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Mission head Victor Ghica said “19 structures and a church carved into the bedrock” were discovered in 2020, according to the statement.

 

The church walls were decorated with “religious inscriptions” and biblical passages in Greek, revealing “the nature of monastic life in the region”, Ghica said.

 

It clearly showed that monks were present there since the fifth century AD, he added.

 

The remote site, located in the desert southwest of the capital Cairo, was occupied from the fourth to eighth centuries, with a likely peak of activity around the fifth and sixth centuries, according to the French Institute of Oriental Archaeology, in charge of the mission.