Chinchorro mummies are seen inside Azapa's San Miguel Museum in Arica city, north Santiago. PHOTO: REUTERS
"We found catacombs containing a number of mummies," said Salah al-Kholi, a Cairo University professor of Egyptology who headed the mission that made the discovery in the Touna el-Gabal district of the province in central Egypt.
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Burial shafts were found in the area and excavation work "revealed that these shafts led to a number of corridors inside a cachette of mummies", the ministry said.
It said in a statement that the cachette housed 17 non-royal mummies.
Antiquities Minister Khaled el-Enany told a news conference held near the archaeological site in the desert that the discovery was "the first human necropolis found in central Egypt with so many mummies".
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The discovery was "important, unprecedented, because it's the first human necropolis" to be found in the area, Mohamed Hamza, director of excavations for Cairo University.
The Touna el-Gabal site dates back to the Greco-Roman period between the third century BC and third century AD.
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