Lost Treasures of Egypt (2019) s02e03 Episode Script

1
NARRATOR: Egypt
The richest source of
archaeological treasures on the planet.
MAN: Oh, wow, look at that.
NARRATOR: Hidden beneath
this desert landscape
lie the secrets of
this ancient civilization.
MAN: I've never seen
something like this.
NARRATOR: Now for a
full season of excavations,
our cameras have been
given unprecedented access
to follow teams on
the front line of archaeology.
WOMAN: This is the most
critical moment.
(men grunting)
NARRATOR: Revealing
buried treasures
WOMAN: Oh!
MAN: We were lucky today.
MAN: Wow, lots of mummies.
WOMAN: The smell is horrible.
NARRATOR: And making discoveries
that could rewrite ancient history
MAN: We've never had
the proof until now.
WOMAN: This is where
it all started.
MAN: My goodness,
I never expected this.
(clapping)
NARRATOR: This time
KATHLEEN:
We're going to start from here.
NARRATOR: Kathleen is in search
of the lost tomb of Cleopatra.
KATHLEEN:
I have to go down and see.
NARRATOR: Calliope
digs up a city center
in the hunt for the queen's capital
CALLIOPE:
Look how big it is.
NARRATOR: Uncovering
heroes and kings.
CALLIOPE: Amazing.
Helmet and weapon means a warrior.
NARRATOR: And in the ancient
Egyptian land of the dead
BAHAA: You feel
that something here.
NARRATOR: Bahaa and his
team move mountains
BAHAA: It seems
it's still alive.
NARRATOR: In search
of lost pharaohs.
The floodplains of the River Nile,
home to one of the longest-lived
civilizations of the ancient world,
and the burial ground of
pharaohs for over 3,000 years.
But not all of Egypt's rulers
built giant monuments
to mark their final resting place.
Some tombs remain lost,
and there is one that
the world is desperate to find.
The last resting place of Cleopatra.
Last year, Dominican
archaeologist Kathleen Martinez
discovered traces of a large
void beneath the ruins
of the northern Egyptian temple
of Taposiris Magna.
KATHLEEN: Wow.
I'm gonna cry, I'm so happy.
NARRATOR: She believes
it could hold clues to,
or perhaps even be, the lost
tomb of Egypt's final pharaoh.
KATHLEEN: We have this temple
which was dedicated to Osiris and Isis.
It could be the final resting
place of Queen Cleopatra,
because she was the human
representation of goddess Isis.
It fit perfect with Cleopatra's story.
NARRATOR: At the time
of Cleopatra's death,
Taposiris Magna had been
a religious sanctuary
for more than two centuries.
Thick walls protected an area
the size of a city block.
Egyptians would come to the temple complex
to worship Isis and Osiris.
Here archaeologists unearthed
broken statues of Isis,
the goddess Cleopatra most admired.
They also discovered
an alabaster bust of the legendary queen,
and a broken mask resembling
portraits of her lover,
the Roman general, Mark Antony.
Could this mean the Taposiris Magna
is Cleopatra's final resting place?
It's a theory Kathleen has been meticulously
building for more than a decade.
KATHLEEN: The last queen of
Egypt was an extraordinary woman.
She was a goddess, she was
a warrior, she was a queen,
she was a mother, and she fascinates me.
NARRATOR: To excavate down to the void
beneath the temple would mean destroying
2,000-year-old Egyptian heritage.
But Kathleen believes
there may be a better route.
KATHLEEN:
One of the main objective
when I came to Taposiris Magna
was to discover possible
tunnels, passages underground
that might lead me to the tombs.
Right now I have 14 tunnels
discovered and seven chambers.
I believe one of those tunnels
will lead me to the tomb
of Queen Cleopatra.
NARRATOR: Only a few sections
of the 14 underground tunnels
have been explored;
any of them could lead
Kathleen to her target.
But she can only access
the subterranean network
via precipitous shafts.
With a potential drop as deep
as an eight-story building,
she can't take any risks.
KATHLEEN: There is a big problem
because the way they've placed
the ladder, it's crazy.
