An Egyptian and Chinese archaeological mission has carried out the first large-scale excavation of the Temple of Sekhmet at Memphis since the early 1960s, Egypt’s Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities announced on Sunday 30 August 2026. The team found blocks and statue fragments from the age of Ramesses II, and a mud-brick residential quarter that stayed in use for centuries.
Xinhua describes the project as the first large-scale systematic excavation of the temple and its surroundings since 1962, covering seasons in 2025 and 2026.
Who is digging
The mission joins Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA) with the Shanghai Museum. It is co-led by Dr Reham Zaki of the SCA and Dr Chen Jie, deputy director of the Shanghai Museum. The Shanghai Museum plans a long-term cooperation framework with the SCA, and the mission will continue its surveys and excavation, according to People’s Daily Online.
Sherif Fathy, Egypt’s Minister of Tourism and Antiquities, described Egypt and China as heirs to two of the world’s oldest civilisations, as HeritageDaily reported. Officials from the SCA, including Mohamed Abdel Badie, head of the Egyptian Antiquities Sector, and the secretary-general Dr Hisham El-Leithy, also commented on the work.
The site
The temple lies at Mit Rahina in the Giza governorate, on the ground of ancient Memphis. It formed part of the Great Temple of Ptah complex, and it was discovered by chance in 1959. Sekhmet, the lion-headed goddess, belonged to the Memphite family of gods as the consort of Ptah, the city’s creator god.
Memphis was founded around 3100 BC and served as Egypt’s capital in the Old Kingdom. Its monuments, together with the necropolis that stretches from Giza to Dahshur, are a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Today the palm groves and fields of Mit Rahina hide much of the old city, and a small open-air museum there displays a colossal limestone statue of Ramesses II.
What the team found
By clearing the remains of the temple, the team revealed a rectangular plan with relatively well-preserved limestone outer walls. Some of the blocks carry hieroglyphs.
Many of the stone blocks and statue fragments date to the New Kingdom, especially the reign of Ramesses II. HeritageDaily and Xinhua report that some pieces, including granite ones, may come from the Great Temple of Ptah, which suggests that the stone was moved and reused as the site changed.
A neighbourhood beside the temple
Near the temple, the mission uncovered a residential quarter of mud-brick houses with courtyards. The area shows continued occupation from the Third Intermediate Period and the Late Period through Ptolemaic and Roman times.
That is a long span. It means people lived and worked beside the temple for many centuries, long after the great age of the pharaohs had passed, and the quarter gives archaeologists a view of ordinary life as well as of royal building.
The small finds add detail. They include pottery, figurines, ostraca, inscribed stelae, amulets, moulds and beads. Ostraca are pieces of pottery or stone used as notepads, and they often record everyday matters. Piles of faience fragments may point to a nearby craft workshop, according to the sources, since faience is a glazed material used for beads and amulets.
Why Memphis still matters
Memphis is among the oldest cities in the world, and for much of Egyptian history it was the capital. It is also easy to overlook. Visitors to Cairo tend to head for the Pyramids and the Grand Egyptian Museum, and the ruins of Memphis, not far away, receive less attention than they deserve.
The new excavation is a reminder that the area still yields surprises. The first Temple of Sekhmet finds came by chance in 1959, and it took more than six decades for a large-scale team to return. The results suggest that careful excavation can still add to what is known about the city, its gods and its people.
What comes next
The mission will continue. No dates for further seasons were given in the reports, and nothing has been said about public access to the dig. Visitors who want to see the site today can visit the open-air museum at Mit Rahina and its colossal statue of Ramesses II.
For readers in the Gulf who travel to Cairo, the news is a prompt to add the ancient capital to an itinerary. The Pyramids and the Grand Egyptian Museum remain the main draws, but a half day at Memphis offers a quieter picture of how a great city was built, lived in and rebuilt.
Sources: HeritageDaily, People’s Daily Online, Xinhua