Nothing in modern discovery has more vividly and suddenly brought the
ancient world home to the world of to-day than the finding of the
actual bodies, the very flesh and blood of the Pharaohs marvellously
preserved to us by the embalmer’s venerable art. The discovery has
bridged the chasm between the Ancient and the New as a midnight flash
of lightning from the clouds to the earth.
As so often happens, what had foiled the eager search of the patient
scholar, had not eluded the cupidity of the thief. The appearance of
royal mummies and priceless manuscripts on the open market filled the
explorers with both chagrin and zeal. M. Maspero tells of the various
wiles by which influential politicians of the Orient concealed their
rich treasure-sources, and of the almost endless difficulties overcome
by the European explorers before the thieves could be first deprived of
their influence with the authorities, and then of their discoveries.
These latter the scholars wished to examine and study where found, and
then distribute them among museums for the benefit of other scholars
and for public enlightenment. The real discoverers, the Arabs, were
after loot alone, and mingled ruthlessness, lies, misrepresentations,
and all manner of duplicity with their thrift. It is not here fitting
to tell the story of the fight between scholarship and commerce; but
the account of the revelation of the treasure-chamber itself is as
appropriate as it is thrilling.[a]
[Illustration: MUMMY AND INNER CASE]
On Wednesday, the 6th of July, 1879, Messrs. Emil Brugsch and Ahmad
Effendi Kamal were conducted by Muhammed Ahmed Abd-er-Rassul to the
entrance of the funeral vault itself.
The Egyptian engineer who long ago hollowed out the secret chamber had
made his arrangements in the most ingenious fashion. Never was secret
chamber better disguised. The chain of hills which at the spot divides
the Biban-el-Moluk from the Theban plain, forms, between the Assassif
and the Valley of the Queens, a series of natural amphitheatres, of
which the best known was, up to the present, that on which stands
the monument of Deir-el-Bahari. In the wall of rocks which separates
Deir-el-Bahari from the succeeding amphitheatres, just behind the knoll
of Sheikh Abd-el-Gurnah, about two hundred feet above the level of the
cultivated lands, a pit was dug forty feet in depth by six in breadth.
At the bottom of the pit, in the western side, was cut the entrance
of a corridor four and a half feet wide by nearly three in height.
After running a length of about twenty-five feet, it turns abruptly to
the north, and extends to a distance of two hundred feet, not always
keeping to the same dimensions; in certain parts it is about six and a
half feet wide, in others little more than four. Near the centre five
or six roughly hewn steps indicate a sensible change in the level,
and on the right hand a sort of unfinished niche shows that there had
been an idea of once more changing the direction of the gallery. The
latter at last emerges into a kind of irregular, oblong chamber, about
twenty-five feet in length.
The first object which struck the eye of Herr Brugsch, when he reached
the bottom of the pit, was a white and yellow coffin, with the name of
Nesi-Khonsu. It was in the corridor, about two feet from the entrance;
a little further was a coffin whose form recalled the style of the
XVIIth Dynasty; then Queen TiuHathor Hont-tui, then Seti I. Alongside
the coffins and strewing the ground, were boxes of funeral statuettes,
canopic vases,[7] bronze libation vases, and right at the back, in the
angle formed by the corridor as it turns north, the funeral canopy of
Queen Isiem-kheb, folded and crumpled like a worthless object which
some priest in a hurry to get away had thrown carelessly in a corner.
All along the great corridor was the same confusion and disorder; it
was necessary to crawl along without knowing where hands and knees were
being placed.
[Illustration: MUMMY IN ITS WRAPPINGS]
The coffins and mummies, hastily scanned by the light of a candle,
bore historic names--Amenhotep I, Tehutimes II, in the niche near
the staircase, Aahmes I, and his son Se-Amen, Seqenen-Ra, Queens
Aah-hotep, Aahmes, Nefert-ari, and others. In the chamber at the end,
the confusion was at its height, but the predominance of the style
proper to the XXth Dynasty was recognised at a glance. The report of
Muhammed Ahmad Abd-er-Rassul, which had at first appeared exaggerated,
was scarcely more than the attenuated expression of the truth: where I
had expected to come on one or two obscure, petty kings, the Arabs had
unearthed a whole hypogee of Pharaohs.