This is like committing suicide.
We risk our lives every day,
trying to solve the secrets
of Taposiris Magna.
NARRATOR: Without
a long enough ladder,
Kathleen's team can't
get to the tunnel she hopes to explore.
She needs to extend the ladder,
but that requires a blacksmith.
KATHLEEN:
I say I need it in one hour,
they say, "Well, maybe two,
we are discussing."
MAN: One hour.
KATHLEEN: One hour, but.
(laughs)
KATHLEEN: When we go down,
we'll find Cleopatra.
MAN: Inshallah, Inshallah
NARRATOR: If she can't
get a longer ladder,
the secrets below ground
will remain out of reach.
30 miles to the east is
one of Egypt's busiest cities:
Alexandria.
This was Cleopatra's capital,
the center of power for her family line,
known as the Ptolemies.
Calliope Limneos-Papakosta has
been unearthing the treasures
of Ptolemaic Egypt for more than 10 years.
Among them, an incredible statue
of the legendary conqueror
of the ancient world,
Alexander the Great.
CALLIOPE: This is the most
important moment of my life,
the discovery of this statue.
When I took the soil out of his face,
I was sure I faced Alexander the Great,
the founder of the city of Alexandria.
The hero of the Greeks, the hero
of the Egyptians after that.
The hero of all the nations
that he conquered.
NARRATOR: Alexander's city was
a Mediterranean powerhouse.
It flourished for almost
300 years under the Ptolemies
until rule passed to
the dynasty's final queen.
Born in 69 BC,
Cleopatra was the daughter
of King Ptolemy XII.
Her father died when she was 18,
and Cleopatra became queen.
But she had to share the throne
with her 12-year-old brother,
and also marry him.
He sent her into exile,
but she smuggled herself
into the company of
Roman dictator Julius Caesar
and persuaded him to help
reinstate her as queen.
Educated in the famous
library of Alexandria,
Cleopatra spoke several languages
and became known for her intelligence
and political skill.
She led Egypt's forces into battle
and kept the country independent
right up to her death.
Cleopatra's capital once
boasted unimaginable wealth.
Today its remains are buried.
Calliope's mission is not
to dig up Cleopatra's body,
but to uncover her life.
Her target is Cleopatra's home,
the ancient royal quarter.
It could hold long-forgotten
secrets of the Egyptian queen
as well as her ancestors.
CALLIOPE: In the area
of the royal quarter,
Ptolemy IV constructed a huge mausoleum.
All the Ptolemies were buried
in this mausoleum,
except one: the Queen Cleopatra.
NARRATOR: Calliope hunts
in Alexandria's equivalent
of Central Park, Shallalat Gardens.
It's here that she discovered
her marble statue of Alexander the Great.
But this dig is no walk in the park;
it's a fight against nature.
CALLIOPE: Our target is
the Ptolemaic level,
and this level is lower
than the water table.
It's a huge project, pumping
the water now 24 hours per day.
But we believe that this area
has a lot of secrets to be revealed.
NARRATOR: If the pumps fail,
the site will be drowned,
destroying an entire season's
progress in a matter of hours.
400 miles south of Alexandria is Luxor,
site of the ancient capital of Thebes.
This was the heart of
the ancient Egyptian culture
that Cleopatra inherited and ruled over.
The city was the seat of Egypt's pharaohs.
Their tombs are scattered
throughout the nearby Valley of the Kings.
But like the tomb of Cleopatra,
many have never been found.
BAHAA: We can remove
this debris from here.
NARRATOR: Bahaa Gaber and
his team are here to scour
the mouth of the valley
on the mountain site of Dra Abu el-Naga.
BAHAA: Oh, wow, this is linen!
It means that we should have a mummy!
NARRATOR: And he
has a particular lost pharaoh in mind.
BAHAA: We are missing one of the
tombs in Valley of the Kings,
the tomb of a king called Amenhotep I.
We are thinking that
this king had been buried here
in Dra Abu el-Naga.
NARRATOR: Amenhotep I
was among the early kings
of the famous 18th dynasty.
