3,000-Year-Old Child Footprints Found at Site of Ancient Egyptian Palace

3,000-Year-Old Child Footprints Found at Site of Ancient Egyptian Palace

When we think about ancient Egyptian houses of worship, entombed pharaohs and the nobility – and perhaps the slaves who built the temples – often remember themselves as the main inhabitants of the buildings. But archeological finds from a recent excavation show that children have also been placed on foot in the buildings.

In a massive complex in Pi-Ramesse, 3000-year-old footprints belonging to an Egyptian child have been identified by archeologists from German Museum of Roemer-Pelizaeus. During King Ramses II’s reign. the city was the center of Egypt.

Mahmud Afifi, Head of the Department of Ancient Egyptian Antiquities, told Seeker, “[ the building is ] absolutely monumental .” It’s either a palace or temple

Archeologists found footprints while excavating the building. A thin layer of muddy mortar enclosed the prints at the bottom of a large mortar pit.

Henning Franzmeier, field director of the Qantir-Piramesse project, told Seeker: ‘ The footprint on children was [ 5.9–6.6 inches ], and therefore relate for children between 3-5 years old if one follows the flow charts for modern children.

“The differences in size are not big enough for us to clearly differentiate [if there was more than one child],” Franzmeier said. “And they are also not so well preserved that we could distinguish so far any other features of the feet.”