The Mataha-Expedition Part I
The quest for the Labyrinth of Egypt
“Meet me at the bridge on the southern edge of the labyrinth,” Dr. Abbas said in a soft, enigmatic tone. The sort of voice one uses to suggest a covert exchange of secret intelligence, rather than a chat in the Egyptian desert.
Dr. Abbas-Mohamed Abbas-Ali1 was never one to shy away from mystery. His eyes always sparkled with a knowing glint, and his smile usually meant one thing: I was in for another wild ride, or—at the very least—something administratively problematic.
That morning, he had dressed my head in a kufiya turban2 and a large pair of golden-tinted sunglasses, so I could slip past the military checkpoints into the Fayoum. It was his clever way of avoiding the army escorts that often trailed travellers in their exploration of the oasis—greatly limiting one’s freedom of movement. This was not uncommon in the Fayoum. After all, the oasis had been flagged purple on the American embassy’s danger zone charts for decades. I wasn’t afraid of bearded Muslims. And I wasn’t a tourist—not on this trip.
As we passed the heavily armed checkpoint, I locked eyes with the watchful Egyptian soldier through the open car window. He examined us with quiet intensity—but saw what he expected to see. And I, cloaked in my desert disguise, felt as though I belonged to the place we were entering —like a local returning home. We drove deeper into the lush green oasis, its palm trees waving in the distance above rice fields and dense sugarcane groves. An ancient land that seemed to exist halfway between the past and present.
Once on the Hawara archaeological zone, I wandered slowly across the labyrinth's desert plain watching as the scientists moved with solemn grace. The team of geologists were already deep into their mysterious work—the scene felt more like performance art than archaeology. Some stood motionless in the sand, listening intently to the echoes rising from the depths beneath them—reflections sent back from the lost Labyrinth of Hawara. Scattered across the landscape like castaways from time, scientists stood solitary or in pairs, and sometimes moved in processions of three or more, carrying strange long instruments across the rocky terrain —modern tools for measuring what the eye could not see. A silent performance only accompanied by the ringing sound in the distance, of copper rods being struck by Dr Hani’s hammer. Each blow delivered with the precision of an acupuncturist inserting fine needles into the body of the past—beats unleashing clear golden chimes that danced on ripples of desert breeze.
It was here, at this very site, that the ancient world touched the edge of modern science. We were deploying advanced technologies for the first time at Hawara. Long after most people had given up on Herodotus’ giant underground temple as a hopeless myth. It was early March 2008— long before satellite archaeology became known, and decades after the invention of GPR, ERT, GEM, and VLF—Every acronym was present and humming—all were aimed at one goal: finding the truth beneath Hawara. The technology wasn’t new—but no one had used it here, ever before.
This was the Mataha Expedition3—an improbable collision of ancient mystery and 21st-century geophysics— which I had both organized and privately funded. Yet, under instruction, I was to avoid all contact with the scientific team and pretend to be a mere visitor—until the moment I would meet Dr. Abbas—quietly— on the bridge at the edge of the site. The moment of first contact; a close encounter of the third kind4.
I waited on the modest metal bridge spanning the Bahr Wahbi canal5, which cuts directly through the buried ruins of the labyrinth. The water flowed beneath me, silent and indifferent. This canal had been engineered in the early 1830s by Louis-Linant de Bellefonds6. Once a young French engineer in Napoleon Bonaparte’s circle. Bonaparte himself had visited Hawara with a retinue of savants and artists, searching—as we were—for the legendary subterranean complex described by Herodotus7, the Greek historian who first wrote of Egypt’s lost labyrinth. But the labyrinth had not revealed its secrets then. Nor had it for centuries. Until now.
Dr. Abbas approached with his usual calm, dressed like a weekend golfer in a white cap and a sporty jacket. A fitting appearance for the head geologist of the National Research Institute for Astronomy and Geophysics (NRIAG)8, which had been working diligently at Hawara for weeks. The past days, however, he and I had been stuck in Cairo—entangled in Egypt’s bureaucratic maze; signatures, stamps, permissions, and endless hours in government offices—always dressed formally to puff up respect and earn those crucial sweaty handshakes.
Weeks earlier, I had wired the project retainer from my Belgian bank—not to a SWIFT account, but to a simple street address. I remember my Belgian bank director asking in his office, "You are really sure you want to do this Louis?” I gave him a smile, thinking how unaware he was that it was for scanning what everyone for the last century had called an empty desert. The funds vanished into the ether, only to materialize weeks later to our great relief in a small, nondescript Cairo bank.