His successors, including Tutankhamun,
were buried nearby.
It means this mountain could
be a prized burial ground.
BAHAA: The ancient people carved
the tomb on the bedrock,
that's why we are cleaning the mountain.
We divided the area
into three different sites,
each one of those groups,
they are looking for a tomb.
NARRATOR:
After three years of digging,
his team may be closer than ever
to their dream of finding a king.
Archaeologist Ahmed El-Taayeb investigates
a corner of the site where
workers are uncovering a wall.
In the dust they find clues
that it might enclose a tomb.
AHMED: Wood
NARRATOR:
On this desolate mountain,
at the base of a rock wall,
this shard of wood can only be one thing.
AHMED: It's a
fragment from the coffin
AHMED: If I am right
we will find more pieces or more
fragments from this coffin
NARRATOR: It's barely 8:00 AM
on the mountain
at Dra Abu el-Naga,
but Ahmed's crew is buzzing.
A coffin could be the clue
that leads him and fellow
archaeologist Mohamed Beabesh
to a lost pharaoh's tomb.
They pick up the pace.
AHMED: What do
you think Mohamed?
AHMED: What we found
MOHAMED: It's a
block of limestone with
I think it's a name
AHMED: Yeah, it's a name, yeah
NARRATOR: What at first looked
like a fallen piece of wall
could be a woman's gravestone.
MOHAMED: Servant of Isis
MOHAMED: I think it
is part of her tomb
MOHAMED: It's just to
identify where she is buried
NARRATOR: If the tomb marker
and the coffin fragments
go together, it's a good sign.
This could be a noble's burial.
The king might not be far away.
BAHAA: Oh, Mohamed, I think you
feel there's something here.
MOHAMED: I feel it,
I just feel it, I just feel it.
BAHAA: We keep going,
we keep going and see.
MOHAMED: Okay.
NARRATOR: At the temple
complex of Taposiris Magna,
Kathleen Martinez and her team
have moved tons of earth
in search of Cleopatra.
The result of all that labor
is a breathtaking network
of ancient chambers.
Underneath the beautiful temple,
there's a labyrinth of tunnels
holding many secrets.
In one shaft, Kathleen found the remains
of a pregnant Greek woman,
clutching a bust of Alexander the Great.
In another shaft,
80 feet below the ground,
she found two people,
thought to be priests,
buried in the fetal position
and adorned with jewelry.
These burials build Kathleen's case
the Taposiris Magna was
a very important site,
with plenty of places for
Cleopatra to lie hidden.
But this season, unprecedented
storms have hit the site.
The rains have taken days
off her dig schedule,
throwing her plans into chaos
and threatening all her work.
Kathleen's team has been using
tomb two for storage,
but rain dripping through the rock
has entirely submerged the lower chamber,
putting her carefully excavated
ancient remains underwater.
KATHLEEN: This is
a rescue archaeology.
We are trying to rescue the human remains
that has been flooded.
And we need to do something.
NARRATOR: While the team
bails out the storage area,
Archaeologist Linda Chapon
turns her attention
to an unexcavated corner of the
tomb that escaped the flood.
The burials here could hold clues
to other secrets hidden at the site
and help steer Kathleen's
search for Cleopatra.
LINDA: I think that
it has been disturbed
because the skulls are not placed
in their original position.
NARRATOR: The bones
are scattered.
Whoever they were, these bodies
had something worth looting.
But even though robbers
have ransacked the corpses,
clues still remain.
KATHLEEN: This one is
very well preserved. LINDA: Yeah.
KATHLEEN: It looks like a woman.
She has beautiful teeth.
Only people which were very rich
would take care of themselves,
and they had beautiful teeth.
NARRATOR: Wealthy burials
strengthened Kathleen's case
that the site could hide royalty,
and they date to the end
of the Ptolemaic period:
Cleopatra's dynasty.
LINDA: Sometimes I wonder,
did these people meet her?
Were they friends?
If these people are from
the time of Queen Cleopatra,
that's a very important discovery for us.
