This volume provides an overview of the excavations at the site of Marsa Matruh on Bates' Island, located in a lagoon on the coast of the north of Egypt's western desert. It reveals the Late Bronze Age and historical period occupations, and provides an introduction to the environmental morphology and history of the island.

The excavations of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology on Bates's Island at Marsa Matruh, on the seacoast at the north of Egypt's western desert, uncovered a small site with a metalworking workshop and nearby houses. The pottery indicates that this small Late Bronze Age settlement had links to several cultures: Cyprus, the Aegean, Egypt, the coast of western Asia, and the local Marmarican people. The volumes publish the architecture, the local and imported pottery, the crucibles and other evidence for metalworking, the ostrich egg shells and other faunal remains, and the other discoveries made at the site.