Egyptian Archaeology 47

No. 47 Autumn 2015

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EGYPTIAN ARCHAEOLOGY

T he B ulletin of T he E gypt E xploration S ociety

The Egypt Exploration Society

Publications of the Egypt Exploration Society

Since its founding in 1882 the Egypt Exploration Society’s mission has been to explore ancient Egyptian sites and monuments, to create a lasting record of the remains, to generate enthusiasm for, and increase knowledge and understanding of, Egypt’s past and to raise awareness of the importance of protecting its heritage. Today the Society supports archaeological research projects throughout Egypt. We rely almost entirely on the support of our members and the wider public to fund our work and run an extensive programme of educational events in Egypt, the UK and beyond to convey the results to our audience.

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Geoffrey T. Martin: Tutankhamun’s Regent: Scenes and Texts from the Memphite Tomb of Horemheb

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A revised edition of the 1989 landmark volume, The Memphite Tomb of Horemheb, Commander-inChief of Tutankhamun (EES Excavation Memoir 55), with changes made to take account of new finds and scholarly articles.

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EGYPTIAN ARCHAEOLOGY Bulletin of the Egypt Exploration Society www.ees.ac.uk The opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the aims or concerns of the Egypt Exploration Society Editor Jan Geisbusch Editorial Advisers Aidan Dodson John J Johnston Caitlin McCall Chris Naunton Luigi Prada Alice Stevenson John Taylor Advertising Sales Egypt Exploration Society 3 Doughty Mews London WC1N 2PG Phone: +44 (0)20 7242 1880 Fax: +44 (0)20 7404 6118 E-mail: jan.geisbusch@ees.ac.uk Distribution Phone: +44 (0)20 7242 2268 E-mail: orders@ees.ac.uk Website: www.ees-shop.co.uk

Published twice a year by The Egypt Exploration Society 3 Doughty Mews, London WC1N 2PG Registered Charity, No. 212384 A Limited Company registered in England, No. 25816 Original design by Jeremy Pemberton Set in InDesign CS6 by Jan Geisbusch Printed by Page Bros Ltd, Mile Cross Lane, Norwich, Norfolk NR6 6SA Š The Egypt Exploration Society and the contributors. No part of this publication may be reproduced without prior permission of the publishers.

ISSN 0962 2837

Temple of Millions of Years of Amenhotep II (Luxor): a dummy canopic jar and clay ushabtis covered with a blue wash, found in chamber A. See Digging Diary, p. 31. (Photo:Tommaso Quirino, 2015)

Number 47

Autumn 2015

Editorial

EA 47 opens with an exciting discovery in Akhmim, about 130 km north-west of Luxor, made when local Antiquities Inspectors followed a tip-off and came across a Ptolemaic/Roman chapel of the god Atum. Thrilling as it is, the find also underscores the continuing threat to Egypt’s heritage posed by illegal digging. Along with looting, risk factors include urban sprawl and land cultivation, such as at Heliopolis, where Dietrich Raue describes the continuing rescue work at the remains of the sun-temple.

The articles by Wojciech Ejsmond and Roland Enmarch showcase the potential of digital technologies, including geographic information systems (GIS) and reflectance transformation imaging (RTI) in archaeological practice, both on the large scale - revealing landscape features - and the small, detecting previously invisible traces of rock inscriptions.

Our packed Digging Diary indicates how much fieldwork in Egypt has bounced back since late 2013/early 2014 when security concerns and travel restrictions halted much archaeological activity. The EES is currently involved in no fewer than 18 projects, two of which are included in this issue: Eva Lange and Tobias Ullmann report on their work at Bubastis, while Joanne Rowland summarises the results of the latest season at Merimde.

Jan Geisbusch

EES Patrons for whose generous support the Society is very grateful: Barbara Begelsbacher, Eric Bohm, Raymond Bowker,Andrew Cousins, Paul Cove, Martin R. Davies, Philip Feakin, Christopher Gorman-Evans, Richard A. Grant,Annie Haward, Michael Jesudason, Paul Lynn, Anne and Fraser Mathews,Wayne Miele, Anandh Indran Owen, Mark Ponman, Keith Raffan, Lyn Stagg, John Wall, and John Wyatt.

If you would like to become an EES Patron, please contact Carl Graves: carl.graves@ees.ac.uk.

Cover illustration: Heliopolis, Area 221, basalt blocks of Nectanebo I (Photo: Dietrich Raue). See p.13.

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Contents A new doorway for Atum in Akhmim

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Gamal Abdel Nasser, Stefan Baumann and Christian Leitz

Signs in stone: archaeological research at Gebelein

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Wojciech Ejsmond

Writing in the ‘Mansion of Gold’: texts from the Hatnub quarries

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Roland Enmarch

The Thirtieth Dynasty in the temple of Heliopolis

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Aiman Ashmawy, Max Beiersdorf and Dietrich Raue

Goddess on the water: research on the sacred landscape of Bubastis

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Eva Lange and Tobias Ullmann

Gifts for the gods: investigating votive animal mummies

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Stephanie Atherton-Woolham, Lidija McKnight and Campbell Price

Tanis: rains and ruins

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Ahmed Nakshara

Middle Kingdom tombs underneath the Temple of Millions of Years

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Myriam Seco Álvarez and Javier Martínez Babón

Digging Diary 2014-15

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Prehistoric groups along the western Nile Delta

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Joanne Rowland

Designed to impress: uncovering the courtyard of Theban Tomb 149

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Boyo Ockinga

Small is beautiful: the gold coffinette G.6 from KV63

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Earl L. Ertman and Otto J. Schaden

Bookshelf

46

View of the upper terrace of the Temple of Millions of Years of Thutmosis III, see p. 27-30. (Photo:Thutmosis III Temple Project) 2

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A new doorway for Atum in Akhmim Gamal Abdel Nasser, Stefan Baumann and Christian Leitz report on an important chance find when the Akhmim Inspectorate was tipped off about illegal digging acivity in the city.

In February 2015 the local Inspectorate received news of an illegal excavation in the ancient city of Akhmim.

Just 50 m southwest of the Inspectorate the owner of a small house had dug a shaft below his house, about 5 m deep. By mere chance he hit on a quite well preserved limestone chapel of the god Atum from the late Ptolemaic or early Roman Period. After the owner fled the house, the Inspectorate immediately stopped the illegal activities, and took measures to secure and conserve this exceptional monument.

The wide descending shaft ends at floor level directly in front of the door to the chapel. From this point a narrow tunnel was dug horizontally through the entrance. Beyond the door a second side tunnel turns right following a wall built of fired mud bricks. Due to Above: the house under which the chapel was discovered. Below: door of the chapel seen from the shaft. (Photos: Stefan Baumann)

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the small size of the robber trenches we can so far only get a small glimpse into the structure of the building now lying underground. Judging by what is visible today, only the door frame was constructed from limestone.

Most of it is still in place, except for the lintel, which was removed already in antiquity after the abandonment of the building. The door is not very large, measuring approximately 1.9 m in height and 0.6 m wide. However, the attached brick wall shows quite a considerable thickness of 1.2 m. It stretches to the the north-west and after 1.8 m leads to a mud-brick wall proceeding at a right angle, indicating the northern limit of one room.

The whole structure is oriented north-east to southwest, thus its axis runs parallel to the nearby Ramesside gateway with the famous statue of Meritamun.

There are four ritual scenes on each side of the outer door jamb, showing the king before the different deities of Akhmim. The layout of the inscriptions, including the cartouches and the text columns (which were supposed to contain the names, epithets and speeches of the deities) were carved, but never filled in with actual text.

Although the identification of the represented deities is in some cases clear (e.g. Min), in other cases a careful examination of the iconography is required. A major source of similar scenes is the Great Temple of Athribis, decorated under Ptolemy XII Auletes (c. 80-58 and 55-51 bc) and the early Roman emperors. On the right side of the entrance to the chapel, there is a scene of a king presenting offerings to the god Atum, who wears the Atef crown. Atum is described as ‘the [serpent god] who is running through the mounds, the agathodaimon, the Lord of Egypt who gives life to the living’.

The god is quite often depicted as a serpent but this special epithet of the god was hitherto unknown and might refer to the sacred snake of Akhmim. He is a

Above: main offering scene in the doorway, the king with the god Atum wearing the Atef crown.

Below left: the king offering to Min and Aperetset.

Below right: the king offering to Atum in the form of a falcon-headed snake.

(Photos: Stefan Baumann)

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primeval god who is described in the inscription over the scene as follows: ‘The King of Upper and Lower Egypt, the father of the gods, who came into being by himself, whose birth does not exist, who opened heaven and earth when he appeared, to whom the gods are coming to give [him] praise.’

Atum is depicted as a snake four times on this monument, in one of these reliefs as a snake with the head of a falcon. The inscription on the right jamb of the doorway describes him again as a primeval being who existed before all other creatures: ‘This god: He came into being at the first moment, when the earth was still in the primeval waters, when the sky did not yet exist, when the earth did not yet exist, when the firmament was not yet tied together. He created the sky goddess, he engendered the gods, he [...] all products of the sky, the earth, and the netherworld.

He comes to see what he has created, coming to everybody in his circuit. He protects his beloved son Horus-senedjem-ib, the Great God, who is in the middle of Akhmim, while he is resting on his throne eternally.’

About Atum in Akhmim nothing is known so far, but he is depicted as a serpent rearing up on its tail in the temple of Athribis, about 15 km southwest of Akhmim on the other side of the Nile. He is named there ‘Atum in the Nun’, i.e. primeval waters, a statement quite similar to that on the newly discovered chapel in Akhmim.

Another and quite unusual aspect of Atum is mentioned at the left outer door jamb of this chapel. Here, he is acting as protector of Isis and Nephthys, when they are rushing through the mounds while searching for

Left: representation of Atum from the temple of Athribis.

Above: depiction of Atum as a snake on one of Akhmim chapel’s door jambs.

(Photos: Stefan Baumann) 5

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their brother Osiris who is supposed to be somewhere in Akhmim, and Atum is defending him against Seth and his allies. A similar description can be found at the left inner door jamb at the exit of the chapel: Atum is together with Isis in the foreign lands and referred to as the living ba of Osiris in the Haou-nebout, i.e. the Greek Islands. This is, as far as the authors know, a unique and rather surprising statement, its mythological background still to be elucidated.

It is to be hoped that this chapel can be rescued from its present place which is unsafe for a number of reasons, but demolishing the house above the chapel and excavating down to a depth of 5 m is quite a difficult task in the ancient city of Akhmim. It would also be quite astonishing if this chapel stood completely isolated and would not be a part of a larger archaeological context, pointing to the potential of further excavation work in the future.

 Gamal Abdel Nasser is the General Director of the Inspectorate at Sohag. Stefan Baumann is a PhD student at the University of Tübingen, working on the project ‘The Temple as a Canon of Religious Literature in Ancient Egypt’ at the Heidelberg Academy of Sciences. Christian Leitz is Professor of Egyptology at the University of Tübingen. The authors wish to thank Mohsen Lamaay, Abdellah Abu-Gabal, and Samir Ahmed Abdellatif.

Top right: upper part of a door jamb.

Above and above right (detail): inscriptions with paint residues.

(Photos: Stefan Baumann) 6

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Signs in stone: archaeological research at Gebelein The first season of research revealed previously unknown graffiti and tombs as well as the urgent need to undertake salvage missions at Gebelein, Wojciech Ejsmond writes.

Recently, new research has been initiated by a team from the University of Warsaw at the archaeological complex of Gebelein. Virtually all periods of Egyptian history have left their traces here and it is representative of almost every kind of archaeological sites found in the Nile valley. Gebelein played an important role in the history of ancient Egypt. In the Predynastic Period, people of very high social status – probably rulers of a

local proto-state – were buried in its necropolis, perhaps suggesting a capital situated here. In later periods, an important administrative and trade centre was also located at Gebelein, inhabited by Egyptians, Nubians and Greeks.

The research area includes two rocky outcrops – the most prominent elements of the local landscape, which gave it its ancient Egyptian name, Inerty (‘Two Rocks’),

Concentration of graffiti in the southern part of the western mound. (Photo:Wojciech Ejsmond)

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as well as its modern Arabic one (Gebelein - ‘Two Mountains/Hills’). The recent growth of settlements and the expansion of agriculture now pose a significant threat to the remaining antiquities.

Our project began with a brief field reconnaissance in April 2013, followed by a second phase in winter 2014, when the initial epigraphic and archaeological surveys commenced at the most endangered area of Gebelein.

Epigraphic Survey The team discovered two concentrations of graffiti: the first one is located next to a small grotto close to the remains of the Hathor temple, on top of the eastern mound. One inscription mentions ‘Hathor, Lady of Inerty’, along with some personal names. The second concentration, much larger and older, is situated in the southern part of the western mound, opposite the Hathor temple. The graffiti are predynastic as well as pharaonic, showing, for example, depictions of gazelles, giraffes, dogs, humans and gods. Among the most significant results of our survey was the discovery of a rock inscription with cartouches of Ramesses IV, dated to his first regnal year and recently published by Dawid F. Wieczorek.

A number of objects were documented by Piotr Witkowski using Reflectance Transformation Imaging.

As these objects were sitting in almost perpetual shadow and their state of preservation is poor, this technique proved to be very useful in detecting graffiti.

third, bigger niche – located opposite the entrance – shows traces of sculptural decoration that was cut in the western wall, though this is now almost completely destroyed. Below the niche there is a badly preserved shelf, cut in the rock. Only in the western part of the speos some sunk reliefs have survived. They represent the goddess Hathor, ‘Lady of Inerty’, with an offering table in front of her.

All discoveries were documented in the database and their positions measured with the use of mobile GIS, including also the bulldozed section mentioned earlier.

As an analysis of the archives and contemporary satellite imagery (Landstat, Corona and high-resolution infrared images) revealed, most of the sites are severly endangered by the rapid growth of settlements and the development of agricultural infrastructure.

We hope to document all archaeological objects at Gebelein in the coming seasons. The strategic location of Gebelein – at the crossroads of water and land routes – made the area a significant centre of trade and administration as well as an important stronghold south of Thebes, whose role and significance in Egyptian history deserves further studies.

Archaeological Survey We located a largely destroyed cemetery between the mounds. In 1996, an Italian mission had discovered a large saff tomb here. Recently, the eastern part of its courtyard was cut away by a bulldozer, and a 300-metre section made by the machine revealed the walls of yet another saff tomb – as well as other tombs – consisting largely of simple pits dated to the Eleventh/Twelfth Dynasties.

Several simple rock-cut tombs have been discovered in the south-eastern part of the eastern mound, comprising three major elements: an outer, rectangular courtyard; an inner, square room (once supported by pillars); and a descending passage with a corridor linking the latter to a rectangular burial chamber. At least two of the discovered tombs have collapsed, while those remaining lie open and easily accessible. Unfortunately, no decorations, either inside or out, have been preserved.

It would seem that they have been completely obliterated by the Nile inundations at the time of their highest water levels.

A few hundred meters north of these tombs we located a small speos, its entrance c.3 m above current ground level. The speos consists of a broad vestibule (c. 6 by 3 m) and a narrow cell (c. 3 by 6 m) with two small niches, one in the northern, the other in the southern wall. A

 Wojciech Ejsmond is a PhD student of archaeology at the University of Warsaw and director of the Gebelein Archaeological Project, which he conducts in association with Julia M. Chyla, MA, Piotr Witkowski (freelancer) and Dawid F. Wieczorek, MA (Polish Academy of Science). They would like to thank the Polish Centre of Mediterranean Archaeology, Cairo branch, and its director, Dr Zbigniew E. Szafrański, for the support in establishing the project.

The research was financed by the University of Warsaw Foundation and Consultative Council for Students Scientific Movement of the University of Warsaw.The publication was made possible thanks to the financial support of the Foundation for Polish Science.

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Reflectance Transformation Imaging The popularisation of digital photography and computers has led to the development of new types of documentation, as well as the emergence of new ways of data collecting. One such new method is Reflectance Transformation Imaging (RTI). It creates an interactive image from a set of photos taken with a stationary camera. Each photo is different from the other only by the direction of illumination. A special software then mathematically recreates the surface of the scene from the recorded variations of light and shadow. When opened in ‘RTIViewer’, we are able to manipulate the lighting of the scene, helping to reveal characteristics of the examined object that might be poorly visible or even invisible to the naked eye.

Using this method at Gebelein led to the discovery of an image of the god Min. It also allowed us to detect new elements of prehistoric graffiti, normally invisible due to their poor state of preservation and untraceable by more traditional forms of documentation.

Simple digital photos combined with specialised software also allow us to generate new information.