NARRATOR: Kathleen has
built up six seasons' worth
of precious human remains
backing up her hunch.
But too long underwater, and
her evidence will fall apart.
In the center of Alexandria,
Calliope has been holding back floodwaters
for more than a decade.
CALLIOPE: If we stop pumping,
this area is like a lake,
becomes a swimming pool.
NARRATOR: She's searching for
the royal quarter of the city
and clues to Cleopatra's life.
Exactly where she discovered
Alexander the Great's statue,
her team uncovers
a further tantalizing clue.
CALLIOPE: Amazing.
You recognize this?
(laughs)
The right hand holds a weapon;
helmet and weapon means a warrior.
This is the third head
of Alexander we find.
NARRATOR: Alexander the Great
was revered
right up to Cleopatra's time,
almost 300 years later.
The royal quarter would have
been filled with artworks
and monuments to the city's founding hero.
MAN: Go ahead, one meter.
NARRATOR: But Calliope
also uncovers evidence
at a much greater scale.
CALLIOPE: Look how big it is,
and we have not arrived to the end.
So, I believe this is the
external wall of this building.
NARRATOR: The foundations of
the newly unearthed building
are laid on bedrock.
It means Calliope can date the structure
right back to the founding of the city.
The building's sheer size
means it can't be a workshop
or ordinary dwelling.
CALLIOPE: We have
an enormous building
that possibly was one of
the famous public buildings
of the royal quarter
of Ptolemaic Alexandria.
NARRATOR: It's evidence
she's digging
in the right part of town.
In 365 AD, a huge earthquake
hit ancient Alexandria
and leveled most of its buildings.
As people rebuilt the city,
all traces of Cleopatra's
royal quarter disappeared.
But the geographer Strabo had written
a detailed first-hand account
of Alexandria's original layout
before the quake.
Strabo states that Cleopatra's
palaces and temples
were all gathered around
Alexandria's main crossroads.
Calliope believes the ancient
layouts Strabo described
is the basis for the modern city plan.
If so, the foundations she has discovered
are in the right place.
CALLIOPE: We are very close
to the main street
of modern Alexandria.
This is a good sign, because
the monuments, the buildings,
the royal cemetery,
supposed to be around here.
NARRATOR: But she needs to find
evidence of the ancient crossroads,
if she's to pin down
Cleopatra's palaces and temples.
It's the final few days
of the field season
at Taposiris Magna.
Kathleen is running out of time
to find a route to the cavity
beneath the temple
that she hopes is Cleopatra's tomb.
But news has come in
from the team working on
access to the tunnels.
KATHLEEN: They told me
the ladder arrived,
and I'm going to look in the shaft now
to see if it's possible to go down.
NARRATOR: Lashed together
with some rope,
she decides the ladder system should hold.
But the greater risk may await
in the shaft itself.
KATHLEEN:
I have a very shaky ladder,
and down in the shaft,
it's full of snakes.
This is the situation I have right now.
NARRATOR: Kathleen hopes
bags of Bedouin herbs
will ward off the venomous reptiles.
But all this preparation
might still be in vain
if her team's suggestions
of chest-high floodwaters are true.
KATHLEEN: The water is
more than one meter,
and so they think
it will cover me completely.
I have to go down and see anyway.
NARRATOR: Kathleen's high-risk
game of snakes and ladders
is finally underway.
KATHLEEN: Oh.
NARRATOR:
This could be the shaft
that leads her to Cleopatra's tomb.
Her tallest worker, Saber,
is already down,
testing the floodwaters
and hanging the Bedouin anti-snake herbs.
But he returns with
an entirely unexpected problem.
SABER: Mouse!
KATHLEEN: Mouse?
SABER: A small mouse
KATHLEEN: Huh? A mouse?
SABER: Yeah.
KATHLEEN: I can't go down
KATHLEEN: There are rats
dead, here
and the smell is horrible
NARRATOR: The rotting
rodents are unpleasant,
but the unusually deep water is dangerous.
One slip in the darkness could be fatal.