There, in person, I withdrew them—around 1 million Egyptian pounds (approximately $20,000 USD)—in withered banknotes. Walking through downtown Cairo with the money tucked inside my black leather briefcase, flanked by Dr. Abbas and a stand-in bodyguard, felt like something out of a cool pulpy movie—until we had to cross one of the busiest squares in downtown Cairo. A megacity —without traffic lights.
The surreal climax came when I personally placed the funds inside NRIAG’s on-site thick, burnished steel vault—something straight out of a Western. These were the funds I had raised painstakingly as an artist through the sale of my own Golden Sun Disks9, which I designed and crafted to finance this life mission: the quest for Egypt’s lost Labyrinth—a dream shared by the Egyptology enthusiasts, archaeologists, and the few hardcore Art buffs who supported it.
Dr. Abbas stepped into my field. We smiled—both aware of the theatricality of our roles. “Hello,” he said. “Marhaban, shukran10,” I replied. We chuckled at the absurdity of our situation. The secrecy wasn’t just for effect. Several Supreme Council of Antiquities11 field inspectors were present as part of the expedition, vigilantly watching for the smallest of infractions, ready to shut the mission down. No one not on the official team list could approach the working NRIAG scientists according to strict SCA regulations. The inspectors took their job seriously—to ensure no artifacts were pocketed, no unauthorized digging occurred. The ancient Hawara necropolis remained heavily guarded—still believed to contain a generous collection of unopened tombs, mummies, and haunting Fayoum portraits12 like those unearthed by Flinders Petrie in 1888, which had made the site world-famous as the cradle of modernist painting.13
That night would mark a turning point. It would be the first time Dr. Abbas would analyze the first datasets gathered by the NRIAG team since the scanning began at Hawara in mid-February.
All equipment—carefully packed in Peli cases and flight boxes—had been loaded into the pick-up truck and a minibus we had rented for the expedition. The ten-person science team was housed in two upper-floor apartments in the heart of Fayoum City—home to half a million Egyptians (give or take a few geese).
After a long day under the desert sun, the dust-covered scientists carried their heavy black cases up four flights of stairs. The top apartment was transformed from a resting space into a makeshift command center. The atmosphere felt electric—like I had joined a clandestine group preparing to execute a world-shattering act. Which, in hindsight, is exactly what it would become. After a shared meal of takeaway food, the table was cleared of plastic containers and repurposed as a data hub. Out came the military-grade laptops and sophisticated instruments—it truly felt like a high-level intelligence operation.
Dr. Abbas lost his usual lightness. I had never seen him so focused—his demeanor turned sharp and commanding. He began speaking in rapid Arabic, pacing, issuing instructions to his team with the intensity of a man defusing a bomb. I wisely stayed out of the way. Dr. Hani, the electro-resistivity specialist—whom I came to know as a soft-hearted man, handed me a strong cup of Nescafé. I stepped to the fragile window and opened it, letting the cool desert breeze sweep into the room.
Outside, the ancient night unfolded. Flying swallows’ fleeting songs were slowly overtaken by the green-illuminated minarets calling to Allah, eclipsing the twilight sky with a mystic tapestry of faith. Above, constellations turning overhead—the same stars that once guided the Giza pyramid builders. Below, donkey carts and mopeds wove through the glow of lightbulb streetlamps. Families in galabeyas14 walked home, unaware that history was stirring nearby.
I watched the stack of black instrument boxes in the corner—wondering what truths they now carried from the deep. What message had the ancients encoded so far below the surface? For us, they are the great antiquity. But once—we were their deep future.
Behind me, the voices were growing louder. Tense. Urgent. Then a silence sharper than sound.
“Louis!” The sudden call pierced the room.
I turned. Ten scientists looked at me, their faces brazen, eyes gleaming, like mischievous treasure hunters. They motioned for me to sit beside Dr. Abbas.
“Behold,” he said, pointing at the screen. “The first survey results.”
“There is something huge,” he whispered with restrained excitement. “Look here—a massive wall beside the pyramid, extending straight down over 17 meters deep, several meters thick. This is big, Louis. Really big. And there’s more. Everywhere15…All the instruments agree—walls, chambers,…structures—far deeper than Petrie’s recorded five-meter foundation level.”
