grew rich as a trading port between Europe and Asia
Ships from India and Rome sought out its fabled lighthouse
one of the seven wonders of the ancient world
The Greek occupation of Alexandria
and the rest of Egypt lasted for some 300 years
until Cleopatra's time
Queen Cleopatra, the seventh
An Egyptian pharaoh and a full blooded Greek
she remains one of history's great enigmas
Popular among the Egyptians
Cleopatra was the first Greek ruler to learn their language
She kept the powerful Roman Empire at bay
by forging intimate alliances with its leaders
but her luck ran out when Octavian the ruler of western Rome
decided to take Egypt from her grasp
Rather than submit to defeat the queen committed suicide
But for all the drama that Cleopatra endured
there's not a trace of it left in present-day Alexandria
Instead, her world lies hidden in 10 meters of murky water
in a bay that spreads over two square kilometers
No one has ever attempted a full search of this enormous site, until now
Since a very long time
I had a dream to come to this place because of the mystery of this site
For Franck Goddio
10 years of planning culminate in this year's expedition
A former financial advisor
he abandoned his successful career to pursue Cleopatra full time
And this is where he hopes to find her
While exploring the sunken island of Antirhodos
home of Cleopatra's legendary palace
his team of divers stumble
across a piece of wood sticking out of the sediment
For three weeks divers clear the site
Curiosity turns to excitement
It is the wreckage of an ancient ship more than 30 meters long
The big surprise for the team
and me this season was the discovery of the wreck
in the port of the island of Antirhodos
and it's a superb wreck
and it's in a magnificent state of preservation
Radio-carbon dating places the vessel within Cleopatra's lifetime
Goddio sends artist Patrice Sandrin to sketch the large ship
Special waterproof paper allows him to draw an overview
We are just transferring the measurements
taken by Patrice at the bottom
Little by little we see the shape of the wreck
and all the details of the wreck
The type of construction will lead us to define
when exactly this boat has been built and by who
and for which purpose which is so very
very important in this case
Sandrin's drawings and film of the wreckage are sent to Dr. Steve Vinson
of the University of Chicago
an expert in ancient ships and shipping
A nice shipwreck is always a pleasant surprise
In fact what they are swimming through is the very bottom of the ship
where all the muck and the gunk used to collect
This is down in steerage, basically
A computer model helps Dr. Vinson bring the ship back to life
Well, the drawing gave me the first clue because
with the drawing I was able to see the whole thing at a glance
What we have is a center line the keel
which is this heavy longitudinal member
that comes from the front to the back
Crossing the keel are lots of pieces
that go from side to side that you would call ribs
or more properly called, frames
The ship was large by ancient standards 30 meters long
with thick supporting beams that measure 8 meters from end to end
Vinson suspects it is a cargo ship
Well if it was leaving Egypt
it may well have been carrying a cargo of grain
Estimates put the amount of grain shipped
from Egypt to Rome at about 50,000 tons a year
A cargo ship this size could carry 300 tons of grain
or wine stored in tightly packed jars
the wealth of the Nile that made Cleopatra rich
Egypt was where a lot of luxury goods from China
from India or Sub-Saharan Africa would have been shipped through
Silks from China, spices from Arabia incenses, perfumes, from Africa
exotic animals, lions for devouring Christians
would have come through Egypt
Hidden between the timbers of the ship
Goddio's team finds jewelry in pristine condition
Every day we have some surprise with this wreck
First we found it, the size of this boat is quite impressive
And we have some very nice luxury item very good quality
This is the bottom of a cup
a very fine, and beautiful cup
and we have also found this hairpin ivory hairpin
and we found a very cute gold ring here.
Very nice
And we have this exquisite and important gold ring here
which is a gold ring with semi-precious stone
with an engraving of a crested bird
called intaglio, and it was used as a seal for example
After weeks of cleaning the wreck site
divers find a large hole the wound that sank the ship 2000 years ago
But there is no way to know
if it struck a reef or was a casualty of war
It may take years to solve the mystery of the wreck in Cleopatra's harbor
It is one of the best preserved ancient ships ever found
A ship that Cleopatra may have watched sail by from her royal palace
The palace Franck Goddio is determined to find
Two thousand years ago
Alexandria was the wealthiest city in the world
greater than Athens or Rome
Today a humble fishing fleet has replaced Cleopatra's imperial navy
Somewhere in these waters lie the palaces
where she seduced the most powerful men on Earth:
The mighty Julius Caesar of Rome
and the ambitious Marc Antony
But time has been cruel to Alexandria
Four centuries after Cleopatra's death
earthquakes and a huge tidal wave toppled the palaces on the harbor front
scattering them into the bay
creating a massive underwater jigsaw puzzle
If anything remains of Cleopatra's palace
it would be found somewhere in the vast featureless bay
Two to ten meters deep
the bay is over two square kilometers
Goddio needs a starting point for his treasure hunt
His only guide is a faint voice from antiquity...