KATHLEEN: It's impossible now
NARRATOR:
Until the floodwater subsides,
Kathleen won't be able
to follow the passage.
KATHLEEN (off-screen): I could
not stand up even in the tunnel.
The rats that live there die,
and they are decomposing.
It smells horrible.
NARRATOR: There's no way
the tunnel will dry out
before Kathleen has to close the site.
KATHLEEN (off-screen): That's
it for the tunnel this year,
there's nothing else we can do.
NARRATOR: With
the underground route flooded,
Kathleen needs to find another
way to the underground void
she hopes holds Cleopatra.
In the city of Alexandria's
Shallalat Gardens,
Calliope has dug down 30 feet
in the hunt for Cleopatra's royal quarter.
CALLIOPE: If we find
the crossroads,
it will make us become closer
to the location
of the burial place of the Ptolemies.
NARRATOR:
But she faces a problem.
CALLIOPE: The death of Cleopatra
is the end of the Ptolemaic dynasty,
and also it's the end of
a whole era, historical era.
Romans come after that, and
things change in Alexandria.
NARRATOR: The conquering Romans
built over Cleopatra's capital.
20 feet down, Calliope discovers
what seems to be a highway
running across her dig.
CALLIOPE: So, these black stones
are not just stones,
they're precious stones,
and when we see black stones,
we know we have a Roman road.
NARRATOR: The Romans may have
leveled the city,
but Calliope believes their engineering
could be a blessing in disguise.
CALLIOPE: Most of the Roman
streets we find in Alexandria
have earlier Ptolemaic streets underneath.
NARRATOR: Calliope thinks
the Roman road network
mirrors the road layout
of ancient Alexandria
at the time of Cleopatra.
Calliope's plan is to excavate
her small Roman road
until she finds the main road
that cuts across it,
which might then lead her
to the ancient city center
where Cleopatra's
royal quarter once stood.
CALLIOPE: We are in
the right location.
We are near the crossroad,
but, for sure, there is
a lot of work to be done.
NARRATOR: The trouble is
there is still
2,000 years' worth of debris
between Calliope and
the ancient road network,
and her route to
Cleopatra's royal quarter.
At Dra Abu el-Naga,
near the mouth of Luxor's
the Valley of the Kings,
Bahaa's team is searching for
the pharaoh Amenhotep I.
They've discovered a grave
marker and coffin fragments.
This could be a collapsed tomb.
AHMED:
Call to the director, the chief.
(yells)
BAHAA: They are calling us.
NARRATOR: A flash of color
in the dry desert sand
could confirm this as a burial place.
BAHAA: It's good news, oh, wow.
MOHAMED: We have a new something
BAHAA: Oh, wow look at that
BAHAA: Mohamed,
this is beautiful
it's a beautiful face
MOHAMED: And Ahmed's thinking
it's a coffin for a lady
NARRATOR: The faces
on male coffins
nearly always had facial hair.
This casket almost certainly
belongs to a woman.
BAHAA: Look at the eyes,
it seems it's still alive.
NARRATOR: This is Bahaa's
first opportunity
to pin a date on the tomb.
BAHAA: The stone that
we found this morning,
and then we found the face,
the wooden face.
MOHAMED: Wonderful work.
BAHAA: This is the style
of the late Egyptian period.
NARRATOR: The find dates
to hundreds of years after Amenhotep.
Their discovery proves
this was a cemetery then.
Now Bahaa is on the hunt for
proof it was a burial ground
in the time of the pharaoh himself.
BAHAA: When you find
some stuff like that,
it's a sign that you are
going to find something!
So we are very close to an amazing tomb.
NARRATOR: At the northern
Egyptian temple
of Taposiris Magna,
Kathleen needs every piece of
evidence the site can provide
to back up her theory
that this is the last
resting place of Cleopatra.
The human remains
she's unearthed this season
provide crucial data,
but the catastrophic flood
in the storage tomb
threatens her dream.
KATHLEEN: In that tomb,
in one niche,
we have 10 human remains, we have so much.
LINDA: We are trying to dry them
with a hair dryer.
Better than to leave them in the sun,
the sun has very bad effect on bones.