And what Pharaohs! perhaps the most illustrious in the history of
Egypt--Tehutimes III and Seti I, Aahmes the liberator and Ramses II the
conqueror!
Two hours sufficed for this first examination, and then the work of
removal began. Three hundred Arabs were speedily collected by the
efforts of the mudir’s people, and set about the work. The museum’s
boat, hastily summoned, had not yet arrived; but reis Muhammed, one
of the pilots on whom reliance could be placed, was on the spot.
He descended to the bottom of the pit and undertook to extract its
contents. Messrs. Brugsch and Ahmad Effendi Kamal received the objects
as they were brought above ground, carried them to the foot of the
hill, and ranged them side by side without relaxing their vigilance
for a moment. Forty-eight hours of energetic labour sufficed to exhume
everything; but the task was only half finished.
The convoy had to be conducted across the plain of Thebes and beyond
the river as far as Luxor; several of the coffins, raised with great
difficulty by twelve or sixteen men, took seven or eight hours to go
from the mountain to the bank, and it will be easily imagined what this
journey must have been like in the dust and heat of July.
At last, on the evening of the 11th, mummies and coffins were all
at Luxor, duly enveloped in mats and canvases. Three days after,
the museum’s steamer arrived; it only remained to load it, and it
immediately started again for Bulaq with its freight of kings.
Then a singular thing happened, for from Luxor to Kuft, along either
bank of the Nile, the fellah women followed the boat with dishevelled
hair and uttering loud cries, and the men fired rifle-shots as they do
at funerals.
HOW CAME THESE MONARCHS HERE?
And now a question arises. The greater number of the kings and princes
of the XVIIIth and XIXth Dynasties, had each his tomb, which exists
to-day or whose site we learn from ancient documents; Amenhotep I at
Drah-abu’l-Neggah, Seti I and Ramses II at the Biban-el-Moluk, and
others elsewhere. How is it that their corpses were hidden away between
Deir-el-Bahari and Sheikh Abd-el-Gurnah, huddled together with the
corpses of the high priests of Amen? The Egyptians themselves have
taken pains to furnish us with the materials for the answer. Several
of the mummies or coffins which we possess, bear, written in ink by
the hand of contemporary scribes, the date, the circumstances, and
sometimes the reason of the transfer. These are veritable official
reports, whose testimony on the subject is unimpeachable.
The three mummies of the XIXth Dynasty had a common fate. The coffins
of Seti I and Ramses II bear three inscriptions, which are identical,
or nearly so, and which date from three different periods: what is left
of the coffin of Ramses II bears the remains of a hieratic text[8]
analogous to the second inscription of the text of Seti I.
The two most ancient of these inscriptions mention Her-Hor. The first
is conceived in these terms: “The year VI, of the 2nd month of Shaït
the VII, the day of the expedition made by Her-Hor the … of the first
Prophet of Amen Ra, king of the gods, to restore the funeral pomp of
King Men-maat-Ra L. H. S. [life, health, strength] Son of the Sun, Seti
Meneptah, through the inspector,” a name which is not very legible, as
is also the case with those of his companions. The inscription which
had been placed on the coffin of Ramses II has been rubbed out, and
then written over. As it now reads, it suffices to show that it, like
the preceding, was of the year VI and of the 2nd month of the season
of Shaït, the VII; that the expedition had been undertaken by order of
Her-Hor, and that its object was to ascertain the condition of the body
of Ramses II. This interpretation of the date does not fail, however,
to involve some difficulties. The name of Her-Hor is not surrounded
with the cartouche; and we may, if we choose, conclude from this fact
that the mention of the year VI refers to the reign of the Ramesside
whom Her-Hor succeeded on the throne. On the other hand, the comparison
of this inscription with the following ones appears to me to prove
that the date, year VI, should probably be placed to the count of the
priest-king.
Indeed, no hesitation is possible in regard to the second inscription.
It presents itself under two forms, of which one is found only on the
coffin of Seti I, whilst the other is afforded us by the two coffins of
Ramses I and Ramses II. The inscription of Seti I is conceived in these
terms: “In the year XVI, of the 4th month of the season Pirt, the VII,
under King Se-Amen, the day of the exhuming of the King Men-maat-Ra
Seti Meri-en-Ptah L. H. S., from his tomb to bring him into the tomb of
the lady An … of the great dwelling, by the prophet of Amen-Ra, king
of the gods, the third prophet of Khonsumois Neferhotep, chief scribe
of the monument of the temple of Amen-Ra, king of the gods, servant of
the temple of Ramses II in the temple of Amen, Nesipkhashuti, son of
Beken-Khonsu. The superior of the funeral hall had said in the presence
(of the king) what was the condition (of the mummies) and that they had
suffered no damage in being taken from the tomb where they were, and
transported to the tomb of the lady An … of the great dwelling where
King Amenhotep rests in peace.”
