The Society’s mission to the Fourth Cataract was one of the first to heed the call first made in 1993 by the Director General of the National Corporation for Antiquities & Museums, Sudan to work in the region threatened by the construction of what was then known as the Hamdab Dam (Hakem 1993, 12).

In October 1999, the SARS team began its work in a concession 40km in length along the left bank of the Nile and on all the adjacent islands between Amri and Kirbekan, that is between the fortresses of Suweigi at Dar el-Arab upstream to Jebel Musa.

After several seasons in the field, often with multiple teams funded by the Society — with generous grants from the Institute for Bioarchaeology and the British Museum in particular, and with smaller contributions from the Packard Humanities Institute (PHI), the Institute of Archaeology UCL, the British Academy, the British Institute in Eastern Africa, the Egypt Exploration Society, Emory Museum in Atlanta and patrons of the Society — work came to a close in November 2007.

The dam was completed in 2008, and by the end of that year the reservoir was substantially full.

A detailed report on the first season’s work was published in Welsby, D. A., 2003, Survey above the Fourth Nile Cataract. For summaries of the SARS component of the project see Welsby 2006, 2008a, 2008b, 2010.

The PHI has graciously funded the post-excavation work connected with the excavations it financed on the island of Mis. Funds for the rest of the project are actively being sought, which will result in the eventual publication by the Society of all the results in a multi-volumed, multi-authored series of monographs.

The post-excavation and publication project is expected to take many years and it will be some time before the final reports are ready. In the meantime, the Society has decided to make available, as soon as they are completed, downloadable draft reports (see below). Much relevant research that is required to complete these reports is not included but some basic data can be consulted.