And it's working, so.
NARRATOR: Linda now has
the thankless task
of assessing the damage
and sorting the remains
for the second time.
LINDA: This one,
part of a mandible.
This is part of the foot.
This is part of the pelvis.
Vertebras.
NARRATOR: With some
gentle blow drying,
the bones will survive their immersion.
It's a much-needed boost for Kathleen.
KATHLEEN: The thing that
keeps me very optimistic
is that these human remains
are from the time of Queen Cleopatra,
and this keeps my theory together.
NARRATOR: With just one day
left of the field season,
it's now too late to excavate
the void beneath the temple.
So Kathleen brings forward
plans to use an experimental technology.
KATHLEEN: We're going
to start from here.
NARRATOR: And prove
the cavity is a tomb,
without even breaking ground.
In the city center of nearby Alexandria,
Calliope is working on
a new area of excavation,
in line with the Roman street.
She's following the road
towards Cleopatra's royal quarter
and the tombs of the queen's ancestors.
But with the ancient structures hidden
below 30 feet of mud and stone,
it's heavy work.
CALLIOPE: We have arrived
one meter and a half
from the surface of the ground.
We are still very high,
our target is maybe another eight meters.
NARRATOR: 2,000 years of
destruction and rebuilding
have jumbled the archaeological record.
Any of these stones could have been
part of Cleopatra's palace or temples.
The team must document every single one.
CALLIOPE: We go slowly, slowly,
and we hope the result will award us.
Be careful if it's black.
Give me the brush.
All these quantity of big stones
is debris,
but the fact that we find
black stones among them
is a very good sign.
NARRATOR: The rock's color
and texture show
it's not from the local area.
It could be the black stone the
Romans used for their roads.
If this proves to be a
continuation of the Roman road,
it could lead her to
the ancient royal quarter,
the epicenter of power
in Cleopatra's Egypt.
♪
NARRATOR: Just over a mile
from the famous tombs
of the Valley of the Kings,
Bahaa's hunt for the pharaoh Amenhotep I
at Dra Abu el-Naga is
producing tantalizing clues.
But he needs to determine
whether the necropolis
was already in use by the time
Amenhotep's reign began,
at the start of Egypt's
18th dynasty of pharaohs.
Further down the mountain,
the team's foreman reports
a cluster of intact pots
emerging from the sand.
For ceramic specialist Mohamed,
it's an exciting prospect.
It's a clue that could date the site
to a time before Amenhotep I.
MOHAMED: I think we
have a great discovery
MOHAMED: There was a ritual
done here in the Theban necropolis
MOHAMED:
Breaking the red vessels
very common in the 17th dynasty
NARRATOR: The pot suggests that
by the time of Amenhotep's 18th dynasty,
people already came here
to commemorate the dead.
(cow moos)
NARRATOR: Each year
after the harvest,
the people of Thebes held
a celebration of the dead
called the Beautiful Festival
of the Valley.
They carried statues
of Thebes' three main gods
in a grand procession out of Karnak Temple
east of the river.
They crossed the Nile on ceremonial boats,
following the sun's journey
from the east bank,
the land of the living,
to the west, the land of the dead.
The procession ended
at the tombs and temples
on the west bank, where people
had laid offerings,
including pots of food,
at the graves of the deceased.
The ritual ensured the dead
had provisions for eternity.
These pots mean a tomb
should be very close.
AHMED: I think it is
a fragment of the wood
MOHAMED: Funery furniture
maybe?
AHMED: Mohamed, Mohamed
I think something else
MOHAMED: You wish, Ahmed
MOHAMED: He wishing
but I don't think
maybe not
AHMED: No, no Mohamed
I think I'm right
MOHAMED: You are right?
AHMED: Yes
AHMED: We have great, great news
AHMED: It's a face!
MOHAMED: So it's a
burial for a coffin
NARRATOR:
The roughly carved casket
appears to be buried in a miniature tomb.
This is clearly no king,
but it's a vital clue
that he might be near.