He looked up, dead serious.
“You’ve found the Labyrinth. It’s still here.”
His words echoed in my mind weeks later, as I flew home—leaving Egypt behind. From the plane window, the Sinai desert stretched below, vast and empty.
I barely recognized the man in the window’s reflection— sun-darkened, my beard grown thick, something shed behind me in the sand. In Cairo, people had mistaken me for a local. Perhaps, in a way, I had become one—no longer just an outsider, but part of Egypt’s story—woven into its mystery, carried by its wind. The story of Hawara.
The labyrinth wasn’t just a myth anymore. It had a voice. And it had started to speak.
—Louis De Cordier
Càdiar, Spain, 21 July 2025
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Dr. Abbas-Mohamed Abbas-Ali, geophysicist at Egypt’s National Research Institute of Astronomy and Geophysics (NRIAG), played a pivotal role in the 2008 Mataha Expedition at the Hawara necropolis. As a leading researcher, he contributed to geophysical surveys using ground-penetrating radar and electrical resistivity to map the subterranean structures of the 12th Dynasty pyramid of Amenemhat III and its Labyrinth complex. His expertise helped identify an extensive network of chambers beneath the site, challenging prior assumptions about its destruction. Despite rising groundwater from the nearby Bahr Wahbi canal threatening the site, Abbas’s work, under the supervision of the Supreme Council of Antiquities led by Zahi Hawass, provided critical data for future preservation efforts.
The kufiya, a traditional Middle Eastern headdress, is a checkered scarf, typically black and white or red and white, worn across the Arab world. Its association with the Palestinian movement emerged prominently in the 1930s during the Arab Revolt against British colonial rule, when it symbolized resistance and unity. In the 1960s, figures like Yasser Arafat popularized the black-and-white kufiya as an emblem of Palestinian nationalism and solidarity with the struggle for self-determination. Today, it remains a powerful symbol of Palestinian identity and resistance, often worn globally to express support for the Palestinian cause. #FreePalestine 🍉 🤲🏼
The Mataha Expedition
The Mataha Expedition was a groundbreaking 2008 geo-archaeological survey conducted at Hawara, Egypt, the site believed to house the legendary Egyptian Labyrinth—a colossal structure described by Herodotus, Strabo, and Pliny as surpassing even the pyramids in grandeur. The mission aimed to resolve an enduring mystery:
A “third kind alien encounter”, as defined in the context of UFOlogy and popularized by Dr. J. Allen Hynek's classification system, refers to an encounter with extraterrestrial beings themselves, rather than just their spacecraft or other phenomena. This concept comes from Hynek's 1972 book, The UFO Experience: A Scientific Inquiry, where he categorized close encounters with extraterrestrial phenomena into three types. The third kind specifically involves direct observation or interaction with animate beings presumed to be extraterrestrial in origin.
The Bahr Wahbi canal, excavated between 1830 and 1835 under the supervision of French engineer Linant de Bellefonds during the rule of Mohammed Ali, is an irrigation channel in Egypt’s Faiyum region, designed to divert water from the Bahr Yussef to the northeastern Faiyum. Running near the Hawara pyramid, approximately 90 km south of Cairo, the canal cuts through the southeastern corner of the ancient Labyrinth complex, a vast mortuary temple adjacent to the 12th Dynasty pyramid of Amenemhat III. Likely intentionally directed toward the pyramid due to Linant’s archaeological interests, the canal’s construction disturbed the site, unearthing artifacts but also contributing to groundwater infiltration that has submerged the pyramid’s passages and chambers since the late 19th century. This has eroded the mudbrick structures and limestone blocks of the Labyrinth, complicating conservation efforts and limiting excavations at this historically significant site.
Louis-Maurice-Adolphe Linant de Bellefonds (1798–1883) was a French explorer, engineer, and later a key figure in Egyptian public works. At the age of 15, he joined Napoleon’s expedition to Egypt in 1798 as part of the Commission des Sciences et des Arts, a group of scientists, engineers, and scholars tasked with studying and documenting Egypt’s geography, culture, and resources. Linant was a young assistant, likely involved in cartographic or exploratory tasks, given his later expertise in surveying. His participation is noted in historical accounts of the expedition, which produced the seminal Description de l’Égypte and included the discovery of the Rosetta Stone.
