Experts have discovered a major network of underground funerary chambers and arches near the original site of the ancient Axum obelisk in Ethiopia, Unesco said on Monday.
The discovery was made last week during a surveying mission in the East African country in preparation for the return of the final piece of the 1 700-year-old Axum obelisk from Italy, the agency said.
Teams from the Paris-based United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation found the chambers using high-technology imaging equipment.
”It is likely that some of the tombs identified through underground imaging are intact,” said Koichiro Matsuura, Unesco’s director general, in a statement.
The Axum site was classified as a Unesco World Heritage site in 1980. The obelisk — a symbol of African civilisation — was stolen in 1937 under orders from Italy’s fascist dictator Benito Mussolini.
The vast chambers, part of a royal necropolis predating the Christian era, are located underneath a parking lot built on the site in 1963, Unesco said.
Italian researchers are examining images and are working to create three-dimensional models of the royal tombs, the agency said. – Sapa-AP