Sunken city gives up its treasure: Ancient Egyptian metropolis lost for 1,200 years below Mediterranean sea set to go on display

An ancient Egyptian city swallowed by the sea more than 1,200 years ago has started to reveal its secrets.

Items including 16ft sculptures, gold coins and giant tablets are among some of the objects recovered from the ancient port city which lies 20 miles northeast of Alexandria in the Mediterranean, The Daily Mail reports.

For hundreds of years it was believed to be a legend, but the city of Heracleion, also called Thonis, was found during a survey of the Egyptian shore at the beginning of the last decade.

Now, an international team of marine archaeologists is preparing to show some of the objects found in the underwater city.
The city was mentioned by the Greek historian Herodotus, who told of Helen of Troy visiting Heracleion with her lover Paris before the Trojan war.

No evidence of the city was found until 2000 when French researcher Franck Goddio discovered it with a team from the European Institute for Underwater Archaeology.

The paper has said weights from Athens have also been discovered at the site, confirming beliefs the city was once an important trading port.

Elsbeth van der Wilt, a University of Oxford archaeologist working at the site, told the paper the port was an important hub in the network for long-distance trade in the Eastern Mediterranean.

She said: 'Excavations in the harbour basins yielded an interesting group of lead weights, likely to have been used by both temple officials and merchants in the payment of taxes and the purchasing of goods.

'Amongst these are an important group of Athenian weights. They are a significant archaeological find because it is the first time that weights like these have been identified during excavations in Egypt.'

While scientists are still unsure why the city suddenly disappeared, one theory suggests a rise in sea level and unstable collapsing sediment combined to submerge the city.

Dr Damian Robinson, director of the Oxford Centre for Maritime Archaeology at the University of Oxford, who worked on the excavation, told The Telegraph: 'It is a major city we are excavating.

'The site has amazing preservation. We are now starting to look at some of the more interesting areas within it to try to understand life there.'