At Gebelein, one software programme used in image processing is the ‘Decorrelation Stretch’ (see also Roland Enmarch’s article on the next page), which reinforces the colour differences between pixels. The use of this software on selected photographs taken during the last season led to the discovery of new, previously unseen, hieroglyphic inscription.

Piotr Witkowski

Mobile GIS and satellite imagery analysis in field survey During our reconnaissance at Gebelein we used mobile Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) tools with geographic information system (GIS) applications to document positions and detailed information of the discovered features. We used Trimble Juno, MobileMapper 20 and ArcPad-ArcGIS applications, which allowed us to create a database of the features found in the field. Additionally, we combined the positions of the features with further information, such as its state of conservation (endangered, destroyed) or the kind of material it contained (if any). We also connected these data with photographs of the archaeological remains.

Before approaching the field, we used GIS to analyse archival maps and contemporary satellite imagery.

Comparing Pierre Jacotin’s map, created during the Napoleonic expedition to Egypt (1798-1801), with Corona, Landstat and Google satellite images from 1969, 1974 and 2013 respectively, the agricultural spread became apparent. Agricultural growth has already partly destroyed one of the palaeolithic sites, while one of the ancient cemetries has been bulldozed. The use of infrared satellite images also allowed us to spot several vegetation marks in the area. We have used mobile GIS to verify those features during the field survey, and we hope to continue this work in the coming seasons.

Julia Chyla

Opposite page: Dawid F.Wieczorek documenting a graffito of Ramesses IV. Top left: face of Hathor – detail of the decoration of the speos.

Above right: Julia Chyla and Cezary Baka documenting a tomb.

(Photos:Wojciech Ejsmond) 9

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Writing in the ‘Mansion of Gold’: texts from the Hatnub quarries The Hatnub Epigraphic Survey is recording the surviving inscriptions at the alabaster quarries of Hatnub, in the Eastern Desert. Roland Enmarch reports on its work and on some of the discoveries that have been made.

The milky-white banded stone known as Egyptian alabaster (also called calcite and travertine) is one of the most distinctive Egyptian stones. Its best known ancient source is a region of the Eastern Desert approximately 16 km south-east of the site of the city of Amarna. The Ancient Egyptians called this area the ‘Mansion of Gold’ (hut-nebu or Hatnub), and even today the region contains rich traces of ancient activity, most notably in the form of a well-preserved road connecting the quarries to the Nile valley, and extensive traces of huts and occupation debris (see Ian Shaw’s book, Hatnub).

As with other quarries and mines outside the Nile Valley, the ancient expeditions to Hatnub commemorated their visits with inscriptions and tableaux. Since the site’s discovery in 1891, these texts have featured regularly in discussions of Old and Middle Kingdom history, but no detailed survey of them had been made since the one by Georg Möller in 1907, the results of which were published by Rudolf Anthes in 1928. Moreover, the texts were published there in facsimile form, without photographs.

Since 2012, the Hatnub Epigraphic Survey has set out to photographically document the Hatnub inscriptions in full and to republish them. Our work has so far focused on one particular part of the Hatnub landscape, Quarry P, which contains the overwhelming majority of previously known inscriptions from the site. Quarry P today takes the form of a 20 m deep open-cast oval approximately 70 by 50 m (it may have been partially subterranean in antiquity), with a descending entry way leading down into it from the north-west. Both sides of the entry way are decorated with numerous sunken rectangular panels that contain royal name tableaux and/or expedition inscriptions. Within the main oval pit of the quarry, there are several further clusters of texts and images.

The earliest dated inscriptions at the site are from the reign of Khufu. There are also numerous texts datable to the Sixth Dynasty, and then a large number of texts

from the later First Intermediate Period or early Middle Kingdom, most notably the graffiti mentioning the nomarchs (local governors) of the Hare nome, such as Ahanakht I and Neheri I. Inscriptions in Quarry P tail off after the early Middle Kingdom, presumably because the alabaster deposit had been mostly worked out, though there is one lone Eighteenth Dynasty inscription inserted among the older texts.

General view of descending entry way into Hatnub Quarry P. 10

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Natural light (left) and digitally enhanced (right) image of Anthes’ Graffito 14.

Digitally enhanced image: detail of lengthy unpublished red-paint hieroglyphic text of Neferkare Pepi II, giving the king’s name and the name of the Hatnub quarry.

In terms of content, the inscriptions in the quarry are varied. Some, as mentioned, include tableaux giving royal names and other royal insignia, as well as lists of participants in the expeditions. Quite a few texts give narrative details of the progress and accomplishment of the expeditions, including (for example) numbers of pieces of stone quarried. A few, much discussed, texts left in the name of the nomarchs apparently make allusion to unsettled political conditions in Egypt. Many of the texts also have a somewhat funerary commemorative flavour: they emphasise the good moral qualities of the senior expedition members (or sometimes those of the people who sent them out to the quarry). Rather as in a tomb inscription, these inscriptions address the reader directly, and appeal to them to ‘raise the hand’ (respectfully, in offering or invocation) to the person commemorated, in return for which a safe return home from the quarry will

be guaranteed. Many of these texts cluster very densely around one 7 m wide area of wall in the south-west of the quarry: one has the impression that the quarrymen are engaged in a dialogue over several generations with their forebears and successors, all coming to the quarry united by a common purpose, and all seeking to be remembered after their death. The funerary overtones are perhaps made even more explicit in this area of the wall by the addition of two carved eyes in the centre, reminiscent of the eyes found on coffins and false doors.

Many of the Hatnub texts are executed in red pigment, applied directly to the minimally treated rock surface of the walls of the quarry. The fading of the red, and the patination and unevenness of the background rock, make reading these texts difficult. However, digital technology 11

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has come to our aid in enhancing the colours of the texts, in the form of the ‘DStretch’ software developed

by Jon Harman as a plug-in for the ‘ImageJ’ programme.

With the aid of this programme, we have been able not only to identify further unpublished sections of some of the long-known texts, but also to find and read many previously unknown or illegible texts. Indeed, in total from Quarry P we have so far identified some 84 ‘new’ images and texts, some of which are quite lengthy.

The discoveries allow us to re-assess the balance and nature of ancient commemoration activities in the quarry. Previous surveys prioritised the recording of lengthy texts, and often merely mention in passing surviving images that have no text traces to accompany them. A very large number of anepigraphic images of ‘little men’, in fact, survive in several places in the quarry, and fully documenting these memorials will perhaps enable us to assess more fully different levels of commemoration accessible to different expedition members.

The new finds also call into question the previous classif ication of the texts in Quarry P. The 1928 publication divides them into ‘inscriptions’ (carved/ incised, largely in hieroglyphic script) and ‘graffiti’ (painted/written in red pigment, largely in hieratic script). However, we have now found numerous examples of ‘new’ texts which do not fit into this schema: for example, a new painted hieroglyphic royal text, a new incised hieratic text, and a couple of carved, red-painted hieratic texts. It has also become clear that many of the poorly preserved sunken rectangular panels on both walls of the descending entry way were not originally carved, but were instead inscribed in red pigment only.

The new texts do not radically adjust the time frame for activity at Quarry P (although, on the north-west wall of the quarry, one newly discovered brief text mentioning an official named Zebi is placed a few metres above the late Old Kingdom texts, and judging from its palaeography it may conceivably pre-date Khufu, 26th century bc). However, our understanding of the intensity of exploitation at different points in the lifetime of the quarry has been improved. For example, the long reign of Pepi II (23rd century bc)was only previously attested by three dated texts (plus perhaps another three undated ones), but we have now identified another five inscriptions containing that king’s name.

Much work remains to be done at Hatnub. Quarry P is encumbered with large amounts of rubble, much of which has fallen back into it from the surrounding ancient spoil heaps. It is possible that further texts and images remain to be discovered under the rubble, and we hope to test this hypothesis on a small scale in future seasons. The ‘Mansion of Gold’ almost certainly has much more information to yield about the men who came there, and how they inserted themselves into its industrial landscape.

Natural light (above) and digitally enhanced (below) image of a detail of Anthes’ Graffito 17.

 Roland Enmarch is Senior Lecturer in Egyptology at the University of Liverpool. He is co-director of the Hatnub Epigraphic Survey along with Yannis Gourdon (IFAO).They would like to thank the MSA and its members for their help and support. The survey is funded with the generous assistance of the British Academy, IFAO, and the Fondation Michela Schiff Giorgini All photographs © R. Enmarch.

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The Thirtieth Dynasty in the temple of Heliopolis Aiman Ashmawy, Max Beiersdorf and Dietrich Raue report on the spring season at Heliopolis, focusing on the enclosure walls of what was, in pharaonic times, one of the largest temple precincts in existence.

The sun-temple of Heliopolis was the largest single temenos ever built in pharaonic Egypt. It was a place of pilgrimage from antiquity right up until the medieval era.

Yet, there is little evidence of individual sanctuaries within the vast precinct of the main temenos at Matariya. Except for a structure of about 400 m in diameter, called the ‘fort bank of the Hyksos Period’ by its excavator W.M.F. Petrie, only few structures were observed and mapped in situ. These include the obelisk of Senusret I and the huge sphinxes at the western entrance of the temenos, as well as its enclosure walls.

It showed that the holes originally reached just about 1-1.3 m into the masonry. In contrast to, for example, the temple enclosure of Karnak, no pieces of wood were found in any of these holes. In Heliopolis, they can be interpreted as visible remains of scaffolding used to finish the outer shape of the wall. The vertical distance between the holes (about 1.8 m) would have provided enough space for the workers. The horizontal distance is about four ‘headers’, approximately 87 cm, easily bridged by simple planks that might have served as work platforms.

The last hole at the end of the concave segment does

Main temenos of Matariya with excavation sites of spring 2015.

(Image: Google Earth/ Pieter J. Collet)

The southern undulating mud brick wall of Heliopolis was reinvestigated in spring 2015. It can be dated stratigraphically by pottery finds to the 4th century bc. It measures up to 17 m at the base, the segments of convex and concave brick layers measure alternately 20 m and 13 m respectively at the base. In order to explain the significance of the superimposed rows of holes in the outer façade, a section was dug in transverse direction.

not extend perpendicular to the outer wall, but at an angle of about 45 degrees. The investigation showed an absence of any binding agent in the internal brickwork.

Only the segment transition and the outer façade of the wall were strengthened by the use of mortar. For the structural stability of the wall and its construction sequence, this fact is of utmost importance: a common temenos wall built in horizontal layers of unbaked mud 13

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Right: southern enclosure of the main temenos of Matariya, outer wall of the 4th century bc. (Drawing: Max Beiersdorf) Below: outer wall of the 4th century bc, concave segment. (Photo: Dietrich Raue)

bricks without the use of mortar would threaten to collapse. However, building without mortar had an enormous time advantage. So, in order to compensate for the weakened masonry, the builders had to come up with a solution. By dividing the enclosure wall into regular segments, they were able to raise the first units at the same time. Those first segments were raised with mud bricks laid in a rising curve. In this way, the dead load of the segments impacted on the centre, giving it a strong structural advantage.

In summary, the following preliminary hypothesis for the construction process can be proposed: as a first step the construction area was divided into regular

sections, corresponding to concave and convex segments. The construction of the wall began with the concave segments (Type 1, see the drawing above). In the transverse direction the bricks are laid in a slightly convex curve. This generates the effect of a shell and has a positive structural impact. Once the concave segment has been raised up a couple of layers, the construction of the adjacent convex segments (Type 2) started. In this way, a wall about 17 m thick and probably up to 20 m high was raised step by step without the need for cranes, winches or external ramps. Effectively, the wall, while under construction, served as its own ramp and eventually comprised an area of c. 1150 by 950 m.

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Excavation work focused on the dating and stratigraphy of the ‘fort bank’ in the centre of the temenos: the eastern and western sections of this structure were encountered in spring 2015. The evidence from pottery found alongside this huge embankment of probably up to 40 m in width points to the first half of the Eighteenth Dynasty. This might fit a historical inscription of the 47th regnal year of Thutmosis III (15th century bc) that commemorates the construction of a wall, but it may also be mentioned in texts of the early New Kingdom. The same dating was obtained at the eastern section close to Midan Misalla. In addition, both areas testified to mixed masonry that was only in parts built of mud brick. Layers of sharp and angular fragments of silicified sandstone also point to stone dressing activities, most likely connected with the erection of a major piece of sacral monumental architecture. The enormous volume of the embankment was partly achieved by levelling surrounding areas: in the case of the eastern section it seems certain that sand, buildings and objects from the necropolis of the third and early second millennium were removed. The top of the eastern section was pierced by pits with pottery of the 4th century bc.

Except for a small number of objects, only little evidence for further building activity of the Thirtieth Dynasty is extant so far. The reinvestigation of the western section in the centre of the Misraa es-Segun, now almost entirely covered by garbage dumps, changed the state of research fundamentally. The wide prominent position on top of the embankment was chosen by Nectanebo I as the location of a temple of ‘Atum, Lord of Heliopolis’. Just

50 cm beneath the water table, the excavation encountered a pile of basalt slabs. They would once have formed part of a geographical procession of Hapi figures that represented probably the nomes of Egypt in their entirety. The blocks that were recovered in a small section of about 8 by 4 m represent the scenes for the nomes of Herakleopolis (20th of Upper Egypt), Medum and Semenu-Hor (21st UE) and Aphroditopolis/ Atfih (22nd UE). This section is therefore the end of the Upper Egyptian sequence. The texts present a most welcome amendment to the scarce first-hand evidence for Late Period sacral architecture in Lower Egypt.

While these texts are considerably longer than those of the New Kingdom and the Third Intermediate Period, they are quite different from the textual evidence of the geographic processions with various fixed parameters for the nome descriptions that are well attested from the Ptolemaic Period. The Upper Egyptian sequence is followed by a résumé of the construction activity of Nectanebo and by another figure, accompanied by text columns that were left blank. All reliefs were brought to the Matariya Open Air Museum at the obelisk of Sesostris I. While limestone blocks from the temple were reused during the Byzantine and Islamic Periods, the basalt blocks remained in place as they were not a favoured building material after the Roman era. Nevertheless, a good number of fragments with remains of relief, suggesting ritual wall scenes and decorated columns, were discovered in the debris under the basalt blocks.

Objects of other periods were also found in this limited area of investigation. Among the most interesting finds

Area 231, western section of the ‘fort bank’. (Photo: Dietrich Raue)

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reliefs of Nectanebo. It can be attributed to an undated sphinx of about double life-size. Such statues may have been rearranged within the sanctuaries of the later first millennium bc.

The forthcoming season will be mainly devoted to the excavation of the neighbouring squares. Current support by various institutions, foundations and donors, such as the American Research Center in Egypt, will offer one of the final chances to gain first-hand information of a sanctuary from the heart of the sun cult at Heliopolis.

Above: alabaster vessel of Merenre, Sixth Dynasty, found in Area 221.

(Photo: Dietrich Raue) Right: the 20th Upper Egyptian nome in the geographical procession at the temple of Nectanebo I for ‘Atum Lord of Heliopolis’.

(Photo: Pieter J. Collet)

 Aiman Ashmawy is Director General of the Excavation Department in the Ministry of State for Antiquities (MSA). Max Beiersdorf is a PhD candidate at the Brandenburg University of Technology Cottbus-Senftenberg. Dietrich Raue is Custodian of the Egyptian Museum-Georg Steindorff of the University of Leipzig. The mission is grateful for the ongoing support of the German Archaeological Institute in Cairo, the Institute of Geography of the University of Gent, the research training group ‘Kulturelle und technische Werte historischer Bauten’ at the BTU Cottbus-Senftenberg, the Polish Institute for Archaeology and Ethnology at the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw, the Austrian Archaeological Institute in Cairo, the project OrTempSol (Labex-Archimede, AAP 2, 2014, Axe 2 Pouvoirs: Espaces de pouvoirs et constructions territoriales, supported by the IFAO).The mission is funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG). Thanks for further financial support is owed to the American Research Center in Egypt, the Fondation Schiff Giorgini, the Bertold Leibinger Foundation, the Gerda Henkel Foundation and private donors. Parallel to the current excavation work, training courses for archaeological and epigraphical methods and techniques for members of the Inspectorate of Antiquities/Matariya were funded by the German Embassy in Cairo.To HE the Minister for Antiquities Prof Dr Mamdouh Eldamaty and the authorities of the MSA, the Inspectorate of Matariya and the staff of the storerooms at Tell el-Hisn we would like to express our sincere thanks for their kind support and cooperation.

is a fragment of a large, vat-like alabaster vessel carrying the titles of king Merenre of the Sixth Dynasty. Fifteen metres to the east of the basalt slabs, a torso of a royal statue was found. It shows a king with long ceremonial beard and nemes headdress, depicted at one-and-a-half times life-size, kneeling on one knee.

