Berenike
Around 250 BC, Berenike was founded by Ptolemy II. The town was part of a series of Red Sea ports created to facilitate the supply of gold, ivory and other products. Berenike was originally created with a specific commodity in mind. Blocked by the rivaling kingdom of the Seleucids of the supply of Indian war elephants, Ptolemaic expeditions were send to capture elephants in today’s Sudan, Eretria and Ethiopia and convey them to the coast. The young elephants were loaded on special transport ships called elephantagoi that sailed north to Berenike, where crews unloaded the animals. Proof for the presence of elephants in Berenike was delivered by the find of elephant teeth and parts of a skull, inside what must have been a retaining pen. The elephants were eventually transported to the Nile Valley and brought to a military camp near Alexandria, where training for service in the Ptolemaic army took place.
Remains of the buildings covered by sand. In the foreground a part of the unexcavated temple in 2011.
Ptolemaic Berenike was surrounded by defensive walls. Besides houses and an elephant enclosure, the settlement also contained workshops and a hydraulic installation with five tunnels cut into bedrock. Directly east of the Ptolemaic town, extensive earthworks are proof of the existence of quays and harbor basins during this period.
Berenike fell into decline during the late Ptolemaic period, but was revived soon after Rome’s annexation of Egypt in 30 BC. The first and second century AD represent the heyday of Berenike as a center of international trade. Hundreds of ostraka, papyri and inscriptions recorded the names and activities of those involved in city life and commerce in Berenike. So far evidence for 12 ancient languages, including Greek, Latin, various African, Semitic, and Indian languages, was found in Berenike. The port was now part of a trade network that stretched from the Eastern Black Sea area, the Mediterranean World and the Arabian peninsula to West Africa, India, Indonesia and China.
The town of the first to sixth century contained besides shops, houses, workshops and warehouses a series of sanctuaries dedicated to Mythras, Zeus, the Palmyrene god Yarhibol, Isis, Venus and the emperor cult. By the fourth century AD there was also a small church.
After a decline in the 3rd century AD, there is a strong revival of the the town in the fourth century. In this period, in contrast to the many nationalities found in earlier period Berenike, the population is mainly composed of local groups of Eastern Desert origin.
Berenike is mentioned a last time in a letter of the patriarch of Alexandria, sent in 524 AD to the king of Axum. In this letter the patriarch promised king Elasbaan his support in his war with Himyar, in the form of ships with troops sent from the port of Berenike. Probably not long thereafter, Berenike is finally deserted.
The location of Berenike was soon forgotten. The name of the port was however preserved in surviving literature of the Ancient World. Based on these texts, the Portugese explorer and Joao de Castro in 1541 organised a small survey as part of a larger expedition to secure the commercial interests of his hoeme country in the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean. He let his ships approach the coast directly south of Ras Benas, estimated the location of Berenike quite accurate, but never landed on the coast to confirm his supposition. In the end, the site of Berenike was rediscovered by Giovanni Belzoni in 1818.