Over the years, the Egyptian temples at Luxor city have been intensely investigated, but most of these studies just focused on the classical sides of the archaeological and historical descriptions. Many of the environmental problems are the inevitable results of the unplanned urban crawling around the monuments temples. This paper aims at assessing the environmental changes around some temples of Luxor City using remote sensing and GIS techniques. In particular, a historical database made up of Corona and Landsat TM data have been investigated along with the new acquisitions of Quickbird 2 and Sentinel 2. Results from our investigation highlighted rapid changes in urban and agricultural areas, which adversely affected the Egyptian monumental temples causing serious degradation phenomena. Using the information obtained from our RS&GIS based analysis, mitigation strategies have been also identified for supporting the preservation of the archaeological area.

The primary objective of this study is to leverage the integration of surface mapping data derived from optical, radar, and historic topographical studies with archaeological sampling to identify ancient settlement areas in the Northern Nile Delta, Egypt. This study employed the following methods: digitization of topographic maps, band indices techniques on optical data, the creation of a 3D model from SRTM data, and Sentinel-1 interferometric wide swath (IW) analysis. This type of study is particularly relevant to the search for evidence of otherwise hidden ancient settlements. Due to its geographical situation and the fertility of the Nile, Egypt witnessed the autochthonous development of predynastic and dynastic civilizations, as well as an extensive history of external influences due to Greek, Roman, Coptic, Islamic, and Colonial-era interventions. Excavation work at Buto (Tell el-Fara’in) in 2017–18, carried out by the Kafrelsheikh University (KFS) in cooperation with the Ministry of Antiquities, demonstrated that remote sensing data offers considerable promise as a tool for developing regional settlement studies and excavation strategies. This study integrates the mission work in Buto with the satellite imagery in and around the area of the excavation. The results of the initial Buto area research serve as a methodological model to expand the study area to the North Delta with the goal of detecting the extent of the ancient kingdoms of Buto and Sakha. The results of this research include the creation of a composite historical database using ancient references and early topographical maps (1722, 1941, 1950, and 1997), Optical Corona (1965), Landsat MSS (Multispectral Scanner System) (1973, 1978, and 1988), TM (Thematic Mapper) (2005) data, and Radar SRTM (2014) and Sentinel1 (2018 and 2019) data. The data in this study have been analyzed using the ArcMap, Envi, and SNAP software. The results from the current investigation highlight the rapid changes in the land use/land cover in the last century in which many ancient sites were lost due to agriculture and urban development. Three potential settlement areas have been identified with the Sentinel1 Radar data, and have been integrated with the early maps. These discoveries will help develop excavation strategies aimed at elucidating the ancient settlement dynamics and history of the region during the next phase of research.

Egyptian civilization has long flourished along the banks of the Nile, in the south (e.g. Luxor and Aswan), the Middle (e.g. Giza ‘Great Pyramids’) and North (e.g. San El‐Hagar and Buto), as well as the less populated areas of the Sinai Peninsula, the Western Desert and the Red Sea coast. There are archaeological sites date back to the Palaeolithic period and cover the Pre‐dynastic, Pharaonic, Hellenistic‐Roman, Coptic and Muslim periods. Across the Nile Delta, many of these archaeological sites have disappeared beneath Nile alluvium from the annual inundation or through intensive agricultural use, climate changes and other anthropogenic activities. This study aims to detect the long‐term changes in the landscape of the archaeological area of Burullus on the Mediterranean shoreline in the North Delta of Egypt. By combining data from historic topographic maps with Radar Sentinel‐1 (High‐resolution Level‐1 GRD) and SRTM data, topographic signatures in satellite imagery can be compared with the historic record of archaeological sites, many of which are now lost. Image layering, enhancement and analysis using ENVI 5.1, ArcMap 10.4.1 and Snap 8.0 software as well as Google Earth Pro facilitated the imagery identification and acquisition. The results of this study provide a means of quantifying the significant loss of cultural heritage sites due to anthropogenic and natural changes in the landscape. This analysis has also identified two—previously unknown—potential archaeological sites. Finally, the reconstruction of the paleolandscape of the study area shows the changing relationships of ancient and historic settlements with natural and man‐made waterways over time. Integrating remote sensing data and historic maps offers a method for evaluating paleolandscapes and locating disappeared archaeological sites that can be applied in other areas of Egypt and the world.

Abstract:Over the years, the Egyptian temples at Luxor city have been intensely investigated, but 18 most of these studies just focused on the classical sides of the archaeological and historical

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