Such statues frequently offer the name of the king in the context of coronation and in connection with the rites at the sacred ished tree; other examples seem to appear in the context of the confirmation on the occasion of jubilee feasts. In addition, wall reliefs providing examples of statues offering ointments or god’s barques are attested. This torso is the largest example of such a statue, attested since the earlier Eighteenth Dynasty, found so far. It carries the cartouche of Merenptah, but since that king frequently usurped statues of his predecessors this can only be taken as a terminus ante quem. Another large fragment of red granite was found close to the 16

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Goddess on the water: the sacred landscape of Bubastis Combining archaeological evidence with written records, Eva Lange and Tobias Ullmann, working at Tell Basta (Bubastis), show how geophysical methods can be used to reconstruct the sacred canals once surrounding the famous temple of the cat goddess.

The famous temple of Bastet at Bubastis was described in the fifth century bc by the Greek historian Herodotus in quite some detail. He especially mentioned two canals about 30 m wide, sourcing from the Pelusiac Nile branch and surrounding the temple in a way that gave the ancient observer the impression the whole building was set ‘on an island’. The reliability of Herodotus’ descriptions of ancient Egypt is controversial and there may be no overall agreement on how much of his writings is based on fact and how much on fiction. In the case of Bubastis, new archaeological and geophysical research shows that his accounts of the town have to be considered as corresponding closely to the ancient reality.

Descriptions of the temple of Bastet enclosed by two canals, the sacred ‘Isheru’, can be found in the older Egyptian tradition as well, which tells how the statue of Bastet would travel on the sacred canals surrounding her temple in a kind of cultic drama based on a local myth: the triumph of the goddess as a daughter of Osiris in a battle against Seth, who had stolen the eye of Horus.

This myth, interweaving real landscape features with a mythological narrative in a typical Egyptian way, can be found in a compendium of local traditions of the Nile Delta in papyrus Brooklyn 47.218.84. While this manuscript dates back to the reign of Psamtek I in the second half of the seventh century bc, it is very probable

Stela from the cat cemetery at Bubastis / Tell Basta, discovered by Ahmed el-Sawi in 1970.

(Photo: Ahmed el-Sawi) 17

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Above: map of Tell Basta (2015). Below: possible traces of the canal south of the temple of Bastet revealed by magnetometer in 2008. (Images: Tell Basta Project) Opposite page: theoretical course of the Pelusiac Nile branch near the city of Bubastis (after M. Bietak, 1975).

that the myth itself is considerably older.

‘And she was rowed within the Oryx-Antelope on the Isheru in the very moment as she rescued the Udjat Eye from him; as Seth created his appearance, stealing the Udjat Eye in Mehet. He came to Bubastis, carrying the things he swallowed, but Horit (i.e. Bastet) rescued the Udjat Eye of her father.’

In an amazing and very rare transfer, we can see the mythical text become image on a stela of the Late Dynastic Period, discovered by Ahmed el-Sawi in the cat cemeteries at Bubastis, depicting Bastet enthroned on her sacred barque at the moment of her victorious return. The head of an oryx antelope, believed by the Egyptians to be a creature of the god Seth, forms the stern of the boat and in this way the defeated enemy itself.

The waters of the sacred Isheru of Bubastis are clearly indicated under the barque by zigzag lines Another paragraph in this compendium from the Brooklyn papyrus gives a more detailed description of the statue of the goddess and the appearance of her temple, showing very intriguing parallels to Herodotus’ words: ‘It is a statue of a woman with the face of a lioness. She is kneeling, with her lower legs beneath her. She sits on the dais of the slaughtering of enemies. A falcon protects her, two hippopotami surround her, and a replica of the lake completely encloses her, measuring 7 ... by 2 ...’

A later text but also very likely composed of older sources appears on the eastern walls of the enclosure of the temple of Edfu. Here, inscriptions accompanying a depiction of Bastet give her epithet as ‘Bastet, the

Temple of Bastet

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‘Save for the entrance, it stands on an island; two separate channels approach it from the Nile, and after coming up to the entry of the temple, one of them runs round it – each of them a hundred feet wide – and the other is shadowed by trees.’

Following the description of Herodotus, there must have been an area close to the entrance of the temple district where the canals converged, without actually meeting. Based on the location of the assumed canal facies and the location of the temple district, we can hypothetically reconstruct a turn in the course of the canals here. The 2015 survey therefore focused on the identification of this ancient course. First hints of the possible location of the eastern part of the canal were found close to the entrance of the temple district by studying the topographic situation and vegetation patterns: today a road separates the northern district from the south-eastern area, following a topographic depression. This course presumably follows ancient tracks that developed after the canal silted up.

Additionally, the surroundings of the road show a high density of intact green vegetation, which may be due to the higher water storage capacity of the fine-grained canal fill. Magnetic measurements with a caesium magnetometer were conducted in this area for clarification. Compared to the sites analysed in 2008, this area shows only a few noticeable magnetic anomalies and in general an absence of clearly identifiable ancient structures. This might indicate the front end of the temple district and the area where the canals converged.

However, no observations were made that would allow an indisputable identification of the ancient courses of the canals.

Further investigations will be undertaken over the next seasons: first of all we will continue the magnetic surveying and conduct core drilling to securely identify the buried canals. Also, we aim to identify the ancient course of the Pelusiac branch of the Nile. Up to now, the most likely hypothesis is that the Pelusiac branch feeding both canals was located north of Bubastis and from there turned south-east along the ancient city.

The identification of the Pelusiac course will hopefully help to locate the Hermes temple and the harbour – two structures also mentioned by Herodotus, but so far undiscovered.

Great One, the Lady of Bubastis, the Eye of Ra, who is in Behedet, [who sits on the] throne, who smites the enemies, who is protected by [the gods], in whose entourage Ipi is, under [whose temple] the Nile flows’.

On the columns in the pronaos of the temple of Edfu she is further described as ‘this goddess, the noble one, under whom the Nile flows’.

Recently, the Tell Basta Project has begun to test these textual sources using archaeological and geophysical methods in order to reconstruct the ancient sacred landscape of Bubastis, created by human efforts around the temple of its main goddess over many centuries.

In 2008 we started a geophysical survey, conducted by scientists of the University of Potsdam, which is now being continued by geographers of the University of Würzburg. Already during a first test run with the fluxgate gradiometer, the results showed possible traces of a canal in the area south of the temple. Rescue excavation by a team of Egyptian colleagues from the Ministry of Antiquities (then SCA) in the same area one year later revealed what we interpreted as remains of canal fill: thick layers of solid dark mud, virtually devoid of small finds or pottery. In the last season (spring 2015), characteristics of these sediments were analysed in order to identify the depositional system and history. The preliminary results indicate that the facies (rock unit) is characterized by a high content of organic matter, very fine particle sizes (silt to clay), absence of coarse material (sand) and medium content of carbonate. About 2 m of sediment are exposed today and reveal a uniform and solid morphology without visible layering. These findings suggest that the sedimentary environment was probably characterized by the presence of standing or very slow-flowing water. Further, the observed high content of organic matter and carbonate make the presence of adjacent gardens or agricultural fields likely.

These considerations fit Herodotus’ description of the canals as unconnected and without an outlet:

 Eva Lange is Lecturer in the Department of Ancient Egyptian Cultural History at the University of Würzburg. Tobias Ullmann is a Research Assistant in the Department of Geography at the same university. The authors would like to thank their colleagues from the Ministry of State for Antiquities (Zagazig Inspectorate), in particular Mr Hisham Abd-el Moamen, and the Egypt Exploration Society for their constant support, as well as Prof Dr Roland Baumhauer and Dr Christian Büdel from the Department of Geography, University of Würzburg.

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Gifts for the gods: investigating votive animal mummies Based on research by the Ancient Egyptian Animal Bio Bank at the University of Manchester, a new exhibition at Manchester Museum examines the creation, collection and scientific study of votive animal mummies. Co-curators Stephanie Atherton-Woolham, Lidija McKnight and Campbell Price describe the research.

Animal mummies were, along with bronze statuettes depicting gods and their animal forms, the most popular votive offerings in first-millennium bc Egypt. Given to the gods by people in need of divine help or as a token of thanks, such votives were intended to last forever by being left at, and deposited within, sacred places. Votive animal mummies far outnumber the relatively few known examples of mummified pets, cult animals, and meat offerings. The votive-animal mummy industry resulted in tens of millions of mummies being deposited at sites throughout Egypt, yet it is still less well understood than human mummification.

From the early nineteenth century, travellers and collectors in Egypt brought significant numbers of animal mummies back to the UK.While coffined human mummies were highly desirable as impressive souvenirs, they were often cumbersome and difficult to transport.

Animal mummies, by contrast, had the advantage of being portable curios. An interest in hunting Nilotic wildlife, especially crocodiles, also added to the attraction of collecting mummified species. Nineteenth-century attitudes to animal mummies were mixed: while some were treasured souvenirs that helped inspire exotic reimaginings of ancient Egypt in European Romantic paintings, in the early 1890s some 180,000 tonnes of cat mummies from Beni Hasan were shipped to Liverpool, where most were ground up for use as fertiliser on fields!

The accounts of travellers – such as William Wilde (1815-1876), father of Oscar – describe the ‘bird pits’ at Saqqara and early investigations of the contents of ‘ibis pots’ found there. Such unsystematic collection of souvenirs gave way to a more structured excavation of animal mummy cemeteries. Flinders Petrie described his discovery of mummies at Hawara in 1888-1889, many of which he unwrapped on-site: ‘In every direction the work brought up crocodiles, of all sizes, from monsters 15 feet long, to infants, and even eggs.The apparent number 20

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was swelled moreover by quantities of dummies, evidently made for a ceremonial purpose’. This more careful recording of animal mummy cemeteries is exemplified by work of the Egypt Exploration Society at the Sacred Animal Necropolis of Saqqara, where tens of millions of ibis, falcons, baboons and jackals have been identified since the 1960s.

Modern scientists are applying non-invasive techniques to these often under-studied artefacts, now in British and overseas museum collections. Research by the Ancient Egyptian Animal Bio Bank (AEABB) at the University of Manchester has been investigating votive animal mummies in UK museum collections, often with surprising results.

The AEABB was established in 2010 to build upon a decade of research into animal mummification. By Top: a gilded mummy (Manchester Museum acc. no. 11293), expected to contain a bird. Above: a radiograph showing the mummy’s contents, which proved to be constructed entirely from organic material, probably reeds or palm ribs, laid longitudinally to provide structure. (Images: AEABB, University of Manchester) Left: hundreds of pottery vessels made to contain ibis mummies, during excavations by the Egypt Exploration Society at Saqqara in the 1960s. (Photo: Egypt Exploration Society) 21

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collating data, images (photographic and radiographic) and samples removed from damaged mummies, the Bio Bank is uniting mummies held in museum collections across the world in the largest study of its kind.

Non-invasive radiographic techniques, such as X-ray and CT (computed tomography) scanning obtained in a clinical environment, are used to assess the contents of wrapped mummy bundles without causing damage.

These methods give an insight into how the animals were mummified – their species, age and pathology, and the presence of other materials that were used to form the mummies. CT is particularly useful in demonstrating the techniques used in the construction of the mummies such as wrapping layers, supports and modelled features.

Information gained from the application of these clinical techniques has informed experimental mummification using modern animal cadavers. The results showed that specific mummification methods, evisceration and the use of natron in particular – a natural compound of sodium carbonate and sodium bicarbonate often used in purification rituals – were not completely necessary to produce well-preserved mummies.

Use of micro-CT scanners, which produce images of even higher resolution than conventional hospital equipment, have revealed animal remains within bundles that were previously thought to be empty. In some cases 3D printing technology has been used to create replicas of bundle contents that could not be identified using imaging alone.

About one third of mummies investigated contained no skeletal material at all. Rather than viewing this as evidence of priestly deception of pilgrims, the presence of plant material, mud, eggshell, and feather could imply a special value for these materials. These may have been considered sacred because of an association with an animal’s natural habitat and worthy of inclusion in a mummy bundle – perhaps akin to the caching of detritus from human mummification.

Often the mummies with the finest outward appearance contain the least complete animal remains. It is worth noting that votive bronzes, often interpreted simply as ‘statues’, might also serve a function as a coffin or container, with hollows for mummified material. When deposited, many such bronzes were shrouded in linen to maintain and enhance their sacredness. This implies a common purpose for both bronze statues and animal mummies (regardless of content) as divine images, a material conduit between humanity and the divine.

Further research by the AEABB aims to refine the conclusions already reached, and help characterise the practice of animal mummification in Ancient Egypt.

Radiograph showing a complete bird body within a mummy bundle (Manchester Museum acc. no 6035). (Image: AEABB, University of Manchester)

‘Gifts for the Gods: Animal Mummies Revealed’ is at the Manchester Museum from October 2015 to April 2016, and thereafter at Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum, Glasgow, and World Museum, Liverpool.

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Wooden shrine containing bronze images of gods, wrapped in linen, as found during EES excavations at Saqqara in the 1960s. (Photo: Egypt Exploration Society)

ď ą Stephanie Atherton-Woolham and Lidija McKnight are Research Associates at the University of Manchester. Campbell Price is Curator of Egypt and Sudan at the Manchester Museum, University of Manchester.

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Tanis: rains and ruins Ahmed Nakshara reports on a recent unusual weather event at Tanis that struck the site virtually on the anniversary of similar events reported by Flinders Petrie in 1884 and Pierre Montet in 1945.

We have just past [sic] the worst of an awful storm. It thundered almost continuously, & rained & hailed heavily. I was woken from my noon nap at 1.15 by the hail & rain, & now at 2.40 it is not yet over. The hail was so thick that at one time I estimated that half the ground was covered by it, large stones 3/10 & 4/10 inch diameter [...].

In two cases of pools on hill tops, where the catchment area was not over 4 times the size of the pool the water was 5 inches deep; & in another case where the catchment did not seem to be over half as much again as the submerged part it was 2 ½ in[che]s. This gives (beside soakage) 1 ¼ to 1 ¾ inch rainfall in the two hours. The results of such a downpour are tremendous; there was a rushing torrent in the plain below the house, dashing over obstacles, & roaring like a Dartmoor river.

In one place two large holes have been caved in in the ground, & the water was pouring into them. All pits & excavations of every kind are flooded, 5 to 10 feet of water being in the holes where we were at work. The temple is a lake, in spite of its sandy foundation; the obelisks lie across the expanse of water, out of which rise heads of sphinxes, & shoulders of statues; all the smaller figures are covered. In front of the pylon the water is 5 or 6 f[ee]t deep; and over in the great excavation by Mariette on Osorkon’s temple the water has filled it to within 3 feet of the brim, about 10 or 12 feet of water […].

With these words Flinders Petrie began his journal of 12 May 1884, describing the deluge which struck Tanis on that day. The event was so extraordinary that he devoted no fewer than four pages to the description of it, commenting in detail on the size of the hailstones, the continuous sound of thunder, the clatter of the hail on the roof of his house, the damage caused to the premises. When it became possible, he tried to get some idea of the amount of rainfall and the tremendous effects of the downpour on the site, his excavations and the surroundings:

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Petrie’s house was also flooded, the walls weakened and his belongings covered with mud, but as soon as he could, he ‘went out, camera in hand, to see & photograph the state of things out of doors.’ Some of these photographs are still preserved in the Lucy Gura archives at the Egypt Exploration Society.

Sixty-one years later, Pierre Montet sent a letter to his wife on 22 May 1945, describing a similar storm when he was working with his daughter Pernette in the area of the royal tombs: ...imagine that on 17th May we had a storm like I did not believe it was possible to have in Egypt, a storm like we have at home, with thunder, lightning, hail (10 minutes of hailstones as big as walnuts) and a cloudburst which flooded the whole plain of Tanis […] The sky turned all black. I sent the workmen back, and, as I had seen Pernette entering Osorkon, I went there in turn, but Pernette had got out to go to Psus[ennes].

Just when I was about to get out, one hailstone on the head and 2 or 3 on the arms invited me to stay where I was. The hail finished, and then came the downpour, and I soon believed that the tomb would fill up. […] The Eastern Temple, the gate of Anta were transformed into ponds and even today these ponds are not completely dried out...

Above: pools of water as described by Petrie and Montet.

(Photo: François Leclère)

Opposite: a photograph by Petrie showing the aftermath of the rainstorm of 12 May 1884. (Photo: Egypt Exploration Society) Below: the same spot from a different angle on 14 May 2015, after a similar weather event. (Photo: François Leclère) Highlighted are the obelisk and the shoulder of a statue still found in situ.

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Surprisingly, the temple areas were again flooded during the same month 70 years later: on 14 May 2015, early in the afternoon a fierce storm broke over the site.

