Dakhla

Three hundred and some kilometres down the desert road is Dakhla spelled with gay abandon, as Dakhleh, Dakhlah and Dakhle. Dakhla is of particular interest to the potters apprentice as the reefs there provided the ancient craftsmen with clays, and raw material for glaze and frit used locally and exported over The Long Road to the factories on the Nile. It is possible that the Egyptian Blue mineralisations originally came from Dakhla The Oasis abounds in pottery workshops and the resultant potters fields are metres deep in broken and abandoned wares. It is eerie to look at the broken stuff from thousands of years ago and make out the ancient potters thumb marks on the handles. It is a strange feeling to extrude similar handles today. Our thumbs seem to be a lot wider.
The Institut Francais d’Archaeology Orientale has excavated at Dakhla for many years and built a suitably wonderful dig house where we lunched. Closed when we were there they excavate in style and bring two Chefs with them to maintain the rage. They have opened up a 6th dynasty burial chamber over ten metres under ground at Ain Asil ‘Spring of Origin’ which now restored can be entered by steps down from ground level.
Rome made its mark here, and a forgotten memory suggested a thought from the ramparts on what it must have been like for conscripts from Gaul to be on guard duty waiting for the Arab attack. Rereading T E Lawrences Revolt in the Desert recently I found that he had made that comment about Rome writing in Wadi Rumm thousands of km away in Jordan ( now ) . Strange how these things come to mind.