Herodotus, a 5th-century BCE Greek historian, documented the Hawara necropolis in his work Histories (Book II), describing its Labyrinth, a vast mortuary temple linked to the 12th Dynasty pyramid of Amenemhat III, as a marvel surpassing the pyramids. He claimed it contained 3,000 chambers across two levels, an account that inspired later explorations, including the 2008 Mataha Expedition, which confirmed an extensive underground complex at Hawara, despite environmental damage from the nearby Bahr Wahbi canal.
The National Research Institute of Astronomy and Geophysics (NRIAG), based in Helwan, Egypt, since 1903, is the oldest research institute in North Africa, founded in 1839 as a royal observatory in Bulaq. Dedicated to astronomy and geophysics, NRIAG played a central role in the 2008 Mataha Expedition at Hawara, led by Belgian artist Louis de Cordier. Employing advanced geophysical techniques, including ground-penetrating radar and electrical resistivity, NRIAG researchers, such as Dr. Abbas-Mohamed Abbas-Ali, mapped a vast underground grid of walls and chambers beneath the Hawara necropolis, confirming the presence of the legendary Labyrinth described by Herodotus. Conducted with permission from the Supreme Council of Antiquities under Zahi Hawass, the expedition’s findings, released in August 2008, faced restrictions on public disclosure due to national security concerns.
The Golden Sun Disks, created by Belgian artist Louis de Cordier in 2008, are 30 cm diameter, 8 mm thick artifacts encoding trigonometric and astronomical data, designed as timeless expressions of art and science. Limited to 26 original copies, their sale through the Cosco Foundation (formerly Mataha Foundation) provided significant funding for the 2008 Mataha Expedition at Hawara, Egypt. This geo-archaeological survey, led by de Cordier in collaboration with the National Research Institute of Astronomy and Geophysics (NRIAG) and Ghent University, confirmed the presence of a vast underground Labyrinth complex, aligning with ancient descriptions by Herodotus. For more info > GoldenSunDisk.PPTX
“Marhaban, shukran” [مرحباً، شكر ] , meaning "Hello, thank you” in Arabic.
The Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA), established in 1858 as the Antiquities Service, was Egypt’s governing body responsible for the preservation, excavation, and management of the nation’s archaeological heritage, including sites like the Giza Pyramids and Luxor’s temples. From 2002, to 2011, the Egyptologist Zahi Hawass served as its Secretary General. In 2011, following Egypt’s revolution, the SCA was restructured into the Ministry of Antiquities (MoA), with Hawass briefly appointed as its first Minister of State for Antiquities in 2011 during the turbulence of the Arab spring. The MoA, later renamed the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities, continues to oversee Egypt’s cultural heritage.
The Fayoum mummy portraits are a type of naturalistic painted portrait on wooden boards attached to upper class mummies from Roman Egypt. They belong to the tradition of panel painting, one of the most highly regarded forms of art in the Classical world. The Fayoum portraits are the only large body of art from that tradition to have survived. They were formerly, and incorrectly, called Coptic portraits. Mummy portraits have been found across Egypt, but are most common in the Fayoum Basin, particularly from Hawara and the Hadrianic Roman city Antinoopolis. "Fayoum portraits" is generally used as a stylistic, rather than a geographic, description. While painted cartonnage mummy cases date back to pharaonic times, the Fayoum mummy portraits were an innovation dating to the time of Roman rule in Egypt. The portraits date to the Imperial Roman era, from the late 1st century BC or the early 1st century AD onwards.
The Oldest Modernist Paintings. From the Smithsonian Magazine article
The galabeya is a long, loose-fitting robe that reaches the ankles, typically made of cotton or linen for breathability. The garment’s simple cut—straight, with long sleeves—allows freedom of movement, ideal for a bodyguard striding through Egyptian cities.
Unveiling the Lost Labyrinth
The Mataha-Expedition, conducted in 2008 at Hawara, Egypt, has unveiled a groundbreaking revelation about the legendary "Lost Labyrinth" of Egypt, challenging long-held assumptions from early explorers. Contrary to the belief that this colossal temple, celebrated by ancient authors such as Herodotus and Strabo as a vast stone library of the ancient wor…
Your compelling, sensitive, and poetic account transported me there, to that place, for a brief moment. Travel literature of the highest caliber. And I'm not even mentioning the actual events that took place or the discovery you made.
Brilliant story!!