The sky turned black, and the heavy rains lasted for about two hours, with thunder and hail, covering the excavated areas and the edges of the site with large ponds and lakes. Photographs of this year’s storm fit perfectly with Petrie’s and Montet’s descriptions; rainfall might be estimated to have been similarly heavy as on the day in May 1884.

As a resident of San el-Hagar, I must confess that this strange phenomenon is rarely observed. Weather in the Nile Delta is very stable, and whilst rain is to be expected in the winter, it is relatively unusual in the area during May. But, as so often, history teaches us that everything is possible anywhere anytime.

Above: view to the south-east after the heavy rainstorm of May 2015. (Photo: François Leclère) Below: the same spot, looking north-east, showing the same statue.

(Photo: Egypt Exploration Society)

 Ahmed Nakshara is Inspector of Egyptian Antiquities at the archaeological site of San el-Hagar (Tanis). The author would like to thank V. Razanajao, former Keeper of the Griffith Institute Archive, for authorization to quote from Petrie’s unpublished journal (1883 -1884, The Gr if f ith Inst it ute, University of Oxford). Thanks also to C. Warsi, The Griffiths Institute, and F. Leclère, director of the Mission française des fouilles de Tanis, for photos, suggestions and transcription of the text. The transcription of Petrie’s journals from 1883 to 1886 will soon be available online on the Griffith Institute website (www.griffith.ox.ac.uk). The quote of Montet’s letter from the private archives of the family.

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Middle Kingdom tombs beneath the Temple of Millions of Years During the last campaigns on the west bank of Luxor, the Spanish-Egyptian team working in the Temple of Millions of Years of Thutmosis III discovered tombs belonging to a Middle Kingdom necropolis. Even though robbed in antiquity, some have yielded interesting surprises, as Myriam Seco Álvarez and Javier Martínez Babón write.

The temple, somewhat to the north-east of the Ramesseum, was built by the Eighteenth-Dynasty pharaohThutmosis III. It has attracted relatively little archaeological attention, until the Thutmosis III Temple Project began work here in 2008. Since then it has already become clear that the structure was erected over an earlier necropolis, of which several tombs have since been identified (see EA 44).

In 2013, tomb number XI was discovered outside the northern enclosure wall of the temple. The area had been previously surveyed with geo-radar and in the sector Radar 4/5 an anomaly was discovered. While working here we found a pottery dump adjacent to the exterior of the above-mentioned wall. This find shows the intensive activity at this spot in ancient times in that precinct. Underneath, there was a rectangular funerary shaft, measuring 5.5 m in depth, which was cut into the bedrock. At the bottom of it we found two large chambers: chamber 1, the main one, was oriented towards the north and had at the centre a space for the deposition of the coffin, while the second one, chamber 3, was oriented towards the south and had a column in the middle.

The chambers were larger than in any of the other tombs discovered by Thutmosis III Temple Project so far.

Chamber 1 had a secondary smaller chamber (which we numbered ‘2’), probably a post-burial enlargement. The preliminary skeletal analysis of the human remains in Tomb XI, performed by Linda Chapon, resulted in the identification of 20 youths and 21 adults. A total of 41 individuals were buried inside Tomb XI, during different periods of reoccupation. In general, the individuals show a low level of pathologies and traumas in comparison with the average health of ancient Egyptians. The height of the individuals was also above average (1.50-1.55 m for women and 1.60-1.65 m for men). The average age was also quite high, as most of the individuals lived into

Aerial view of the Temple of Millions of Years of Thutmosis III, 2014.

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At least ten pieces that belong to ivory magical wands as well as one complete specimen (Inv. no. 15323), decorated with protective symbols related to birth and rebirth. Although their state of preservation varies, it is possible to identify turtles, crocodiles, serpents, felines and other animals.

Two incomplete female heads display lateral locks of hair on each side and another lock on the back of the head (Inv. nos 15178 and 15262). These statuettes were crafted from limestone and very likely represent fertility figures which were deposited in tombs.

There were also numerous wooden fragments belonging to staffs and the model of a boat, most of which were badly preserved; some cedar wood oars and rudders (Inv. no. 15151); pieces of statuettes as well as scarabs, small plates and ornaments that once were parts of pendants.

In 2014, the team continued work in the necropolis beneath the temple and discovered three additional tombs. One of them, tomb XIV, excavated by Ismael MacĂ­as, is located under the south sector of the hypostyle hall. As its funerary chamber had partially collapsed, it had remained unlooted. The tomb consisted of a rectangular burial shaft 5.15 m deep, at the bottom of which there were two chambers: the main chamber was oriented towards the east, with two niches oriented north and southwest respectively, in which the coffins were deposited. Chamber 2 was oriented towards the west.

The coffin niches had further, smaller recesses, probably for the canopic jars. After the gradual clearing of the collapsed section around the tomb, we found a wooden coffin in the southwestern niche, containing the mummy of a woman. Both sarcophagus and mummy had been badly damaged by the collapse, though the jewellery found with the body remained intact.

A complete female body still undisturbed in situ, the body laid out in a west-east direction, was discovered within the coffin. It was not possible to determine which direction the head had been facing, as fallen masonry

Top: aerial view of tomb XI, 2013. Above: Its main burial chamber.

Below right: fragment of a coffin (Inv. no. 15397).

their thirties and two females were probably older than 50 years. An explanation might be that the individuals belonged to higher social strata, although this assumption is difficult to ascertain.

The tomb had been robbed and reused in antiquity, yet nevertheless we were able to recover a number of interesting objects. Some of the most significant ones, currently undergoing further study, are: Twenty-one fragments of a polychrome coffin of sycamore-fig, the most remarkable of which preserves the name of its owner, Ikery (Inv. no. 15154). It seems that whoever entered the tomb after the original burial took particular care to preserve the name of the deceased.

We were also able to recover a fragment showing the two large symbolic eyes common on coffins of that period (Inv. no. 15397).

Nine fragments of a funerary mask (Inv. no. 15364), consisting of brown-painted stucco on cloth.

Four of these fit together and allow a partial reconstruction of the face, showing the eyes, part of the cheeks and a portion of the nose, as well as the lips and the chin.

We also found fragments of four human heads in wood (Inv. no. 15158), in various states of preservation, the stoppers of canopic jars, representing the four Sons of Horus in human form. The faces were painted a bluish-grey colour on stucco.

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Above: fragments of ivory magical wands, from tomb XI (Inv. nos 15136 and 15137). Below: fragments of wooden heads from the canopic jars (Inv. nos 15158 and 15241).

Fragment of a coffin that preserves the two big eyes (Inv. No. 15397) (© Thutmosis III Temple Project).

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had crushed the skull, fragments of which were found around the rubble. Analysis of the skull and the pelvic area, as well as the general morphology of the rest of the bones, enabled us to determine the individual’s sex. The pelvic area was too damaged to allow a determination of age, though the reconstructed skull suggests that the individual was about 20-25 years old.

The lady’s jewellery consisted of a pendant in the shape of large golden shell; a cylindrical amulet of alternating pieces of gold and amethyst; two golden bracelets with reef knots; and two silver anklets originally of the same shape as the bracelets.

The shell and the bracelets were found in perfect condition. The cylindrical pendant was broken into several fragments, which we could, however, entirely recover. Unfortunately, the silver anklets were very badly deteriorated. Jewellery similar to this has been found in tombs of the Middle Kingdom, such as those of the princesses Meret, Sithathor, Chnumet, Senebtisi and Nubhotepi. Apart from being a marker of high status, it also holds great symbolic value as it was intended to aid regeneration and protection in the afterlife.

These tombs constitute clear evidence that officials of the Middle Kingdom Theban elite were buried in the necropolis located underneath the Temple of Millions of Years of Thutmosis III. Above: a complete female burial still in situ, tomb XIV. Right: other objects found in tomb XI: fragment of a wooden duck (Inv. no. 15130) and a piece of a limestone statue in sitting position with outstretched legs (Inv. no. 15125).

Below: the complete jewellery set found with the burial of tomb XIV. Bottom: two golden bracelets with reef knots from the jewellery assemblage from the same tomb.

 Dr. Myriam Seco Álvarez, Egyptologist, Academy of Fine Arts, Seville, is the Director of the Thutmosis III Temple Project in Luxor. Dr. Javier Martínez Babón, Egyptologist, Museo Egipcio de Barcelona, is a member of its team. We would like to thank the Ministry of Antiquities for facilitating the work and to express our gratitude to the Botín Foundation, Santander Bank and Cemex for funding this project. Among the many team members I would like to mention in particular Manuel González Bustos (photo processing) and Carlos Borrico (translations). All photos by the Thutmosis III Temple Project, http://www.thutmosisiiitempleproject.org/ 30

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Digging Diary 2014-15 Summaries of some of the archaeological work undertaken in Egypt between autumn 2014 and summer 2015. The sites are arranged geographically from north to south, ending with the oases. Field Directors who would like reports of their work to appear in EA are asked to e-mail a short summary, with a website address if available, as soon as possible after the end of each season to: jan.geisbusch@ees.ac.uk

Jan Geisbusch

Abbreviations: EDP Early Dynastic Period; OK Old Kingdom; FIP First Intermediate Period; MK Middle Kingdom; SIP Second Intermediate Period; NK New Kingdom; TIP Third Intermediate Period; LP Late Period; GR Graeco-Roman; ERT Electrical Resistance Tomography; GPR Ground Penetrating Radar Institutes and Research Centres: AKAP Aswan-Kom Ombo Archaeological Project; ARCE American Research Center in Egypt; AUC American University, Cairo; BA British Academy; BM British Museum; CFEETK Franco-Egyptian Centre, Karnak; CNRS (USR) French National Research Centre (Research Groups); CSIC Spanish National Research Council; DAI German Archaeological Institute, Cairo; FNRS National Fund for Scientific Research, Brussels; IFAO French Archaeological Institute, Cairo; MSA Ministry of State for Antiquities, Egypt; NVIC NetherlandsFlemish Institute, Cairo; OI Oriental Institute, University of Chicago; PCMA Polish Centre for Mediterranean Archaeology, Warsaw; Swiss Inst Swiss Institute for Architectural Research and Archaeology, Cairo;.

WINTER 2014-15 (November to February) Lower Egypt Tell el-Farkha (Ghazala): The mission under Marek Chlodnicki and Krzysztof Cialowicz of the Inst of Archaeology Jagiellonian Univ, KrakÓw, the Poznan Archaeological Museum and the PCMA worked at a number of sites: at the W kom, excavations were made in strata dated to Naqada IIIA-IID. The most important work concentrated on the brewery discovered two years ago, showing three phases of use.

A cross-section was established and a part of the brewery explored. At the central kom the team explored an earlier phase of the large rectangular building (probably a central storeroom) dating to Naqada IIIA1 and discovered in 2012. Underneath, a mud-brick wall was found belonging to the so-called ‘Lower Egyptian Residence’ (Naqada IIC/D) – a continuation of the wall discovered in 2007 in the neighbouring trench. The rounded building on the N-W slope of the kom, built in the middle of the 1st Dyn, could be explored in its entirety. At the E kom 13 graves were discovered. Most of them (dated to the later half of the 1st Dyn and the beginning of the 2nd) were very poor. Four graves were furnished more richly. The oldest grave (dated to Naqada IIIB) was furnished with stone and clay vessels, a cosmetic palette and a necklace of carnelian and lapis-lazuli beads. www.farkha.org Qarara: After two years’ interruption, the Inst of Egyptology (Univ Tübingen) under the fielddirectorship of Beatrice Huber has devoted a brief season in November 2014 to a small settlement lying 100 m E of the Coptic site. It is situated on an area of 100 by 100 m, 20 m higher than the main site. The settlement is seriously threatened by the advance of the modern Muslim cemetery, so it was necessary to record the area before its complete destruction. The area is covered by a thick layer of bricks and pottery, particularly amphorae LRA7. Building walls are preserved only to the height of a few brick layers. They

belong to domestic installations with ovens and silos. About 20 tombs of male and female individuals have been recorded superficially.

The main textiles collected are tunics of Roman type which can be dated to the 4th-5th century. Under the buildings five tombs were found without grave goods. Funeral wrappings differed from those of the Coptic burials. Until now, it has not been possible to define the exact function of this settlement including a cemetery, which is situated in the immediate vicinity of the main site.

El-Kom el-Ahmar (Sharuna): The work under the auspices of the Inst of Egyptology (Univ Tübingen), directed by Beatrice Huber, continued the excavation begun in 2010/2012 in the N-W side of the rock necropolis (directed

by Luis Gonzálves, Museu Egipci de Barcelona), completing research in the OK tomb L8a, reused in Ptolemaic times, where the two inner chambers have been recorded. Next to them, the robbed and scattered remains of more than 50 individuals were found with a batch of amulets, a lot of pottery and offering tables. E of L8a, excavations have begun in the OK tomb ensemble M9, which consists of a big courtyard and a chamber with a false door and a funerary shaft. The tomb had been reoccupied in the Ptolemaic period. The area in front of the tombs has been used as a Coptic cemetery.

Seven graves have been discovered until now; they are dug in the rock and sometimes cut into earlier tomb structures. The bodies are undisturbed; they are wrapped in typical Coptic fashion. http://www.uni-tuebingen.de/fakultaeten/

philosophische-fakultaet/fachbereiche/altertumsund - kunst wis sensc haf ten / ianes / for sc hung / aegyptologie/projekte.html

Upper Egypt Athribis: The Athribis Project of the Univ Tübingen and the MSA, led by Christian Leitz and Abdelhakim Qarar and directed in the field

by Marcus Müller, continued its work in the Repit temple of Ptolemy XII. During the 13th season (Nov 2014-Mar 2015) several rooms were excavated, all but one revealing reliefs

and inscriptions, many of them colourful. The excavation of the E ambulatory was finished, the floor being disrupted by a Coptic water conduit. Its columns now show coloured reliefs and inscriptions. The N ambulatory revealed a massive robbery of temple blocks down to the sixth foundation layer. Along the W wall of the temple we discovered elaborate Roman mudbrick structures such as a workshop and animal shelters with feeding sites. All rooms contained finds of daily life dating post 642 ad (Islamic conquest) when the temple was used for domestic purposes and as animal shelter.

Epigraphic work focused on collating numerous texts in various rooms and the recording of newly discovered texts. Fifty-seven collapsed blocks were removed from the temple which is now void of big blocks. Consolidation and restoration were undertaken at numerous spots throughout the temple, on collapsed blocks and single finds, mainly on polychrome reliefs. http://www.unituebingen.de/aktuelles/pressemitteilungen/200912-05akademieprojekt-english.html

Luxor: The Italian team of the Centro di Egittologia Francesco Ballerini led by Angelo Sesana concluded its work at the Temple of Millions of Years of Amenhotep II on 17 Jan 2015.

It focused on the excavation of two funerary structures: a MK tomb (D21) and a LP burial shaft (R11). Tomb D21 consists of a corridor 12 m long and at least two lateral chambers. In the corridor, filled up mostly by debris from the ceiling, partly collapsed, we found, among a large quantity of bones and skulls, MK-SIP pottery and a LP mummification deposit. In the rear part of the corridor we unearthed two terracotta coffins and some mud bricks, enclosing the remains of a wooden coffin, containing the traces of a cartonnage (probably TIP). The burial shaft R11 has two chambers, one of which was investigated in 2013. During the last mission we excavated the second chamber. We unearthed three dummy canopic jars (the fourth had already been discovered in the other chamber), three wooden boxes containing mud ushabtis, two bronze/copper eyes belonging to a badly preserved coffin and a quadripartite wooden

Luxor: the ramp of the Temple of Millions of Years of Amenhotep II, partially restored by the 17th mission of the Centro di Egittologia Francesco Ballerini. (Photo:Tommaso Quirino, Milan, 2015) 31

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box containing the viscera of the deceased. Next to this wooden box we also discovered three vases in fragments, completely reconstructible, dating to the Persian Period. Excavating the small rooms located in the S part of the temple we discovered a pottery ostrakon (33.8 cm long) with a hieratic text traced in black, probably the Instruction of King Amenemhat for his son Sesostris I. The restoration works of the ramp and of the enclosure walls also continued.

