While watching a documentary (possibly Drain
the Oceans: Egypt’s Lost Wonders) present information about a string
of large ancient
Egyptian fortresses that were flooded by the creation of the Aswan
Dam, I couldn’t help but think “Ken
Hite and Robin Laws must have talked about this before, right?”.
Sadly, they had not. So, since I back their Patreon, I
sent them this question:
When the Aswan Dam was constructed, several ancient temples were relocated. One of these was moved from the massive fortress complex of Buhen, but the fortress itself, and the other important Middle Kingdom fortresses, were left to be flooded. What calamity was prevented by innundating these fortresses, and why would an intrepid band of divers need to break into them now?
Today, the Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff podcast posted Episode 594: Bishop of the Drowned Land, which directly answers this question (and generates the episode’s title). The segment starts at about the 20:30 mark.