MOHAMED: My happiness
will be complete
if it belongs to the 17th dynasty
MOHAMED: In archaeology I
am not sure about anything
I don't trust anything
until I have it in my hand
NARRATOR: If the burial
does predate Amenhotep I,
it proves Dra Abu el-Naga was
a cemetery by the time he died.
So he could be buried here.
But there's no way to tell
until this coffin is out of the ground.
NARRATOR: Mohamed and Ahmed
have mobilized
a whole team of workers
to excavate the coffin.
It's their best lead yet
in the hunt for the missing
pharaoh, Amenhotep I.
MOHAMED: Now we have a coffin,
for a child, from one piece.
AHMED: One tree.
MOHAMED:
And it's a sycamore tree.
(speaking native language)
NARRATOR: A single dug-out
trunk is a key clue
that this burial predates
Amenhotep's reign;
a boost to their hopes
that the pharaoh was
buried in this cemetery.
But the proof will lie inside the coffin.
It looks like the coffin of a tiny infant,
but mummies of the time
were often stuffed into
ill-fitting tree trunks,
not stretched out comfortably
like later mummies.
RAMADAN: Before opening
it we want to be ready
RAMADAN: This is a very
sensitive stage of work
and we have to be concentrated
NARRATOR: Opening a coffin
that has been closed
for thousands of years
is a delicate operation.
Any wrong move and they could
damage the body inside.
RAMADAN: Can you
see something now?
BAHAA: A mummy wrapped by linen
RAMADAN: Yeah and the
light is coming through
RAMADAN: There is no connection
between the lid and the base
so it will be easy to open it
RAMADAN: 1, 2, 3
and move it, move it
RAMADAN: Slowly. Ease. Yes.
MOHAMED: That's what I expect
BAHAA: You were right
MOHAMED: Did you see
how he fits the legs?
MOHAMED: I think it's
more than five years
Also now I am sure it is 17th dynasty
NARRATOR: This is evidence
that the necropolis was in use
by the time Amenhotep I died.
MOHAMED: For me now
I'm looking for something
BAHAA: For something bigger
BAHAA: A tomb of a King
MOHAMED: And the evidence
increases day by day
NARRATOR: The hunt for royalty
at Dra Abu el-Naga goes on.
But Bahaa and his team have confirmed
the cemetery's great age.
They're inching ever closer
to their goal of finding the missing king.
At the temple complex of Taposiris Magna,
it's the last day of the field season.
Kathleen is in a race to show
the cavity beneath her feet is a tomb.
If she can, it will help persuade
the Ministry of Antiquities to
allow her to dig for Cleopatra.
MOHAMED 2:
Can you start from here?
NARRATOR: She's thrown caution
to the wind and put her faith
in a promising but
experimental technology.
Mohamed Gamal sounds out
hidden cavities in the rock
with a network of geophones.
KATHLEEN: I want to check
all these rooms.
MOHAMED 2: I'm very excited to
see are we going to be able
to succeed to see what's
hidden from us or not.
This is a challenge to us.
NARRATOR: The technique
relies on acoustic imaging.
Mohamed's ultra-sensitive
equipment records sound
caused by micro-tremors
in the earth's crust.
He can analyze the signal
to create a subterranean map,
including every crack
in the rock, every void,
or any tomb that might
conceal a lost pharaoh
or a hiding queen.
But with the team deep into their work,
Kathleen spots a problem.
The scan has begun, but she has
no way of mapping the results.
KATHLEEN: Whenever they are
doing the profile,
I need the beginning and the end.
I need to know where
are we doing the profile.
If not, it's not gonna work for me.
They were not putting any marks.
MOHAMED 2: Let them do it,
let them do it.
NARRATOR: If she's to prove
to the Egyptian authorities
that it's worth damaging
the ancient structure,
she needs to know exactly
where the geophones are placed.
She needs to know where to dig
down to the nearest inch.
KATHLEEN:
This is the only day I have,
it's the last day of the season,
and we lost a couple of hours.
NARRATOR: Kathleen is within
touching distance
of a discovery that could eclipse
even that of Tutankhamun.