...a Greek scribe who journeyed to Alexandria three years
after Cleopatra's downfall
and chronicled the wonders that he saw
His name was Strabo-and he described a sprawling walled city
with a great lighthouse
one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World
We know from Strabo
that all around this harbor there were palaces and temples
Among them there was also an island with the Palace of Cleopatra
and a small harbor belonging to the king
Many maps have been made based on Strabo's writings
but only underwater exploration can provide the missing details
Visibility is a problem
Divers can rarely see more than two meters through the murky waters
and the slightest storm churns up centuries of silt
To locate the palace
Goddio's team uses a variety of sensors
to detect the shape of the seafloor below
The harbor is scanned for changes to the Earth's magnetic field
indications that structures may lie buried there
The images are combined with sonar
and depth soundings to produce a rough
sketch of the submerged jetties and ancient ports
Goddio has assembled a multi-national team
of divers and archeologists
Goddio's team has eight weeks to find the palace
before the torrid Egyptian summer
turns the water into an impenetrable soup
At first the divers have a hard time getting their bearings
Centuries of calcium deposits cover rocks
and relics alike in nearly a meter of solid crust
By chipping away at that crust
the divers expose pieces of the ancient city's wealth and grandeur
a statue of the Greek god Hermes
a coiled serpent
guardian of the city
a sacred bird of Egypt
the head of a Roman empress
Goddio gives the divers a new piece of technology
known as the piano for its many black buttons
It helps divers establish their position
by receiving signals from a global positioning satellite
But the satellite's data are only accurate within 15 meters
Goddio needs much greater precision
So he finds a modern solution... in a medieval fortress
A transmitter is mounted in the turrets
Its signals will be used to improve the calibration of the piano underwater
This receiver is linked to two antennas
The first one receives the signal from the satellite
and the second one receives a signal from our base
which is on the tower.
The computer will link the two signals
Goddio's system is thirty times more accurate than before
This is the first time the GPS system
has been used in underwater archeology
and it allows Goddio and his team to establish the longitude
and latitude of each location...
...accurate to within one and a half meters
The results of the GPS survey are astounding
Franck Goddio is able to draw an accurate map of a vanished metropolis
In 1997 and 1998
after archaeological excavation
we were able to precisely define the contour
and location of the ruined city
Goddio's team uses red buoys to
make an outline of the sunken discoveries
Following Strabo's clues
Goddio is now finally able to bring a lost world into view
His map offers entry into the queen's domain...
...a palace where Cleopatra seduced Julius Caesar
mighty commander of the Roman legions
The waterfront where her companion
Marc Antony, built a private sanctuary just months
before he took his own life
And finally, Antirhodos Cleopatra's royal island
I never thought one day
I will be able to map the whole of the royal quarters
Now we know we are just at the beginning
of a great scientific adventure
For the first time in nearly 2000 years
Queen Cleopatra's royal palaces may receive new visitors
Having mapped the ancient port of Alexandria...
Goddio narrows his search to the sunken island of Antirhodos
It was here, in 26 BC
that the geographer Strabo saw Cleopatra's luxurious summer home
four years after her death
But he provides no clue to where the palace stood
Now it's up to Goddio and his divers to find it
An archeological excavation it's like a big puzzle
Very tiny information fills gaps
The site itself is enormous twenty seven hectares in water so murky
that visibility is often limited to arm's length
When artifacts are found
they must be placed along a scale of time
on which Cleopatra's life is but a brief moment
In this treasure house of history artisans left precious clues
eight blocks inscribed with Egyptian hieroglyphs
a wealth of information for the modern scholars who can read them
Strips of flexible silicone are sent down to make copies of the text
One engraving is a dedication to gods
whose cult ended a thousand years before Cleopatra's birth
Other inscriptions are in Greek
A tablet honors an emperor
who ruled two centuries after Cleopatra's death
On the Eastern tip of the submerged island Divers discover
two long rows of wooden stakes
They are the foundation of an ancient jetty and a valuable clue
The age of the wood can be determined
It dates back from the fourth century BC and fifth century BC
And this is very interesting
The jetty was here long before Cleopatra
It's an encouraging find
If it survived all those years
there's a chance Cleopatra's world also did
By the time Cleopatra assumed the throne
Antirhodos was a thriving royal port
prime real estate for the palace of an ambitious beauty
and her famous lovers
Elated by the discovery of the ancient docks...