The inscription of Ramses II differs from the preceding only in the
opening words: “In the year XVI, of the 4th month of Pirt, the VII, the
day of the exhuming of King User-maat-Ra-sotep-en-Ra, the great god
of the tomb of King Men-maat-Ra, Seti Miptah.” The rest is similar in
every point to the text of Seti I.
The inscription of Ramses I is much mutilated; but what has been
preserved permits us to restore a formula at the commencement, which is
intermediary between the formula of Seti I and that of Ramses II. “(The
year XVI, of the 4th month of Pirt, the VII, under) King Se-Amen, (day
of) the exhuming of (the King Men-pehtet-Ra L. H. S.) from the (tomb of
King Men-maat-Ra) Seti Miptah (to bring it into this tomb) of the lady
An … of the (great) dwelling (where the King Amen) hotep (rests) in
peace, etc.”
The three bodies, carried at different periods to Seti’s hypogee, were
taken thence all three in one day. This identity in time explains why,
in the second part of each inscription, the scribe has always made use
of the plural number to express the condition of the mummy: he placed
on each of the coffins the formula which applied to all three.
The other coffins of the XVIIIth and XIXth Dynasties bear no
inscriptions, but I have no doubt that at about the same time they were
the object of frequent visits. One certain fact seems to me to result
from the reports: by the close of the XXth Dynasty the bodies of Seti
I, Ramses I, Ramses II, and Tehutimes I were no longer in their own
tombs, and not yet in the hidden chamber where they were discovered:
they were carried from place to place and their funerary appointments
restored at fairly short intervals. What was the motive for so often
taking the trouble to verify this condition?
The documents which have come down to us from the last kings of the
XXth Dynasty give us some idea of an epoch of decadence. Egypt,
exhausted by six centuries of conquest, no longer possessed the
strength necessary to retain her dominion over the provinces in Syria,
and was losing with them the best part of her revenue. The great towns
of the Delta--Memphis, Tanis, Saïs--standing on the natural highway
of Asiatic commerce, did not suffer greatly from this political
diminution of the country; but Thebes, which was situated in the
interior, at a distance from the great commercial routes, and had owed
the prosperity she enjoyed to conquest alone, grew poorer and rapidly
declined. Constructive works were for the most part suspended for want
of supplies; and the labouring population, ill-paid from the royal
treasure, began to feel the pangs of hunger. Hence proceeded strikes
and daily disorders, which the overseers of the workshops recorded in
their note-books; and then pillage and theft.
[Illustration: QUEEN NUBKHAS]
Bands were organised, in which civil employees, officers, workmen, even
women, figure indiscriminately, and these set to work to exploit the
necropolis. They forced the doors of the tombs, that they might carry
off the objects of value, the jewels, furniture, and gorgeous arms
which the piety of relatives had deposited with the corpses.
Soon, not content with attacking private individuals, they ventured
to lay their hands upon the kings. The government of Ramses made vain
attempts to stop their depredations. An inquiry, opened in the XVIth
year of Ramses IX, informs us that the king’s commissioners found one
royal tomb violated for every ten that they were authorised to visit.
It is curious that one of the hypogees examined belonged to a prince
whose mummy we found in the secret chamber of Deir-el-Bahari, namely
Amenhotep I; it was still intact.
The report of the opening of the tomb of Sebekhotep [VI] tells us in
what the booty of the thieves consisted: “We opened the coffins of the
king and his wife, Queen Nubkhas, as well as the funeral caskets in
which they lay. We found the august mummy of the king, and beside it
his sword, as well as a considerable number of talismans, and ornaments
of gold about his neck. The head was covered with gold, and gold was
scattered all over the mummy: the coffins were plated with gold and
silver within and without, and incrusted with all kinds of stones. We
took the gold which we found on the mummy, as well as the talisman and
the ornaments of the neck and the gold of the coffins. We likewise took
all we could find on the royal spouse, then we burned their funeral
caskets and we robbed them of their furniture, which consisted of vases
of gold or silver and of bronze, and we divided them among us in eight
portions.” One might fancy he was reading the description of that mummy
of Queen Aah-hop, whose jewels now form an ornament of the museum at
Bulaq.