Western Thebes (Dra Abu el-Naga North): The CSIC mission, led by José M. Galán, continued excavation around the tomb-chapel of Djehuty (TT 11). Above the chapel, the mudbrick façade of the tomb-chapel of Djehutynefer, overseer of the treasure after Djehuty (i.e under Thutmose III), was rediscovered. It was first found by Champollion and Rosellini in 1829, then lost. The entrance of a 13th Dyn rock-cut tomb was also brought to light. A mudbrick offering chapel of the 17th/early 18th Dyn was excavated and also two (robbed) shafts, one of them preserving in good condition two bows and twenty arrows. The study of the hundreds of animal mummies deposited inside the burial chamber of Hery (TT 12) continued, as did the restoration of both neighbouring tomb-chapels. www.excavacionegipto.com

Western Thebes (Dra Abu el-Naga): Between Dec 2014 and Jan 2015 Boyo Ockinga’s team of Macquarie Univ excavated the courtyard of TT 149 (see pp. 40-42). Two main occupation phases were identified above the 20th Dyn structure: Late Antique (Coptic) and TIP. From the former phase, fragments of Greek and Coptic papyri were recovered (including a fragment of the Sahidic version of Genesis). In the latter phase two shafts and burial complexes were excavated in the NW and SW corners of the courtyard, enclosed by mud-brick walls. Remains of the original 20th Dyn courtyard architecture were also uncovered: sandstone column and pillar bases, foundation blocks for the revetment blocks of the courtyard walls, as well as column, pillar and ceiling fragments. Numerous inscribed and decorated fragments were also found, including one with the cartouche of Ramesses VII, part of a window of appearances scene, allowing to date the tomb and its owner securely to the latter part of the 20th Dyn. Western Thebes (Medinet Habu): The OI epigraphic team in the small Amun temple of Hatshepsut and Thutmosis III under the supervision of J. Brett McClain finished the final drawings for Medinet Habu X and continued work on Medinet Habu XI and XII. Epigrapher Jen Kimpton assisted by Anait Helmholz continued her preliminary survey and cataloguing of blocks and fragments of the destroyed Medinet Habu W High Gate.

Senior conservator Lotfi Hassan assisted by Nahed Samir supervised the Medinet Habu conservation work and the second year of the Epigraphic Survey’s conservation student training programme for 14 local Egyptian conservation students. Master mason Frank Helmholz assisted by mason Johannes Weninger and the stone team finished re-erecting the Domitian Gate with new sandstone blocks that replace the lowest courses destroyed by ground water salt. Tina Di Cerbo and Richard Jasnow continued their digital documentation of LP and medieval graffiti in the N Ptolemaic annex of the small Amun temple, a Ptolemaic gate on the S, plus the roof area of the Ramesses III mortuary temple. This season saw the collaboration of Chicago House and the Ramesseum team led

by Christian LeBlanc and Philippe Martinez in the documentation of reused blocks from the Ramesseum in the Ptolemaic and Roman additions to the small Amun temple. The

Medinet Habu: raising the lintel of the Domitian Gate, 22 March 2015.

(Photo: Yarko Kobylecky) documentation, conservation, and restoration work at Medinet Habu is funded by a grant from USAid Egypt. http://oi.uchicago.edu/research/ projects/epi/

Western Thebes (TT 33): During two short seasons in Nov 2014 and Apr 2015 we pursued the copy and study of the texts: doorways, the cenotaph and related chapels (Prof. Claude Traunecker), the Book of the Dead in room I (Silvia Einaudi), the Amduat and the Book of the Gates in rooms XII-XIII (Isabelle Régen).

Journalists of Le Figaro visited in Nov, as did the French TV channel TF1 in April (http://videos.

tf1.fr/jt-20h/2015/egypte-a-louxor-au-coeur-de-lamysterieuse-tombe-33-8605837.htm). It is now

evident that the Book of the Dead spells attested in room I are arranged on the walls according to the so-called ‘Saite recension’. In room XIII, the study of the inscribed fragments continued. The main contribution of these two seasons was a new interpretation of the monument. As a result of a comparative study (position of the shafts in the Asasif tombs, decoration programme of rooms XVII-XIX and of the Osireion in Abydos), Claude Traunecker suggests that the model used by Padiamenope for his tomb was the Osireion itself. In this perspective, it seems clear that the mysterious ‘cenotaph’ delimited

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by corridor XIII, with its 15 false doors and 22 naoi, is the Theban reproduction of the now completely vanished superstructure built by Seti I above the subterranean rooms of the Osireion in Abydos. Accordingly, the set of rooms XIIXVI of the tomb represents a sort of pilgrimagetemple of ‘Theban Osiris’ strictly related to Abydos. This interpretation of Padiamenope’s ‘funerary palace’ allows to explain some of its peculiarities and in the meantime it substantially changes our concept of Seti I’s temple in Abydos. During our last season we also planned the content of our first monograph: Le palais funéraire de Padiamenopé. Tombe thébaine 33 (vol.

I). This volume will include a detailed list of the epigraphic material, as well as a history of the tomb. http://egypte.unistra.fr/les-travaux-de-terrain/ la-tombe-de-padiamenope-tt33 -responsableclaude-traunecker/ • http://www.ifao.egnet. net/archeologie/tt33/ • http://www.montpellieregyptologie.fr/index?p=tombe33

Western Thebes (TT 107): Senior OI epigrapher J. Brett McClain continued to review and collate the facsimile drawings of the portico façade reliefs done by epigraphic artists Margaret De Jong and Sue Osgood, and will finish the collation next season. http://oi.uchicago.edu/research/projects/epi/

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El-Kab: The expedition, directed by Vivian Davies (BM), made further progress in the conservation, planning and documentation of tombs in the main necropolis. Cleaning in the tomb-chamber of Senwosret (12th Dyn) revealed new details of the decoration including hieroglyphic inscriptions and workshop scenes.

A new drawing was made of the important scene on the W wall showing oxen drawing a catafalque holding an anthropoid coffin of the deceased, preceded by mu-dancers, a scene which formed the model for the similar representation in the nearby tomb of Sobeknakht (16th Dyn).

Cleaning continued in the tombs of Renseneb (16th Dyn) and Ahmose-Pennekhbet (18th Dyn). Fragments of an inscribed offering-table from the tomb of the musician Tientis (25th26th Dyn) were reconstituted and the decoration recorded. New detailed plans were prepared of the tombs of Sobeknakht and Bebi (16th Dyn).

Hagr Edfu: Another brief study season, directed

by Vivian Davies, was undertaken, continuing to check figural decoration in tomb 3 and of inscriptions on the top of the hill. Inspection of monuments in the necropolis revealed a certain amount of damage to the ceilings of some of the tombs, especially HE tomb 2 and the so-called ‘pylon-tomb’, caused by unusually heavy rainfall and the high water table. There was continued documentation of Coptic ostraca from the site, stored in the magazine at Elkab.

Hierakonpolis: This season’s activities included excavations in the elite predynastic cemetery at HK 6 and in the predynastic food production area at HK 11C, the survey and recording of rock art and conservation of rock-cut tombs and objects (under the direction of Renée Friedman, BM).

At HK 6, two new tombs were discovered, one containing an ivory figurine of a giraffe, possibly originally from a comb. Architectural remains of walls and pillars surrounding various tombs were also investigated. At HK 11C more cooking hearths were revealed, confirming that meat and fish were being prepared here on an industrial scale. This production was probably associated with the funerary cults of the elite rulers buried at HK 6. An inscription of King Niussere, which contains a list of gods including several that are specific to the desert, was discovered during the rock art survey. This inscription was found at the far W side of the site, near the land reclamation area of the Wady Sayyida Project. It is an important record of OK interest in the Western Desert. www.hierakonpolis-online.org Berenike: Joint excavations by the Univ of Delaware and the PCMA, directed by Steven E. Sidebotham and Iwona Zych, documented a late first-century bc/early first-century ad structure of unknown function W of the site with an interior comprising three square podia.

Also excavated were Ptolemaic urban defences, a possible cistern and hydraulic tunnels, and early Roman burials, some with grave goods. The harbour contained industrial areas, a shipyard and a late Roman temple. We continued excavations of the early Roman-era animal cemetery (cats, dogs, baboons, vervet monkeys, some wearing iron collars). Excavations in the N part of site recorded a room built of ashlars recycled from the Ptolemaic or early Roman period; its function remains unknown. Excavations in and adjacent to the so-called Serapis Temple unearthed large amounts of fallen masonry, fragments of cedar timbers, marble wall/floor revetment, other wall decorations and about a dozen inscriptions including two in hieroglyphs (one with the cartouche of Amenemhat IV). One anepigraphic stele fragment had images of Isis/Hathor, an unidentified ruler (likely Roman), Harpocrates and Min/Pan. The bulk of the inscriptions and fragments were in Greek and dated first to third

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centuries ad. Two of these were quite large: one was dedicated to Isis the Greatest Nurse Goddess in 49 ad, while the other was a dedication of a statue by a secretary of an aromatics warehouse in Berenike to a prominent citizen of the city in 112/113 ad. The project also included excavations in the long-horned cattle cemetery in Wadi Khashab (c. 2000-1500 bc), a detailed survey of the Roman-era beryl/emerald mining settlement at Nugrus and other desert surveys. http://micropublica.com/missions/the-berenikeproject/ ; http://www.centrumarcheologii.uw.edu. pl/index.php?id=253&L=0

Aswan (Kom Ombo): The 11th field season of AKAP (Yale Univ and Univ of Bologna) directed by Maria Gatto and Antonio Curci, ran from 19 Jan to 11 Feb 2015. During this short season, mostly dedicated to finalize the digital data collection of rock art and continue the archaeological survey, a Predynastic settlement was discovered in Wadi el-Tawil, c. 20 km N of Aswan on the West Bank. The site seems to include two areas: one on top of the lowest N spur, with possible granaries; and one on the N side of the valley mouth, with the actual occupation. No cemetery has been found yet, but the area is heavily disturbed by the construction of a house and its garden, and probably it lies somewhere nearby. Surface pottery collections consist mainly of shale wares, Nile black-topped and red-polished and Nubian black-mouthed, dating the site to approximately Naqada ICIIB/C, contemporary to the site found in Nag el-Qarmila, located only few km to the S. Aswan (Syene): The 15th season of work of the joint team of the Swiss Inst and the MSA Aswan, headed by Cornelius von Pilgrim and Nasr Salama, and directed in the field by Wolfgang Müller, continued until Apr 2015. Fieldwork concentrated on concluding investigations in the LP layers of Area 2 in the S-E corner of the fortified town. Salvage excavations were carried out at the S limit of the medieval town where a segment of the medieval fortification was uncovered. The chronology of adjoining layers let us assume that it was constructed during the Ayyubid Period. Two salvage excavations to the N of the Isis temple revealed well-preserved structures of the Early Islamic Period and part of a remarkable building of the Roman Period covered by painted wall plaster. Short-term investigations in an ongoing construction site to the E of the temple of Domitian revealed a destroyed rock-cut tomb of the late MK as well as a further section of foundation made of sandstone blocks. Together with two corresponding sections of foundation discovered in earlier excavations in close vicinity it indicates a large platform of Ptolemaic date at the S-W slope of a rocky outcrop in the town.

Aswan (Elephantine): The joint DAI/Swiss Inst team directed by Stephan Seidlmayer, Felix Arnold, Johanna Sigl and Cornelius von Pilgrim continued fieldwork on Elephantine island between Jan and Apr 2015. New excavations in the MK settlement on Elephantine had already started in autumn 2013. The project focuses on everyday life in ancient times and the assessment of the use of modern archaeometrical methods in the archaeology of Egypt. As contamination of find material is a major issue in this case, the execution of excavation work as well as processing of finds had to be completely changed.

This issue was addressed during the workshop and lecture series ‘Reality of Life’ in Nov/Dec 2014 in Cairo and Aswan. In the course of the ongoing study of relief blocks deriving from the NK temple of Khnum, evidence for the existence of a previously unknown structure of queen Hatshepsut was discovered. On a newly discovered relief, remains clearly indicate that

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Hatshepsut had been represented as a woman and then replaced by a male king. The building must therefore date to the early part of her reign. The function of the newly identified building is not yet clear. It appears to have combined features of a way station surrounded by pillars with those of a sanctuary, similar to the temple of the 18th Dyn in Medinet Habu. With the permission and support of the MSA an archaeological event day for the pupils of the two schools on Elephantine took place on 18 Mar 2015. The aim was to raise awareness of site’s historical heritage and explore new approaches to the site management of the archaeological area on Elephantine island through contact with the local people. http:// www.dainst.org/project/25953

SPRING - SUMMER 2015 (March to June) Lower Egypt Tell el-Fara’in (Buto): The DAI team continued the investigation of late Predynastic (Naqada IIIB/A) building structures which precede the development of a royal estate during the 1st Dyn. Although no comprehensive picture can be drawn yet, the structures revealed seem to form an interrelated facility connected to agricultural activities. Worth mentioning is an installation consisting of several low parallel walls that were covered by matting. The structure might have served to dry agricultural products such as grain or fruit. As the water table was low this spring, the uppermost level of the underlying settlement of the Lower Egyptian Maadi culture was reached in one of the excavation trenches without the need of pumps. The exposed structures date to Naqada IIIA1 and consist of light rectangular huts arranged side by side. The work of the Univ of Poitiers team, supported by the French Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs, the IFAO and the Centre of Alexandrian Studies, focused on the urban development of Buto from early Ptolemaic to the beginning of Islamic times.

This season the continuation of the pedestrian survey on the S kom and soundings on top of the N kom of Buto yielded new evidence for the different phases of Ptolemaic, Roman and Byzantine occupation. In an area S of the temple enclosure, excavations revealed several kilns that had already become visible on the map of previous geophysical measurements. The kilns are clearly connected to the pottery production from late Ptolemaic until the very beginning of Roman times (late 2nd-/early 1st-century bc to the early 1st century ad.). http://old.dainst.org/en/ project/buto?ft=all

Naukratis (Kom Gaif ): The 4th BM fieldwork season under field director Ross Thomas and deputy director Alexandra Villing concentrated on two areas: the region of the Greek sanctuaries of the Dioskouroi and the Hellenion in the N part of the site, and the silted up remains of the LP riverbank in the W of the site (supervised

by Edwin de Vries). Excavations in the N (supervised by Astrid Lindenlauf and Aurelia Masson) revealed figurines in limestone and terracotta and pottery (including inscribed Greek fine wares) alongside burnt animal bones, which represent votive offerings dating from the late 7th to the 6th century bc. They also provided important information on technical details of the earliest phases of (mud-brick) construction and use of this ritual centre. The riverbank revealed late 4th to early 3rd century bc pottery and rubble dumps overlaying mid5th to mid-4th century bc deposits, where the inhabitants had created a bank or crude surface for use. Within the waterlogged deposits wellpreserved wood was found, including a piece of hull plank timber typical for Mediterranean sea-

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going ships. The 5th to 4th century bc layer also yielded Egyptian plaque figurines in terracotta and wood, large quantities of Attic black glaze and other imported pottery, notably amphorae, and locally made Egyptian as well as Greek-style pottery. This important sequence will fill a gap in our knowledge of the Persian Period and 28th -30th Dyn Naukratis. http://www.britishmuseum. org/research/research_ projects/all_current _ projects/naukratis_the_greeks_in_egypt.aspx

Saqqara: The Leiden Museum/Leiden Univ team, now together with its new partner, the Museo Egizio of Turin and directed by Maarten J. Raven and Christian Greco, continued the fieldwork in the NK necropolis at Saqqara. The substructure of the anonymous 18th-Dyn tomb excavated in 2013 (‘tomb X’, see EA 43) was emptied and proved to consist of a 7.9 m deep shaft and two burial chambers, connected by a stairway. The stairway and lower chamber had already been explored in 2002 via a robbers’ tunnel from the adjacent tomb of Meryneith.

The shaft and upper chamber contained some loose relief fragments, bricks stamped with the name of Amenhotep II, and other finds, but did not provide information on the identity of the tomb-owner. Two shallow platform structures against the W wall of the courtyard of tomb X contained a great quantity of broken pottery, mainly red funnel-necked jars and blue-painted ovoid jars. E of the tomb, a Ramesside floor level of rubble and potsherds was exposed. Here, a large shaft was emptied, again containing some relief blocks among which was one inscribed for Meryneith. It gives access to at least three tombchambers, which could not be explored due to lack of time. The shaft probably dates to the 18th Dyn and may be connected to some mud-brick walls enclosing the rubble floor in the S and E. In the debris to the S a large limestone falcon figure was discovered, probably from a private cult chapel of a Ramesside tomb. The removal of an accumulation of sand and rubble against the N wall of tomb X produced an in situ four-sided stela of a stonecutter, Samut. The expedition also consolidated the walls of the tomb of Sethnakht further E, which was then backfilled for protection. www.saqqara.nl

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Upper Egypt Deir el-Barsha: Excavations were undertaken

by Harco Willems and his team from the Univ of Leuven in an area on the S fringe of the village. This area contains dozens of mud bricklined tomb shafts, some of which lead to burial chamber to the N or S, while in some others the bottom of the shaft itself serves as burial space.