Goddio looks for traces of buildings from Cleopatra's reign
Across the harbor
divers have uncovered dozens of distinctly Greek columns
Cleopatra's ancestors came from Greece
and they imported their style to Egypt
Sharp edges resemble columns found in Athens
but carved in native Egyptian granite
Stones that were placed at the top of the columns are decorated
with traditional Egyptian symbols
The pillars may have formed elegant colonnades
sheltering the queen and her entourage
as they boarded their royal vessels
Anchored above Cleopatra's sunken island
Goddio is following a trail described only
by the ancient geographer Strabo in 27 BC
Goddio knows there was a palace on Antirhodos island
From here, the royal family could have looked out
across the bustling harbor toward the great lighthouse
Goddio's divers have chipped away at encrusted ruins
at the southwest corner of the sunken island
Now, their labor pays off
The divers discover a series of giant columns
cut from red Egyptian granite
On the southwest tip of Antirhodos Island
we found an accumulation of red granite columns
fallen into the port
We counted sixty pieces
They are huge, over four feet in diameter
The ruptured columns cover 60 meters of the bay floor
Shattered pottery beneath them suggests they fell
during an earthquake centuries after Cleopatra's death
Paintings from the ancient world indicate
that the columns might have acted
as a ceremonial gateway to the island
The columns announce the majesty of their owner
Some were more than 7 meters tall
a magnificent entrance fit for a queen
Approaching sailors would have marveled
at this grand entrance to the royal island
The gateway leads Goddio to suspect
that the palace is near the center of the island
But in his attempts to find it
Goddio sometimes finds the unexpected
One day, I was diving alone on Antirhodos Island
cleaning a granite block
I was hoping for a hint to indicate
I was on the right track to discover the remains of Cleopatra's palace
The hieroglyphs on the block of stone reveal a coiled snake
reminding the explorer of the legendary serpent
that ended the life of a 39-year-old queen
Even though it was not from the period of Cleopatra
I took it as a good omen for my search
The inscription reads "eternal life. "
Dozens of other blocks are soon found
The next discovery convinces the team
that they are on the right path vast expanses of limestone pavement fit
for a queen
550 square meters all over the island forming a series of grand esplanades
Still more toppled columns are found columns
that seem to form an ancient colonnade leading
presumably, to the palace
Goddio suspects he is close to the palace
so he instructs his divers to dig a deep trench near the pavements
Using a powerful dredge
the team probes the jumbled strata of the harbor floor
layers that stretch backward in time from modern Egypt to Imperial Rome
It takes the team 3 weeks to reach the layer they're most interested in
The divers bring up a few surviving traces
This layer that we found yesterday with this very fine ceramic date
we think that's from the time of Cleopatra
Goddio and American archaeologist Emily Teeter examine the artifacts
Pots and cups that may have been used by Cleopatra
and her royal courts: A miniature oil-burning lamp
Meanwhile, another team of divers has made a remarkable discovery
Where the pavement ends abruptly huge stone blocks appear
Unsure of the blocks' purpose
Goddio decides to dig around them to see
if they are signs of something important
A palace, of course it's an important monument
and for this important monument you need a very strong foundation
Goddio's divers begin to dig down through the centuries
A series of wooden foundations appear
marking the outline of a structure 62 meters long
large enough to support the construction blocks the team
has found earlier
Goddio is convinced this must be the foundation of Cleopatra's palace
The dating of the wood indicates this structure
was built two hundred years before Cleopatra's birth
Goddio believes this is a palace Cleopatra inherited as queen
Which would mean: He found it the ruins of Cleopatra's island home
We can suppose that she spent time at this palace
when Julius Caesar came to Alexandria
or later on, Marc Antony of course
Classical art offers hints of the palace's appearance:
Tall Greek columns erected in Egyptian soil
billowing canopies providing shade for royalty
But what did the palace really look like?
