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Also connected to the town of Berenike are two forts and two settlements
near and mountains to the west of the site. Both forts are located in Wadi
Kalalat, eight kilometers to the northeast. The smaller fort simply met
the needs of a normal fort, but the larger fort contained a large cistern
with a diameter of 32 meters which is thought to have been the main water
supply for Berenike. The settlement at Shenshef, roughly 15 kilometers
south of Wadi Kalalat, consists of about 150 clean, well-built houses and
a hill fort. It has salty, but drinkable water readily accessible. Almost
all visitors to the site have been particularly impressed-the surveyors
of the current expedition lauded the quality of construction and layout
of the houses. Murray felt that Shenshef was well-protected to store precious
goods from Berenike, and that it would have been a good place to reside
between September and January for officials and merchants needing to write
reports and make up accounts. Perhaps a bit more enigmatic is the settlement
at Hitan Rayan, which I had the chance to visit (see Figure 3). The structural
remains are stone walls about two feet high that define the outlines of
the various buildings. These buildings would have probably been completed
by erecting tent structures on the tops of the walls. Several burial cairns
and graves are located on and near the site. The function of Hitan Rayan
is not known, though I heard one opinion that it might have been a local
copy of the Shenshef site. Both forts and both settlements have been linked
to Berenike through pottery evidence.
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