| The Survey of Egypt 1:100,000 map of 1916 shows a mound in this location under the name of Tell Amd. No archaeological site is marked on the Egyptian Survey Authority 1:50,000 map of 1996, but the rising contours of the mound are shown. From their disposition, it is evident that about half the mound on the east side has been levelled to agriculture recently. During a visit in November 2001 by Jeffrey & Patricia Spencer, local villagers gave the name as Tell Iswid. It is an extensive mound with gradually sloping sides which rise to a height of about 8 metres above the cultivation. A steel survey-marker is set into the highest point. The highest part of the mound is surrounded by a wide area at a low level, bordered by fields on the north and west, and by a road on the south. The field boundaries are straight and appear to have encroached on the site. All the surface is dark brown and powdery with no sign of built features. Some pieces of fired bricks and ceramic slag litter the surface. A few sherds noted were of Late Roman date, but few were visble in the powdery surface. A couple of robbers' pits in the high areas had thrown up a quantity of fired bricks. Very little stone was present: only a decayed block of limestone at the south and a piece of red granite on the slope of the high central area. | Photograph
taken Nov. 2001 © Patricia Spencer
View of the mound from the south. The dusty brown surface is free of vegetation and has only a limited scatter of sherds and fired brick fragments |