Most burials were untouched, with the deceased lying on their backs, and orientated S-N. The burials contained hardly any finds, but based on the limited amount of pottery probably date to the FIP. On top, and often inside the shafts, numerous burials probably dating to the 4th7th century ad were found. Geomorphological research was carried out in the floodplain with the aim to link the cemetery site to its settlement setting in the floodplain. A hitherto unknown main bed of the Nile was detected due E of alBayadiya, but on the whole the hypothesis of a general eastward migration of the Nile bed as first proposed by Butzer was not confirmed. www.dayralbarsha.com

Amarna: Between 18 Oct and 13 Nov 2014 Anna Hodgkinson led a small team opening the investigation of an area (M50.15–16) in the Main City where glass-working had been reported in 1922, thus adding to our knowledge of local industries. Immediately following, Anna Stevens ran a month of recording and study of categories of material from the South Tombs Cemetery as part of the final preparation for a major publication. Work resumed on 10 Jan, when a conservation team (led by Lucy Skinner) devoted a month to stabilising further the decorated coffin fragments from the cemetery.

This was followed (from 7 Feb) by seven weeks of re-clearance and repairs at the Great Aten Temple (directed by Barry Kemp), which is leading to a re-evaluation of how the ground around the temple was utilised; and (beginning on 27 Mar) by six weeks of excavation (directed

by Anna Stevens) at a new site: a cemetery of the Amarna Period located behind the North Tombs and the next step in a study of the human population of Amarna. The rich assemblage of recovered bones became the focus of a month’s study (until 15 Jun) by a bio-anthropology

team from the Univs of Arkansas ( Jerry Rose) and Southern Illinois (Gretchen Dabbs). www. amarnaproject.com

Karnak: The CFEETK (MSA/CNRS USR 3172) programmes of archaeological and epigraphic research and conservation continued at Karnak under the direction of Mohamed Abdel Aziz and Christophe Thiers.

Excavations led by Guillaume Charloux to the E of the Ptah temple brought to light a favissa containing 38 statues and cultic objects; they were probably buried at the end of LP/ beginning of Ptolemaic Period according to the study of pottery led by Stéphanie Boulet and Juliette Laroye. During this study, different mud-brick remains were uncovered around the temple, improving the understanding of the building sequence in

Saqqara (above): limestone statue of a falcon. (Photo: Leiden/Turin Mission) Karnak (below): small statue found in the precinct of the Ptah temple.

(Photo: CNRS-CFEETK / J. Maucour)

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Dime es-Seba: south-east corner of the great temenos. (Photo: S.Vannini)

this area, in particular the existence of a large mud-brick construction destroyed at the time of Tuthmosis III. A large Roman-Byzantine settlement was also excavated by Benjamin Durand to the E and to the S of the temple. The restoration and conservation programme of the N storerooms of Tuthmosis III continued under the supervision of Camille Bourse and Agnès Asperti. The reconstruction of the bark-chapel of Tuthmosis III in the Open Air Museum was achieved by Antoine Garric: a huge ceiling slab (36 t) and the lintel (18 t) were repositioned on top of the walls. Excavation programmes continued of the chapel of Osiris Neb-djefau under the direction of Laurent Coulon, and at the treasury of Shabaka under the supervision of Nadia Licitra. The Karnak online project continued under the supervision of Sébastien Biston-Moulin, providing highresolution photographs and Egyptological data of the Karnak temples. http://www.cfeetk.cnrs. fr/karnak

Karnak (Khonsu Temple): The OI work at the Khonsu Temple under the direction of W. Raymond Johnson this season consisted of the production of new drawings of reused material exposed in the standing walls of chapels 11 and 1 by epigraphic artist Keli Alberts. Keli also tutored several MSA inspectors in epigraphic drawing techniques. http://oi.uchicago.edu/ research/projects/epi/

Oases Dime es-Seba / Soknopaiou Nesos (Faiyum): The excavation by the Centro di Studi Papirologici (Univ of Salento, Lecce), under the direction of Paola Davoli and Mario Capasso, continued on the W side of the temple dedicated to the god Soknopaios (ST 20) in trench 8. In addition, a new area has been investigated in the S-E corner of the temenos (trench 10). Trench 8 (8.65 by

3.10 m) has been opened in a pavement made of limestone slabs, perfectly preserved on the W side of the temple. The floor was made during a restoration phase of the exterior wall of the temple, probably during the 2nd century ad.

The stratigraphy found in trench 8 is sealed and therefore of great interest to determine the temple’s history. Ceramics and Demotic ostraka found in these layers were dated to the late first century bc. A base of a column and the imprint of a second one are all that remains of a chapel built in this area but demolished for the construction of the new floor. In trench 10 (10.5 by 10 m) part of a mud-brick house was found. It is likely that it was a house for priests during the Roman period. The house was built on a layer of domestic waste levelled on purpose and covering an earlier demolished mud-brick structure. In turn, this building was built directly on a previously demolished mudbrick building. So far, three building phases could be identified in the area. The temenos was still inhabited during the Byzantine Period: an ostrakon with a staurogram attests to the presence of Christians. In total, 181 ostraka, of which one Greek, some figurative and all the other Demotic, were recovered. A dozen fragments of Demotic papyri and one Greek were also found. www-museopapirologico.eu Tell Umm el-Baragât (Tebtunis): In autumn 2014 the joint mission of IFAO and the Univ of Milan, directed by Claudio Gallazzi, worked in the N-W part of the Soknebtunis temple and in the depository mound E of it. In the N-W area, the granary discovered in 2013 (secondfirst century bc) was completely unearthed, together with another storage facility lying underneath (third-second century bc) and a courtyard used as a bakery (third-first century bc). The whole sector was covered with a thick layer of debris, which yielded about 50 Greek documents written on papyri and pot sherds 35

and also an Aramaic ostrakon, all dating from the Roman period. In the depository mound E of the temple, some rare objects have been recovered, such as two limestone tablets with drawings and an amphora model made of.

Many ostraka, painted amphorae and papyri (hieratic, demotic, Greek) have been collected. www.ifao.egnet.net/archeologie/tebtynis

Amheida (Dakhla): Work at Amheida (New York Univ; Roger Bagnall and Paola Davoli) in 2015 concentrated on three areas. In area 4.1 (the temple of Thoth), mainly undecorated blocks, some perhaps of the NK but reused in Roman times, were found, along with a stele of the TIP, nearly completing the excavation of this area. Work by Olaf Kaper on the reconstruction of scenes from several temples continued in the block magazine. In the temple area a large bread oven, probably of the SIP or the NK, was excavated. Excavation of a very large house (c. 30 by 26 m) began in area 8.1; it has moulded stucco and elaborate wall paintings, and one room yielded numerous wine jars and their mud stoppers and ostrakon labels (fourth century ad). A survey was conducted in several buildings in central areas in rooms with plaster, to examine their decoration and condition. Many typical Roman-style paintings were found, along with moulded stucco. Work also continued on the decoration of the replica of the House of Serenos (building 1) and on the conservation and study of objects found in previous seasons, particularly the large hoard of 854 tetradrachms (from Claudius to Antoninus) excavated in 2012, the conservation and recording of which were completed. The unbaked clay coffins for sacred birds excavated in 2008 were conserved, and their contents (largely bones of birds) removed and studied.

The archaeobotanist studied many samples of vegetable material collected in earlier seasons as well as the current one. www.amheida.org

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Egypt Exploration Society Expeditions (www.ees.ac.uk)

WINTER 2014-15 Thebes: The EES/Uppsala Univ Theban Harbours and Waterscapes Survey, led by Angus Graham (Univ of Uppsala), focused on further investigations of the West Bank floodplain in Jan-Mar 2015. There were two principal goals: firstly to extend the transect of hand augering and percussion coring started in 2014 in front of the Ramesseum, and secondly to further our understanding of the building and engineering activities of Amenhotep III in the floodplain by continuing our work at his Mansion of Millions of Years and at Birket Habu. We continued our augering and coring transect, together with ERT, eastwards for a total of 3.2 km between the Ramesseum and the W bank of the Nile.

The aim was to map the floodplain to identify the existence and location of former branches of the Nile and possible canals. Preliminary results indicate a flood basin between the Ramesses Canal (Tir’at Rameses) and el-Fâdilîya Canal.

Between the el-Fâdilîya and the active channel of the Nile the sedimentary record of the channel and island (Gezirat Sa’d) known from early maps was recorded. A series of percussion cores were carried out to the N and E of the Colossi of Memnon together with geophysics (ERT, GPR and magnetometry) in the First Court and in front of the Memnon colossi, revealing potential structures on the central axis of the temple. At Birket Habu we conducted 3D photogrammetry and GPR on the A and B mounds to the W of the birket. The GPR results show the internal structure of the mounds, including mud-brick terracing and infilling of different levels of the mounds, and possible mud-brick paved areas on the low-lying area between the mounds. http:// eestheban.tumblr.com/

SPRING 2015 Tell Mutubis: This season, a small team under Penny Wilson (Durham Univ) worked at Tell Mutubis to undertake a more extensive magnetic susceptibility (magnetometer) survey of areas of the main mound and also of the surrounding flatter areas. The team worked together with Inspectors from the Kafr el-Sheikh office and the Tell Fara’in magazine in studying the methods used at the site, the aims of the research and the skills training in using theodolites and the fluxgate magnetometer. The processing of the results is complicated by the salinity of the outlining areas and the dense red-brick and pottery coverage of the mound, but the work has shown some interesting sub-surface features. In addition, visits to outlying villages and towns were undertaken to add local information to the story of the site. http://www.dur.ac.uk/Penelope.

Wilson/Delta/Mutubis.html

Tell Buweib: Two areas were investigated in a short season by Jeffrey Spencer’s team of the EES Delta Survey in an attempt to refine the dating

Penny Wilson at Tell Mutubis.

(Photo: Chris Naunton)

Drill-coring at Naukratis. (Photo: Ben Pennington) evidence for the temple discovered in 2014. First, a building adjacent to the temple was excavated and planned. Excavation was mostly limited to the definition of the tops of the walls, but part of one room was dug to the ancient floor-level.

Pottery in the upper fill was TIP or LP, probably later than the building. The deeper fill was more problematic to date, being practically free from sherds. An administrative function seems most likely. The second part of the work was to excavate a sample area of the settlement over which the temple was constructed. Pottery found indicates an 18th Dyn date for this settlement, which was revealed to be quite widespread by surface tests. In addition to typical Egyptian vessels of the period in silt or marl clays, there were a couple of blue-painted sherds and a few imported pieces from Cyprus. http://deltasurvey. tumblr.com/

Naukratis: Working alongside the ongoing BM excavations at Naukratis, Ben Pennington (Univ of Southampton) conducted a survey of the palaeo-landscape around the site, using a handauger and drilling 17 boreholes to complement a further 18 collected during 2013-14, and 14 drilled in a previous survey in the 1970s-80s, during American investigations. The results have made it very clear that the Canopic branch of the Nile – the westernmost of the extinct major river branches in the Delta – abutted the edge of the site in antiquity, and was wide and large enough to transport substantial vessels to and from the town. Furthermore, it is becoming increasingly obvious that there was an evolving relationship between the river and the site. The river was not a static feature of the landscape 36

but as it migrated, previous waterfronts were abandoned and built over. This branch of the Nile finally silted up forever in the closing centuries of the first millennium ad.

Imbaba: In Imbaba province, a systematic gridded survey and shallow excavation of selected grid squares was conducted on the Pleistocene terraces of the Wadi Gamal to the S-W of the Neolithic settlement at Merimde Beni Salama, led by Joanne Rowland (EES/Freie Univ Berlin). The survey involved the flagging of each type of lithic, recording of the exact findspots, photography and collection for analysis.

The surface finds included lithics ranging in date from the Middle Palaeolithic to the Neolithic, and ceramics (roughwares) of Neolithic date.

Targeted shallow excavation was also carried out in two locations where dense finds of ceramics were observed on the surface, which also revealed Neolithic material. Recording and analysis of finds from the previous seasons continued, including ceramics, worked stone objects, lithic finds, and also examination of the animal and plant remains from the investigations of the summer season 2014.

Quesna: The season focused on the postexcavation analysis of finds in preparation for publication. This included the recording and analysis of ceramics from the Ptolemaic falcon necropolis and the OK mastaba tomb; osteological analysis of human remains from the OK mastaba; and conservation procedures, including the re-wrapping of finds of mummy remains from the falcon necropolis. We also conducted an archaeobotanical analysis of plant remains from previous seasons.

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Prehistoric groups along the western Nile Delta In spring 2013 a new project, the EES Imbaba Prehistoric Survey, began to work along the western Delta fringes, investigating all prehistoric activity in the region, including the Neolithic settlement at Merimde Beni Salama. Here, Joanne Rowland describes some of the preliminary results of fieldwork.

The Imbaba Prehistoric Survey developed out of the Minufiyeh Archaeological Survey in order to document and further investigate the prehistoric finds that stretch along the western Nile Delta fringes between the modern town of el-Khatatbah in the north, through the Neolithic settlement of Merimde Beni Salama, and as far south as el-Qata, a particularly important and urgent task given the growth in cultivated land along the desert edge. This covers – as the crow flies – a distance of 15 km, and the team is investigating the high Pleistocene terraces, along which groups passed already during the Palaeolithic, as well as the area descending down to the modern cultivation and the Nile floodplain to the east.

One of the key research aims, the subject of planned upcoming research, is to reconstruct the environment in the survey area, so as to better understand the natural landscape and climate, and how and why people passed through the area, stopping initially on a short-term basis, but eventually where they came to settle and implement mixed farming at sites such as Merimde Beni Salama. Since prehistory, this landscape has changed dramatically; even since the discovery of Merimde itself

by Hermann Junker and the team of the Austrian West Delta Expedition in the 1927-8 season, there has been large-scale expansion of cultivation, transforming the area from an expanse of desert that was still apparent on the CORONA satellite images from the late 1960s.

There is a long history of research at Merimde (as detailed in JEA 100), but the new project offers a regional perspective and the use of new techniques to approach new (and old) research questions, techniques that were not in common use at the time of former fieldwork in the area.

During the spring 2013 season, a geophysical survey was implemented at and around Merimde, given the great potential of magnetic survey for detecting hearths and a range of archaeological features (see Tomasz Herbich on geophysical methods in EA 41). The survey employed an array of six fluxgate gradiometer probes mounted onto a cart, which meant that it was possible to cover large areas reasonably quickly. The survey was

Above: site locations showing Merimde Beni Salama, Abu Ghalib and elQatta. (Image: Google Earth).

Below: Cornelius Meyer and Dana Pilz carrying out the magnetic survey.

(Photo: Eastern Atlas, Berlin)

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successful in detecting both natural and human-made features, including the areas that had already been disturbed by the former excavations, and an old water channel bed. At the south-western extent of the site, just east of the asphalt road, a series of anomalies was identified, circular in shape and of c. 1 m in diameter, features that may be human-made, and to the west of the road, further anomalies ranging from 0.5 to 2 m were detected; these have been interpreted as the structures associated with the Neolithic settlement. The extent of the settlement has been thought, on the basis of previous excavations, to stretch some 300 m to the east.

This evidence was further substantiated by results from the investigations of our colleagues from the Abu Roash Inspectorate, when test trenches were excavated ahead of the laying of a gas pipeline along the western Delta, revealing substantial Neolithic finds. Both pieces of evidence pointed to the fact that the Neolithic settlement – or perhaps settlements – had covered a much wider area than has been previously considered. During summer 2014, before the laying of the pipeline, the EES team opened up an excavation trench in order to test the results of the magnetic survey to the west of the modern road, which confirmed that the features do indeed date to the Neolithic and include numerous pits, one structure (only partially investigated) that appears to be a round ‘Merimde’ dwelling, and another area suggestive of communal food preparation and eating. The finds will be analysed during summer 2015 and the 2016 seasons.

On the high ground to the west of the Neolithic settlement, as well as along the desert edge north to el-Khatatbah and south to el-Qatta, prehistoric stone tools and the associated debitage have long since been found dating back to at least the Middle Palaeolithic.

As part of the new fieldwork, the team has conducted a systematic gridded collection survey on the southeastern and northwestern terraces of the Wadi Gamal, namely on either side of the ancient wadi bed. The survey has been successful in detecting distributions specifically of the Middle Palaeolithic, Epipalaeolithic and Neolithic.

What is particularly interesting is the new evidence from

Top right: the interpretative results of the magnetic survey. (Image: Eastern Atlas Berlin) Above right: a ‘Merimde’ dwelling from the 1927-28 Junker excavation. (Photo: Medelhavsmuseet Stockholm) Above: Geoffrey Tassie and Mandour Mohammed at the excavations ongoing in Trench 2, southwest of the main site of Merimde Beni Salama. (Photo: EES Imbaba Project) 38

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the survey on the Wadi Gamal southeastern terraces, which has highlighted the presence of lithic tools associated with the mobile hunter-gatherer groups of the Epipalaeolithic, a period not well known in Egypt.