But it will be some time before
Mohamed has fully mapped
the temple's underground labyrinth.
She faces an anxious wait
for the survey results.
NARRATOR: In Alexandria's
Shallalat Gardens,
Calliope's team has discovered
a black stone in
a newly opened excavation.
It could be the clue that
points her in the direction
of Cleopatra's royal quarter.
CALLIOPE: Let's start
removing the debris.
NARRATOR: To get there,
she needs to find
the main crossroads of ancient Alexandria.
BILAL: This is three pieces,
this one.
CALLIOPE: It's black, yes.
And what about this one?
We have four black stones here,
so maybe we are in
a part of the continuation
of the Roman street.
NARRATOR: The stones
are covered in a layer
of white mineral after
centuries buried in the soil.
But they were once smooth, dark
Roman street cobbles.
CALLIOPE: Also, Bilal, this way,
clean also this way. Yes.
We found another one,
so I don't believe it is random.
You don't understand how
a person can be happy,
finding just a black stone;
this is archaeology.
NARRATOR: As the workers haul
the stones out of the ground,
Calliope spots a potentially crucial clue.
They're much larger than the cobbles
on the Roman road she's following.
CALLIOPE: These black stones
are very big,
so maybe they belong to
the big street, not to this one.
I'm very excited by the fact
that these stones could belong
to the main latitudinal
street of Alexandria.
And this will be great,
because this is our goal.
NARRATOR: If this is really
one of Alexandria's
two Roman main highways,
Calliope just needs to trace it
to where it meets the other one.
And she will find the crossroads
where the ancient royal quarter
once stood.
Calliope will have to wait for next season
to open another excavation.
CALLIOPE:
And this is black, too.
NARRATOR: But for now,
she's one more step
along the road to Cleopatra's royal home.
CALLIOPE: It's a stone,
but it's not just a stone.
Everything has a meaning.
I think this is the beauty of archaeology.
NARRATOR:
At his laboratory in Cairo,
Mohamed has has finished
processing the acoustic survey
of Taposiris Magna.
With the dig season over
and the site closed,
Kathleen has returned home.
But the subterranean map
of the temple is finally ready.
MOHAMED 2: Kathleen.
KATHLEEN (over video): Hello!
MOHAMED 2: How do you do? Hello.
KATHLEEN (over video):
How are you?
MOHAMED 2: Fine, thank you.
I have good news for you.
KATHLEEN (over video): Really? I've
been waiting, I'm dying to hear from you.
MOHAMED 2: We found
something at Taposiris.
KATHLEEN (over video): Where?
MOHAMED 2: At the guard room,
room number two,
is making like
a very big resonance for us.
NARRATOR: Mohamed's geophones
have confirmed the presence
of a large chamber-sized void
beneath the temple.
But there's more.
MOHAMED 2: You
can see my finger?
KATHLEEN (over video): Yes.
MOHAMED 2: This is the place
which is most promising to us.
It looks like this small place
is a hidden entrance.
There is very big resonance,
like it's a connected place to
under a subsurface room or an entrance,
or a corridor or something like this.
KATHLEEN (over video): This is
exactly what I've been looking for.
I am thrilled. I am
This is one of the happiest
days of my life.
This is something that I believe,
and now we have this scientific evidence.
Thank you so much.
NARRATOR: Not only does
Kathleen have a hidden void,
she has a secret entrance,
and now she knows exactly
where to excavate.
MOHAMED 2: If we found
the mummy of Cleopatra,
it would be a great discovery
in this century.
KATHLEEN (over video): My
heart is beating so hard now.
So strongly.
I don't know how I'm going
to control myself
during this month,
until I get the permission.
I'm so excited.
NARRATOR: Cleopatra has
bewitched historians
and archaeologists ever since her death
and the Roman conquest of Egypt.
Now the centuries-long hunt
for the last pharaoh's tomb
may have entered its final stage.
When she gets back on site,
Kathleen could be just
a day's digging away
from the greatest discovery
since Tutankhamun 100 years ago.
Captioned by Cotter Captioning Services.