Let us now examine the condition of the coffins and mummies found at
Deir-el-Bahari. Seqenen-Ra, Aahmes and his son Se-Amen, Nefert-ari,
and Aah-hotep are certainly in their original coffins, as is proved by
the style and the absence of inscriptions indicating a restoration.
Amenhotep I and Tehutimes II appear to have retained only the covers
of their original coffins; the case is of wood, very roughly shaped,
and in order to introduce the mummy of Tehutimes II, it has been
found necessary to reduce the thickness of the sides at the level of
the shoulders. The inscriptions assert that the wrappings have been
renewed: this may have been as much because they were worn out in the
natural course of things as because of the violence of human hands, and
the restoration does not in itself prove that the mummy has suffered by
thieves. But do not the two false mummies of Princess Meshent-themhu
and the Princess Set-Amen furnish us with proof of a violation
analogous to that to which King Sebekhotep and his wife Nubkhas were
subjected?
The robbers, after breaking open Sebekhotep’s coffin, had dispersed
the bones of the king, and the tomb was empty. Something similar must
certainly have occurred in the case of the Princess Meshent-themhu.
The coffin was broken open, and the inscription which it bore, inlaid
with blue enamel, partly disappeared; for it was necessary, as I have
shown above, to restore it roughly in ink. As for the bones, they had
disappeared: probably the thieves, fearing they might be disturbed in
their sacrilegious work, made haste to carry off the mummy with them;
then abandoned it, once it had been despoiled, in some place where no
one thought of looking for it. On the other hand, religion did not
allow that the disembodied soul could enjoy a full existence in the
other world if the body it had owned during its earthly life should
completely disappear.
In default of the real body, the commissioners charged to inspect and
restore the tombs adopted the plan of manufacturing the semblances
of bodies for Seti and Meshent-themhu. A fragment of broken coffin
simulated the bust of Meshent-themhu, a bundle of rags the head,
another bundle of rags the feet, and the whole, duly encased in
wrappings, was deposited in the coffin, which was more or less
carefully restored. Was the soul satisfied at recognising the
counterfeit body?
For my part I am very glad to have discovered, thanks to that pious
fraud, the principal, if not the only, reason for the collection of so
many royal mummies in one place.
It was to save the dead Pharaohs from thieves that it was decided to
hide them away. It was hoped that a pit, thirty-eight yards deep,
followed by a narrow corridor of two hundred and fifty feet, would
protect them from profanation; and experience has proved that the
reckoning was not so far out, since centuries rolled away from the
day that they were deposited there, before that on which the Arabs of
Sheikh Abd-el-Gurnah discovered the hiding-place.
Some Egyptologists will, at first sight, be amazed at the rude
character of this supposed tomb, and will object that it is a far
cry from a chamber without ornament and roughly hollowed out of the
rock, to the magnificent hypogees of Biban-el-Moluk. I answer that the
difference between the tombs is not greater than the difference between
the kings. Amenhotep III, Ramses II, even Ramses V and Her-Hor, reigned
over all Egypt, over Ethiopia, over at least a part of Syria, and had
command of the men and money needful to hew out and decorate immense
syringes.[9]
Painet´-em II and the people of his family possessed only the poorest
region of Egypt and Nubia: it was as much as they could do to secure
their mummies the same burial as that of the wealthier men of their
time. No more special monuments for each of the dead, but one common
vault for all; no more immense sarcophagi in hard stone, but mere
coffins in polished wood, sometimes stolen from earlier kings or
private persons. There is nothing which more clearly marks the
decadence of Thebes than this increasing poverty of the last Theban
kings.[b]
[Illustration: FEMALE HEAD-DRESS, ANCIENT EGYPT]
FOOTNOTES
[7] [Vases with tops of human forms or divinities, used to hold the
entrails of embalmed bodies.]
[8] [Hieratic writing is a modified form of hieroglyphics.]
[9] [Syringes (plural of syrinx) are narrow and deep rock
tunnel-tombs.]