This evidence from the Wadi Gamal therefore suggests a decline in groups passing through the area after the Middle Palaeolithic (c. 250,000-50,000 BP [= Before Present]) and before the Epipalaeolithic (between c.

10,600-7,500 BP), which accords with the population decline at this time suggested by Nile Valley evidence.

Subjects of future investigations will be the relationship between the Epipalaeolithic groups and the Neolithic population in the area of Merimde Beni Salama, and the question of continuity. It is possible to state already that individuals and/or groups living in the region in the Neolithic were utilising the area around the Wadi Gamal, given recent in situ findings, and to suggest that they were possibly not practicing an entirely sedentary lifestyle; a grinding stone was found upturned, with deposits of Neolithic stone tools and debitage found within their original contexts in depressions beneath the surface. The individuals may have been exploiting the area above the settlement for hunting, the processing of animal products, and cooking, as well as the manufacture of stone tools. Ongoing research in the region by the Imbaba Prehistoric Survey team will serve to shed much light on what remains a poorly understood period in Egypt’s history.

 Joanne Rowland is Director of the EES Imbaba Prehistoric Survey and a Junior Professor in Egyptian Archaeology in the Egyptology Department of the Freie Universität Berlin. The geophysical survey was carried out by Cornelius Meyer and Dana Pilz of Eastern Atlas Berlin. Funding for the pilot project at Merimde was generously provided by the Fritz Thyssen Stiftung (Grant 20.12.0.058) and the Center for International Cooperation (CIC) of the Freie Universität Berlin, with subsequent financial support from the TOPOI Excellence Cluster, Berlin, and logistical support from the Egypt Exploration Society. The support of the MSA in Cairo and our colleagues at the Abu Roash Inspectorate is gratefully acknowledged (Alaa Shahat, Wahleed Kamal, Ahmed Moussa, Mohamed Haykal, Mona Akml, Mustafa Abdel Shokour Ali, Ramadan Hassan Abdelgawad Ali, Sayed Mohammed Abdel Samad and Ashraf abd al-Aziz), as is the logistical and archaeological support of Rais Omer Farouk and his team from Quft. Thanks also to the people of Merimde Beni Salama and Ezbet el-Biali.

Above: Sebastian Falk and G. J. Tassie conducting the flagging survey on the Wadi Gamal terraces. Top: a Neolithic grinding slab from the Wadi Gamal northwest terraces. (Photos: EES Imbaba Project)

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Designed to impress: uncovering the courtyard of Theban Tomb 149 While archaeological attention normally focuses on the chapels of New Kingdom tombs, Boyo Ockinga presents a case study for a different methodology, concentrating instead on the evidence that a tomb’s courtyard can yield.

Theban New Kingdom tombs are well-known for their decorated chapels and it is on the basis of these that their, and their owners’, significance is determined. Yet this can be misleading: from the late Eighteenth Dynasty, tombs included another important architectural element, the courtyard. As the most accessible part of the tomb, it may be expected that the owners would have done their utmost to impress visitors. In evaluating a tomb, courtyards have, however, rarely been considered, as in most cases little or nothing remains of these constructions. Excavations in the courtyard of the tomb of Amenmose (TT149) conducted by the Macquarie Theban Tombs Project have illustrated how deceptive it can be to judge a tomb and its owner by the chapel alone. Amenmose’s is modest in size; its decoration very poorly preserved and his main title, ‘Royal Scribe of the Table of the Lord of the Two Lands’, seems insignificant.

The tomb’s courtyard, however, is sizable, c. 12 m wide and 9 m deep. It was very unevenly filled with debris and all that was visible of its Ramesside architecture were its pylons, preserved to a height of about 1.5 m.

After the removal of the upper layers of debris, three main occupation phases were revealed – Late Antique/ Coptic, Third Intermediate Period and Ramesside.

Poorly preserved remnants of Late Antique/Coptic structures were found in the doorway of the chapel, along the courtyard’s axis (where sections of a limestone pavement were preserved) and on top of the remains of two sets of well-built mud-brick walls that enclosed the courtyard’s north-western and south-western corners.

Notable amongst the finds from this phase are 82 Coptic and Greek inscribed papyrus fragments and seven ostraca. One of the papyri, in a fine book hand, bears part of the Coptic text of Genesis 2:19–20 on one side and Genesis 3:2–5 on the other. Some of the papyri are in Greek, which indicates an early date for the start of the Late Antique occupation phase of the tomb.

The more substantial of the walls, in the north-west corner of the courtyard, were 87-90 cm wide (three headers) and preserved to a height of 0.88 m and a length of 4.95 m; only the mud-plaster bed remained of the northern end of the north-south section of this wall. The

Aerial shot of Theban Tomb 149 and its courtyard. (Photo: Julien Cooper)

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walls in the south-west corner of the courtyard had a thickness of c. 75 cm (two headers and a stretcher). They were less well-preserved, surviving only to a height of two to four courses of bricks.

Both sets of walls were built on a hard surface that formed a horizon extending across the entire central area of the courtyard. Below the Coptic stone pavement and associated crude mud-brick steps leading down into the tomb chapel, an earlier, neatly constructed broad entrance way into the tomb chapel was revealed, its threshold at the same level as the surface on which the large walls were built.

These walls are associated with two roughly cut shafts in the north-western and south-western sections of the courtyard. Each has two burial chambers opening from the north and south sides, and above the northern shaft a stele emplacement is set into a fissure. The remains of burial equipment from the northern shaft indicate a Third Intermediate Period date for these complexes – Twenty-second Dynasty, to judge from the numerous fragments of a cartonnage mummy cover from a female burial. One bears the inscription ‘Daughter of the Chief of the Chamber of the Temple of Amun, Ankhefenkhonsu’. The broad entrance leading into the tomb chapel must date from this same period when the chapel was also reused.

Top: the courtyard after the removal of debris. (Photo: Boyo Ockinga). Above: a sandstone architectural fragment from the New Kingdom courtyard.(Photo: Leonie Donovan) 41

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In the courtyard, below the Third Intermediate Period horizon, a stratum of about 45 cm of debris was found.

Mixed in, together with large rocks and boulders, were a great number of fragments of sandstone, hundreds of which are decorated, deriving from the New Kingdom courtyard structure. The destruction of the Ramesside courtyard, perhaps by a large rockfall, occurred prior to the Third Intermediate Period since the western side of the southern shaft cut through the sandstone foundation blocks of the west courtyard wall. It is of note that the sandstone architectural fragments found were relatively small in size, suggesting that any large reusable blocks had been removed.

and cushion from a window of appearances (an opening in the façade of a palace where the pharaoh would show himself on the occasion of public ceremonies). Such a scene would have commemorated an important event in the life of Amenmose, either an appointment to office or the bestowal of a reward, and highlights Amenmose’s close connection with the king. This is also documented by the text on another fragment: ‘[Osiris] the true royal scribe, his beloved, Attendant of [the Lord of the Two Lands / the King / the Good God / the Sovereign]’.

This title is regularly held by men of high office who were close to the sovereign. The qualification ‘true’ with ‘royal scribe’ most probably indicates that he was in the personal service of the king, a conclusion backed by a title inside the tomb, ‘Head of the King’s Entire Estate’.  Boyo Ockinga is an Associate Professor in the Department of Ancient History and member of the Ancient Cultures Research Centre at Macquarie University. Since 1984 he has conducted regular fieldwork projects in Egypt at a number of sites – Nag El Mashayikh, Awlad Azzaz (Sohag), Dra Abu el-Naga (Luxor) and Saqqara. Since 1991 he has directed the Macquarie Theban Tombs Project at Dra Abu el-Naga.

Top of a cartouche: ‘Lord of Diadems’. (Photo: Leonie Donovan)

EGYPTIAN GOLD JEWELLERY

Particularly important for a proper understanding of the significance of TT149 and its original owner are the remains, in situ, of what was once a substantial and impressive courtyard: along its four sides, sandstone foundation blocks with impressions in plaster of revetment blocks that lined the courtyard walls; one of two column bases and the impression of the second from the portico, and four pillar bases and the impressions of two more pointing to the presence of colonnades on the north, west and south sides. In the south-west corner along the façade a sandstone slab was found in situ bearing remnants of decoration and a bandeau inscription. Some of the numerous fragments of sandstone pillars, columns and capitals, architraves, roof and wall slabs provide us with valuable information.

Probably the most significant is a small wall fragment with a title and the top of a cartouche, which could be reconstructed as the nomen of Ramesses II or Ramesses IV. Although the neighbouring tomb of Saroy, TT233, dates to the reign of Ramesses II, stylistically the reliefs of TT149 are identical to those of TT148, whose owner Amenemope served in the reigns of Ramesses III to V, making Ramesses IV the more likely candidate.

Not only does this fragment provide a secure date for Amenmose, it can be associated with three other fragments, one of which shows the image of a raised hand, while the other two show parts of a balustrade

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By means ans of technical examination of the gold objects now part of the renowned and outstanding Egyptian collection of the National Museum of Antiquities in Leiden, this book gives a unique and innovatory insight in the work of the ancient Egyptian goldsmith.

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Small is beautiful: the gold coffinette G.6 from KV63 Earl L. Ertman and Otto J. Schaden describe a tiny coffin, covered in gold foil, that was recovered from the embalming cache KV63

The shaft-tomb KV63 was discovered in the Valley of the Kings on 10 March 2005 and was entered on 5 February 2006. Although no royal name was found in the tomb, evidence is now pointing to it as the place where some of the left-overs from the mummification of Tutankhamun may have been deposited, whose tomb lies only a few metres away. This embalming debris had been placed in a number of large pottery jars and some of the eight wooden coffins that were found in the tomb.

Of these coffins, the two smallest (D and G.6) have gold-leaf attached to their surfaces. The latter is both the smaller and best preserved of the two, being sturdy, and, unlike most of the other coffins, undamaged and free of termite infestations. As it was contained in coffin G, it was not visible when we entered the chamber and consequently not given an identifying letter designation at that stage. Its number relates to its find spot – under five pillows and above a further one – when coffin G was opened and the contents were systematically removed and recorded (the pillows will be published by our textile

Above: Otto Schaden with the coffinette G.6. (Photo: Amenmesse Project) Left: KV63 tomb layout, showing coffin letter designations and pot numbers; coffin G is highlighted. (Map: Pieter Collet)

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specialist Elise van Rooij, together with Salima Ikram and Maryann Marazzi). Coffin G.6 (42.8 cm in length) was covered with strips of gold foil and this material is quite thin, as can be seen from several areas, mostly on the corners and base, where the surface is at present abraded and the foil is curled away from the wood.

Much of this foil was applied in thin rectangular strips in what appears to be a random pattern. The surface appearance of this object is mottled, from a pink-gold to a darkened, dull, less reflective brown surface. No inscriptions, symbols or objects were found on or in it.

The details of the recumbent figure on its lid, arms crossed over the chest, show a rather heavy wig dominating the rounded facial area with noticeable cheekbones and a slightly bulbous chin. Between the wig lappets, a horizontal line seems to denote the lowest point of a face mask, possibly made of a separate piece of wood like those of coffins of actual size. There is little definition of the inner details of the ears. The width of the mouth, with a raised upper lip, is small compared to the flaring nostrils above it. There is a short thin bridge of the nose. In profile, the tip of the nose is turned up slightly. The eye sockets are sunken, creating the eyebrows. The eyes are undefined, apparently without upper or lower lids and without any pupils. They appear to stare blankly forward and are sometimes referred to as ‘sfumato’ eyes, a term from the Italian Renaissance, meaning ‘smoky’ or ‘hazy’. One might think that these features mirror those of a young child, but that may not have been the thought or intent of the sculptor who carved them. The upper arms descend downwards parallel to the body with the forearms flexed, crossing each other over the chest. The elbows of the figure are only slightly differentiated from the torso by being raised somewhat, with thin and straight forearms, narrow

wrists and small hands. The thumbs are clearly shown with a minimal separation of the remaining digits.

The whole interior of the deep trough of this coffinette is covered with a black resinous substance, as is its outside base. The underside of the lid, rather than being domed or hollowed out to conform to a body shape as might be expected, is flat and painted black, perhaps with a material similar to that coating the interior of the coffin, with its border painted red-brown (over the black painted material) to suggest its thickness, so as to imply an actual concave shape rather than the present flat one. Even though no royal insignia or inscription seem to have ever been present on this object, the use of costly gold leaf on its surface sets it apart from most other similar funerary containers. Certainly the precious metal

The coffinette G.6: three-quarter view (above) and plan view (below).

(Photo: Heather Alexander)

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covering of the face and body indicates importance, emphasizing the status of the individual portrayed, suggesting that it might have been for a royal child. If this object was intended for a purpose other than a burial, then considerations might include its identification as a receptacle for viscera, a papyrus, shabti, heirloom or other similar object.

On the underside of the lid, the remains of some metal nails and eight wooden dowels, some of these seemingly broken off and protruding slightly out of their holes, indicate that they once secured the lid to the trough to safeguard its contents. This indicates that it had been used to contain something of importance before being relegated to a secondary use with the associated objects in KV63. When discovered, two small metal nails (probably made of copper or bronze) were in situ (but loose) hanging from the underside of the lid, facing toward the trough. Such nails are rare in coffin production. Enlargements of photographs of the bottom side of the lid reveal at least five small holes where nails had been placed. These holes are seen on both sides of the lid starting at neck height and then randomly spaced between the wooden dowels with three on the left side and two on the right toward the foot end of the coffin (as one views the lid’s underside). These small holes still contain the remains of nails (?), broken off flush with the bottom of the lid. Since there is no sign of the nail holes on the top of this lid, it must be assumed that their placement was covered by gesso before the gold leaf was applied to the surface of the lid.

Although a study of the object has revealed something about the technology used to create it, its use remains obscure. Whether it was made to contain the body of an infant or a precious object will forever remain an open question.

Left: position of the nails in the coffin lid. (Photo: Heather Alexander)

ď ą Otto J. Schaden is the Director of the Amenmesse Project, investigating KV10 and KV63. Earl L. Ertman is a Professor Emeritus, University of Akron, and Associate Director of the KV10 and KV63 mission. They would like to thank Salima Ikram for her suggestions on various drafts of this article and artist Elaine Taylor for preparing the illustrations for this article.

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Bookshelf

Wolfram Grajetzki, Tomb Treasures of the Late Middle Kingdom. Penn Press, 2013 (ISBN 978 0 812 24567 7). Price: £ 52 Tomb Treasures builds on the work of Harco Willems, Gianluca Miniaci and others including the author, who explore categories of late Middle Kingdom elite burials: courttype or Osirification burials, with especially made grave goods; and a second group with more variable grave goods, most of which were used in everyday life. Grajetzki’s focus on female burials is new. He clarifies that court-type burials were usually those of king’s daughters and adds that the noncourt-type burials can be divided into two sub-categories along a continuum.

Grajetzki writes clearly and knowledgeably, providing useful endnotes for those wishing to dig deeper. The black and white line drawings and photographs are likewise clear and sufficient, though had they been reproduced in colour, the lavish ‘gewgaws’ described in the volume could have made for a successful ‘coffee table’ volume.

T he volu me beg i n s w it h selec t ive comparisons between ancient Egyptian funerar y practices and those of other cultures, encouraging an uncritical reader to question the evidence. Chapter 1 discusses court-type burials; burials of elite women, several having the title ‘King’s Daughter’.

Grave goods include staves and weapons, mirrors, gilded coffins, and jewellery made especially for the tomb. Hair ornaments and floral headdresses, broad collars and necklaces, cowrie shell girdles, pectorals, armlets and anklets and claw amulets (which Grajetzki describes as a bird claw, though others might interpret as feline) are among the jewellery. The author explains that staves and weapons were linked with the Hour Ritual. Several of the items are either foreign-made or show foreign influence.

Chapter 2 considers burials of ‘other

women’. Their grave goods appear largely to have been worn in life and include, like the court-type, cowrie shell girdles, mirrors, and similar objects. Broad collars and pectorals, staves and weapons are not included. Chapter 3 is a more detailed analysis and comparison of grave goods with related evidence, including tomb paintings and faience ‘fertility’ figurines (though not wooden paddle dolls, which Grajetzki sees as quite separate items). Court-type jewellery assemblages include gender-neutral pieces (e.g. pectorals). There follows a framing chronological description of Egyptian burial customs, including those of men. Men’s grave goods tended to include more papyri and games. In this chapter, Grajetzki divides female non-court-type burials into two sub-groups: one with some material made especially for the grave and another with only daily-life jewellery. He also briefly describes court-type ‘Osirification’, which involved the Hour Ritual, staves and other symbols of royalty. He surmises that for other burials ‘birth protection’ items such as wands may have provided an alternative means to reach the afterlife.

