Archaeologists hunt for Cleopatra's tomb

By Will Rasmussen

ALEXANDRIA, Egypt (Reuters) - High on a hill overlooking the Mediterranean Sea, buried deep under the crumbling limestone of a temple to the goddess Isis, archaeologists believe the body of Queen Cleopatra may lie.

The tomb of the Egyptian queen has never been found but archaeologists are discovering more evidence that Cleopatra's priests carried her body to the temple after her suicide, where it could lie with her lover Marc Antony.

"This could be the most important discovery of the 21st century," Zahi Hawass, Egypt's chief archaeologist, told reporters on a tour of the temple on Sunday. "This is the perfect place for them to be hidden."

Archaeologists from Egypt and the Dominican Republic plan to start digging in search of Cleopatra's tomb as early as this year.

Researchers have found by radar what may be three chambers as deep as 20 meters under the rock. Historians believe, based on the Roman writer Plutarch, that Antony and Cleopatra were buried together.

Kathleen Martinez, a Dominican Republic scholar who pioneered the theory that Cleopatra could be buried in the temple thinks one of the chambers might contain the remains of the famous couple.

POSTERITY

If Martinez, 40, and her team, who have been working on the site for three years, find bodies beneath the rock, they will look for cartouches bearing the name of Cleopatra or a crown to indicate the identity of any mummy.