Beni Mazar Attractions

Some 9mi/15km west of Beni Mazar, on the Bahr Yusuf, is Bahnasa, with the mound of rubble which marks the site of ancient Oxyrhynchus (Egyptian Permedjed, Coptic Pemje), once capital of a nome, where the Oxyrhynchus fish (Arabic mizda) was worshiped. Plutarch tells us that there was a war between Cynopolis and Oxyrhynchus, settled only after Roman intervention, because the people of each town had eaten the sacred animal of the other. After the introduction of Christianity Oxyrhynchus became a great monastic center, with 12 churches within the town and many monasteries and nunneries round it. In the fifth C. the diocese of Oxyrhynchus is said to have contained 10,000 monks and 12,000 nuns. In the Mameluke period the town was still a place of some consequence, but thereafter it declined. Excavations by Grenfell and Hunt from 1897 onwards yielded large quantities of Greek, Coptic and Arabic papyri. Remains of colonnades and a large theater of the Roman period were also brought to light. From Bahnasa there is a desert track to the Bahriya Oasis.