Example of Pharaonic golden mask. This is the famous golden mask of Tutankhamon. Image by Steve Evans

(Astigan) — An archaeological team discovered several mummies with golden masks while working at Egypt’s Fayoum Oasis. The golden masks are accompanied by other discoveries of great historical importance.

The discoveries were made by a Russian archaeological team working in the Fayoum province, 80 km southwest of Cairo, since 2003. Investigations have focused in the past two years on the Deir Al-Banat necropolis which contains burial sites dating back to the Ancient, Roman and Christian periods of Egypt.

Alexei Krol, deputy chief of the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Egyptology center, said that “despite the fact that the site was badly robbed in the early Christian period, the Coptic era and in the 1960s-1970s, we are still managing to find mummies with golden masks.”

Example of Fuyoum portrait from the 2nd century AD.

The team also discovered a number of ‘Fayoum mummy portraits’ which can be dated to Roman Egypt. The Fayoum mummy portraits are remarkably life-like paintings of the deceased that were once bandaged in place over the face of the mummy. The portraits are usually finely made in encaustic paint on wood and sometimes on linen.

According to archaeologists, the discoveries suggest that pagans and Christians in Egypt may have lived together without major confrontations, thus challenging the existent theory based on early Christian literature that there was a constant conflict between them.

“They could live in the same city and pray to different gods,” Alexei Krol was quoted by the Russian news agency, RIA Novosti.

Russian archaeologists continue their work at the Deir Al-Banat necropolis and also conduct underwater research in ancient Alexandria.