Based on the foundations experts can now hazard a guess
"Inside these walls, ivory clothed the entrance hall
and Indian tortoiseshell was inlaid upon the doors
The palace was adorned with many an emerald
jewels glittered on the couches. "
It was here, 2000 years ago
that the queen of a once-great nation tried
to save her people from conquest
Cleopatra's love affairs with Julius Caesar
and Marc Antony have become enduring legends
two great warriors entranced by a royal beauty
and dazzled by the wealth of her dynasty
I feel privileged to be able to touch pavement
on which once Cleopatra walked
Goddio has found the main building of Cleopatra's palace complex
but he knows that his search of the island is not over
His divers have discovered something unusual nearby
something that would take everyone by surprise
Having found the sunken island where Cleopatra ruled as queen
Franck Goddio is looking for one more building
A shrine belonging to Cleopatra her own personal temple
Divers have spent two years searching for it
Goddio is convinced it's still there
For the Egyptians, what mattered was life after death
Only the temples were built to last to eternity, not the palaces
One temple hundreds of kilometers to the south
still heralds Cleopatra's immortality
Here, her image merges with the goddess Isis
Isis controlled the power of fertility
Women begged her blessings for their children
She controlled the annual flood of the Nile
that was essential for a successful harvest
For millions of worshippers in Egypt and throughout the Roman empire
Cleopatra was Isis In religious processions
Queen Cleopatra dressed as the goddess herself
What was left, then of her personal shrine?
Divers search an area of the sunken island near its shore
A perplexing statue is found
but its identity is not immediately clear
It will head to the surface for further inspection
To raise the statue
Goddio and engineer Jean-Jacques Groussard prepare a slow
and careful hoist to prevent the statue from being smashed to pieces
on the jagged paving stones below
Goddio is joined by Ibrahim Darwish
Egyptian director of the department of underwater archaeology
and archaeologist Emily Teeter
Most likely thing, it's from a small sanctuary of the god
and this would be the major focus within the temple...
Yeah, so most probably thing is this is a priest
a great priest, bearing canopus...
It is a high priest of Cleopatra's cult of Isis
He holds a jar called a Canopus
filled with holy water from the sacred Nile
It is a priceless discovery
the first complete Canopus statue ever found in Egypt
The figure's bald head identifies him as a priest of the Isis cult
His entire body shaven for purity every three days in preparation
to pray to the goddess to ensure the fertility of the Nile
But something even more spectacular waits in the water...
...two perfect sphinxes
The sphinxes are creatures of myth
but their faces bear the likeness of Egypt's kings and queens
perhaps even Cleopatra herself
Franck Goddio orders both sphinxes to be lifted aboard so
that full casts can be made
For two thousand years
the sphinxes have been hidden from human sight
Now for a few agonizing minutes they spiral towards the sky
What I am amazed is the face
The preservation of the face does not...
it has been destroyed by nature But there's no inscription
unfortunately
but stylistically this would be fairly easy to date
because of the roundness of the face
the shoulder patches Very nice
For the divers
after months of searching in the muddy darkness
it is a moment of joy
Each sphinx is prepared for a silicone molding
Petroleum jelly is applied to lubricate the surface
Life-size casts will be sent to classical scholars to help
solve the riddle of the sphinx
When I am excavating on Antirhodos Island
I have the chance to bring new information to light
such as the Sphinx bearing her father's likeness
During Cleopatra's reign
sphinxes were often used as spiritual guardians for temples
The discovery of the sphinxes so close to the Canopus priest
suggest to Goddio that he has found the shrine he was looking for
These were lying on the beautifully paved area
near the red granite columns
This layout most probably shows
that this was a small sanctuary of Isis close to the palace
Two thousand years ago
it would have been enclosed in sacred gardens instead of the sea
As the goddess Isis transformed into human flesh
Cleopatra would have led processions here holy rituals blessed
by the Isis priests
purified by sacred Nile waters from the Canopus jars
In the final hours of the expedition
there is one last treasure that must be resurrected
from Cleopatra's harbor: It is a giant stone head
The complete statue must have stood at least 5 meters tall
but what man deserved such a memorial?
There is only one way to be certain
bring it to the surface for study
Goddio immediately recognizes the face
It is the Roman dictator Octavian Cleopatra's mortal foe
As his mighty army invades Alexandria
Cleopatra chooses suicide over surrender
She is Egypt's last queen
and now a mighty Roman claims her realm
After 2000 years Franck Goddio has touched her world
As they prepare to sail home
Goddio's team has one last task
they must return all of Cleopatra's treasures back to the bay
Ultimately, the Egyptian government will determine their fate
Ten years ago I decided to undertake this important project
trying to find some remains of the submerged city of Alexandria
What he has found opens a new chapter in Egyptian archaeology
and casts new light on a legendary queen the world cannot forget
Ripped by: SkyFury