Scientists uncover part of a boat believed to have belonged to ancient Pharaoh

(hate the title, by the way but that's what the news article says)

Egyptian and Japanese scientists and Egyptologists unearthed on Wednesday a piece of wood containing metal they believe was part of an ancient boat belonging to Pharaoh Kufu.

Egyptologists believe the metal parts, which have never been seen before in an ancient Egyptian boat, were used as a buffer to reduce damage to the oars during sailing.

The boat is one of two buried next to the Pharaoh Khufu in what appeared to be a religious custom to carry him in the afterlife.
Source

So... to straighten this out, this is the second of the two boats found in the boat pits in front of the Great Pyramid (inscriptions indicate that Khufu's son put them there for his father as part of the funerary material) and it's not a new boat that's been uncovered. The first one has been completely excavated and reconstructed, but they were still working on the second one when I visited last year. This is that second boat.

Iron was available in small quantities in ancient Egypt (including meteoric origin iron), along with hardened copper and a little bit of bronze (mostly from trade.) Metal was more common during the New Kingdom and later times.

That would have been cool to see the first one excavated and second on its way out.

Thanks for sharing.

Scary that one day people like ISIS might destroy all that.