Finally, Grajetzki suggests that the Hour Ritual was not simply a means of reviving the deceased women, but a means by which the women revived the king. Depictions of the king’s children in carrying chairs and images of a goddess (Repit) are also suggested as means of revivif ication; a tantalising suggestion. I wonder if the means of revivification of the king could not have, additionally, mirrored the sexualised Hathor reviving her aged father, as outlined in the Return of the Distant One. Certainly Grajetzki mentions the youthful, sexualised aspects of some of the jewellery in court and non-court burials.

Hathoric aspects of court-type assemblages are described by Grajetzki. The goddess is depicted on some of the pieces and several women included her na me in their s.

Additionally, Grajetzki notes, the king’s children were associated with Hathoric Repit. One might also add to that the youthful Hathoric rejuvenation symbolism in the use and context of floral headdresses, mirrors, etc. Floral headdresses shown in art, for example, were often worn by practitioners of Hathoric ritual.

Could this be taken further? Morris (‘Paddle Dolls and Performance’, JARCE 47) links paddle dolls, faience figures and female burials (though largely of the early Middle Kingdom), with the khener (singers and dancers) and Hathoric youthful and sexualised rites intended to revive the ailing sun-god/king. Many khener ornaments described by Morris also appear in elite burials, particularly the court-type. While Grajetzki supposes that older women’s burials lacked finery because they had given it to younger women, alternatively, perhaps, the finery of the king’s daughters and other nfrwt of the royal household parallel youthful Hathor and khener. Contemporary literature suggests royal daughters revived the king through sexualised Hathorian actions; a role

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suggested for New Kingdom princesses by David O’Connor. The question remains, however, how did non-court women enter the afterlife? I remain intrigued and inspired to research further, always the sign of a successful book.

CAROLYN GRAVES-BROWN

Aidan Dodson, Amarna Sunrise: Egypt from Golden Age to Age of Heresy. AUC Press, 2014 (ISBN 978 9 77416 633 4). Price: £ 25 In the preface, Dodson describes this book as a ‘prequel’ to his Amarna Sunset (2009; reviewed in Egyptian Archaeology 37, 2010), encompassing the religious and political history of Egypt from the later reign of Amenhotep II down to where Sunset took up the story in Akhenaten’s 12th regnal year.

After the brief introduction covering the time from the expulsion of the Hyksos down through the final years of Thutmose III, the initial chapter is devoted to Amenhotep II and Thutmose IV. Comparatively little updating is necessary of the studies of those reigns by Peter Der Manuelian (1987) and Betsy M. Bryan (1991), respectively, cited frequently in the endnotes. For the longer second chapter on Amenhotep III’s reign, Dodson can draw upon – and disagree with – Arielle Kozloff’s recent monograph (2012) about the ‘radiant pharaoh’. The building programme of his reign passes in review, and the coregency debate is considered once again (Dodson rejects the idea) before relations with the ‘Asiatic’ potentates of the Near East under Amenhotep III are examined.

With Chapter 3 the reader arrives at the accession of Amenhotep IV, followed by his change of name and transmogrification into ‘Effective-spirit-of-Aten’ – Dodson’s translation of Akhenaten. The foundation of the new capital city in Middle Egypt

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concludes the chapter. After comparing its layout to the programmatic texts of the boundary stelae at the beginning of Chapter 4, Dodson devotes some pages to the ‘Hymn to the Aten’ (perhaps a bit long, as it differs little from Murnane’s in his Texts of the Amarna Period in Egypt, 1995). He then turns to foreign relations; the chapter concludes with the great durbar of Year 12 where Sunset began.

In the f ifth and f inal chapter, Dodson reiterates his take on the last years of Akhenaten and the succession as argued in Sunset. There has been no response in print to date (apart from the objections I expressed in EA 37) to Dodson’s proposal that Nefertiti was first the coregent of her spouse and then, after he died, of (their son) Tutankhaten with his nearly decade-long reign counted from Akhenaten’s death. Of course, Nefertiti’s survival of her husband is crucial for his thesis. He mentions the recently discovered graffito that names the queen in her husband’s 16th regnal year (Athena Van der Perre, Journal of Egyptian History 7). Both she and Dodson seem unaware that analysis of labels on wine amphorae from Amarna (published in 1997) had already made it highly likely that she was alive in Akhenaten’s final 17th regnal year. Regardless, neither graffito nor labels furnish support for the theory that Nefertiti was coregent with either her husband or her putative son – only that she was alive towards the end of Akhenaten’s reign.

Dodson says little about most monuments he lists and illustrates. While illustrations are numerous, their often small scale and

ARCHAEOLOGY

rendering in monochrome tend to make them less attractive than they could be and sometimes hard to decipher – a problem that confronts all of us when marketing strategies mandate a smaller format than we might consider ideal. In such circumstances, illustrating and elucidating relevant details is in the best interest of readers.

The chronology of the Eighteenth Dynasty presented in the first of four appendices differs somewhat from Sunset (e.g., Amenhotep III is now allotted a 40-year reign). The second appendix correlating Near Eastern rulers with Egypt’s pharaohs is expanded to accommodate the reigns of Amenhotep II and Thutmose IV as well as Mitannian rulers omitted from Sunset. The complete titularies of Amenhotep II, Thutmose IV, and Amenhotep III are added to the list in appendix 3 while those of Tutankhaten/ Tutankhamun, Ay, and Horemheb are omitted. The transcription of all variants but with neither suggested translations nor discussion in the text raises a question that occurred to me repeatedly when reading this book: for whom is it intended? Lay readers, even those well-versed and very interested in the Amarna Period, and all but advanced graduate students will not benefit from this appendix nor from many of the references in the endnotes. These are of the author + date type, as in Sunset, obliging the reader who encounters a note in the text to go from the endnotes to the bibliography. Often enough the search does not end there, especially when the reference for a monument or site is to one of the volumes of the Topographical Bibliography,

the specialist’s standard reference work.

The fourth and f inal appendix tackles the genealogy of the Eighteenth Dynasty and the problems created – not solved – by the publication in 2010 of analyses of data obtained from CT scanning and DNA sampling by the team headed by Zahi Hawass.

Dodson’s system of differentiating likenamed individuals by adding a letter or number is not ‘a basic system that has been developing in Egyptology since the 1970s’, except among specialists dealing with Third Intermediate Period personalities.

It has certainly not caught on for the New Kingdom.

Anyone interested in the Amarna Period and its aftermath quickly becomes well acquainted with the dilemma of keeping up-to-date: new theories (less frequently, new data) are published continuously.

Dodson’s impressive bibliography of over 30 pages lists many titles that were new to this reviewer. Among those that are conspicuous by their absence is Susanne Bickel’s publication (1997) of the blocks from Amenhotep III’s funerary temple reused in the construction of Merenptah’s (fig. 101 which is also reproduced, in colour, on the dust jacket). Also not cited is Herman Schlögl’s comparatively modest Nofretete – Die Wahrheit über die schöne Königin (2012), which may have appeared after Dodson submitted his manuscript; not so, however, Dimitri Laboury’s extensive study Akhénaton (2010). Both authors present a rather different picture of the ‘heretic’s’ reign than Dodson.

MARIANNE EATON-KRAUSS

Authorized bookseller for the Egypt Exploration Society

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known as the donor of the homoerotic ‘Warren Cup’ in the British Museum), thence to the Boston Museum of Fine Arts where it now enjoys considerable fame.

As Berman points out, it is easy to forget the head once was attached to a body. Had the statue survived intact it is unlikely to have received such acclaim. In its detached state, modern attention is focussed on the face; indeed, the realism of the countenance (whether or not it was intended to represent a unique, living individual) was probably an ancient means to attract attention to the sculpture, and thus increase desired interaction with living temple staff.

Berman’s book is to be highly recommended for the different (often very colourful) stories behind this incredible face that it throws into relief. Imagine how many other stories like this await the telling!

CAMPBELL PRICE

Lawrence M. Berman, The Priest, the Prince and the Pasha: The Life and Afterlife of an Ancient Egyptian Sculpture. MFA Publications, 2015 (ISBN 978 0 87846 796 9). Price: £ 15 So-called ‘masterpieces’ do not, in reality, exist in the same isolation in which they are so often displayed in modern museums – appreciated as ‘art’ but largely decontextualised from their intended settings. The present volume is a very welcome reminder that all objects, however aesthetically pleasing or seemingly without the need of explanation, are a nexus of (hi-) stories and values.

The Boston Green Head is arguably (to modern sensibilities, at least) the finest piece of ‘portrait’ sculpture to have survived from Late Period Egypt. Around half-lifesize, its dating has been notoriously difficult to pin down but the Thirtieth Dynasty suggestion implicitly endorsed by Berman (p. 150, and n. 29) seems most likely.

Larry Berman’s book skilfully draws together the threads of a remarkable object biography, beginning with the Serapeum excavations of Auguste Mariette. There is no question that, even by 1850s standards, Mariette was dreadful at recording his archaeological work and unscrupulous in his ethics. Flinders Petrie took a very dim view of him, claiming (Seventy Years in Archaeology, p. 49-50) that Mariette’s workers supplied extraneous objects to an unpromising area to keep his interest. Even so, the origin of the Green Head in a mixed cache of temple sculpture deposited near the Serapeum (reported second-hand but championed by the author) seems plausible.

In 1858, Egypt’s ruler Mohammed Said Pasha appointed Mariette Director of Antiquities, giving him sufficient authority to export objects in large numbers. It was thus as part of a shipment of material from the Serapeum that the little Green Head was sent, among other objets d’art, to impress the impetuous Prince ‘Plon-plon’ (nephew and namesake of Emperor Napoleon I).

The Head found an incongruous home at the Prince’s Pompeian-style villa in Avenue Montaigne, Paris, whence it eventually passed into the possession of wealthy gay aesthete Edward Perry Warren (better

It is not often that a prospective reviewer is able to listen to her author converse on the experience of composing his (or her) book. But that was exactly my privilege when I attended Jason Thompson’s one-hour keynote address at the ASTENE (Association for the Study of Egypt and the Near East) biennial conference, held in Exeter this past July.

Focusing on the researching and writing of his Wonderful Things, Thompson described the necessity for a ‘committed, sustained effort’ to produce what is ultimately designed to be a four-volume work. Volume 1, here under review, takes us to the death of Mariette in January 1881, while the second, due in September 2015, covers the period until the outbreak of the First World War in 1914. The third volume, scheduled to appear in 2016, will take us to the present day, while a fourth pictorial grand finale with a supplementary video is being contemplated for 2017.

Jason Thompson br ings a wealth of prior experience to what he describes as a ‘mountainous’ undertaking. He is the author of an earlier History of Egypt (2008), which together with his weighty monographs on Sir John Gardner Wilkinson (2008) and Edward William Lane (2010) was similarly published by the American University in Cairo Press.Yet Thompson describes himself as an outsider looking in on the discipline of Egyptology, much like Alice through the looking glass.

His credentials are as a historian of the British Empire and the Middle East, concerned with the encounter between the West and the East.

I have no doubt that it is this outsider perspective that makes Thompson uniquely fitted for what is a long-awaited task. As I know from my own writing and teaching on the history of Egyptology, a Eurocentric approach is no longer sustainable and we must deconstruct our discipline by engaging in a firm analysis of its Egyptian underpinnings in relation to that histor ic East-West encounter. Rather than choosing to start in the traditional manner with Napoleon in 1798 or Champollion in 1822, it is therefore immensely pleasing that, as his sub-title makes clear, Thompson commences his history at the very beginning: in the Middle Kingdom of c. 2000 bc. Moreover, he makes clear that he views this ‘not merely as a preface to the history of Egyptology, but as a component of it’. He also gives appropriate attention to the 48

Medieval Arab input, and to individuals such as the Egyptian-Armenian Joseph Hekekyan Bey from the nineteenth century, stating that his ‘archaeological accomplishments have gone largely unrecognized’.

The lack of a pictorial dimension implies that the text must speak for itself, especially when discussing topics such as art and photography.

Thompson’s aim is to present a strong narrative line to track the incremental progress of Egyptology while acknowledging that ‘stringing together the formation of knowledge is hard’. He presents a rich tapestry for analysis: great personalities and their rivalries, such as Richard Lepsius and his ‘upstart rival’ Heinrich Brugsch, alongside less illuminated minor characters. Egyptophiles Johann Lieder, director of the Cairo mission of the Church Missionary Society, and his wife Alice are a case in point. While Johann proved very useful to Lepsius in managing his expedition, we learn that Alice’s ‘investigations at Saqqara may have come close to anticipating Mariette’s discovery of the Serapeum’. Thompson is aided throughout by his ability to write.Thus, what he has to say about his queen of travel writers holds equally true for himself: ‘Amelia Edwards could write purple prose with the best – or compose passages that were meticulously descriptive, succinct, and to the point’.

There has never been a better time to write this history, given the availability of accessible archives, biographies (Who Was Who in Egyptology, now in its fourth edition, is a resource unique to our discipline), and oral histories (I would here encourage Thompson to rework my own 1992 interviews, subsequently digitized by the Egypt Exploration Society).

While no history of Egyptology can ever hope to be complete, and individual countries and institutions must set about compiling their own narratives, we await with anticipation the follow-up volumes. Wonderful Things deserves to become the essential resource for decades to come.

ROSALIND JANSSEN

Jason Thompson, Wonderful Things: A History of Egyptology (1: From Antiquity to 1881). AUC Press, 2015 (ISBN 978 9 77416 599 3). Price: £ 24.95

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No. 47 Autumn 2015

Graeco-Roman Archives from the Fayum

EGYPTIAN ARCHAEOLOGY

By K. Vandorpe, W. CLarysse & H. VerretH the Fayum is a large depression in the western desert of egypt, receiving its water directly from the nile. In the early ptolemaic period the agricultural area expanded a great deal, new villages were founded and many Greeks settled here. When villages on the outskirts were abandoned about ad 300-400, houses and cemeteries remained intact for centuries. Here were found thousands of papyri, ostraca (potsherds) and hundreds of mummy portraits, which have made the area famous among classicists and art historians alike. Most papyri and ostraca are now scattered over collections all over the world. the sixth volume of Collectanea Hellenistica presents 145 reconstructed archives originating from this region, including private, professional, official and temple archives both in Greek and in native demotic.

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T he B ulletin of T he E gypt E xploration S ociety

2015 – Collectanea Hellenistica 6 496 p.

105 euro IsBn 978-90-429-3162-6

Engineering and Construction in Egypt’s Early Dynastic Period

O r i e n tA L i A L O vA n i e n s i A A n A L e c tA

A.s. LA LOggiA – engineering And cOnstructiOn in egyPt’s eArLy dynAstic PeriOd

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By a.s. La LoGGIa

Engineering and Construction in Egypt’s Early Dynastic Period

by

angela sophia la loggia

Peeters

Peeters

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2015 – orientalia Lovaniensia analecta 239 X-208 p.

85 euro IsBn 978-90-429-3181-7

SYLVIE CAUVILLE MOHAMMED IBRAHIM ALI

DENDA R A ITINÉRAIRE DU VISITEUR

Price £5.95

throughout history people have marvelled at the pyramids, from the elemental beauty of the step pyramid of djoser to the monumental scale and engineering achievement of the Great pyramid in Giza. the knowledge needed to build such grand monuments was vast, but not acquired overnight. the precursors to the pyramids, the massive mud brick tombs of the First and second dynasties, reveal a high degree of proficiency, ingenuity and capability by the architects, engineers and builders of that time. these mud brick structures, built almost five centuries before the Giza pyramids, reveal a structured and well organised society with well developed construction and management skills. In fact, the construction time and labour force requirements in these earlier structures were efficient and small in comparison to ventures in the proceeding dynasties. It is through these structures – and the development of the skills and diversity of industries required to sustain the building of them – that the foundation for the economic and social development of future generations and the dawn of large scale stone construction was laid.

Dendara Itinéraire du visiteur par s. CauVILLe & M. IBraHIM aLI Le site de dendara, avec ses temples et ses dépendences, est un des plus beaux et des mieux préservés de l’Égypte entière. L’Itinéraire en décrit tous les édifices en insistant particulièrement sur les plafonds étoilés à sujet astronomique, l’ensemble osirien – unique dans le pays – et des multiples rituels représentés, en hiéroglyphes et en images, sur les parois. Celles-ci viennent d’être restaurées par le service des antiquités de l’Égypte et les somptueuses couleurs du passé revivent; quelque trois cents photos rendent compte de cette splendeur retrouvée.

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