20 - 26 December 2001
Issue No.565
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Al-Ahram Weekly Online 20 - 26 December 2001 Issue No.565 |
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Dancing with tomb robbers
History is disappearing day by day at the hands of tomb robbers. They dig in the dead of night to steal treasures from ancient burial grounds. This is one of the biggest problems facing Egyptologists today. We are in a race against time to excavate and record our history and, more importantly, preserve the great monuments and learn about the amazing ancient Egyptian civilisation before it is ruthlessly pillaged or destroyed by environmental pollution and other causes. Each time we discover an artefact, another piece of the puzzle of ancient history can be set in place, and gaps in our knowledge filled.
Stealing antiquities is not a syndrome of the modern era; it has been happening since the time of the Pharaohs. The ancient Egyptians protected the mummified remains of their ancestors and their funerary treasures in their burial chambers by blocking the entrances. The entrance to the Great Pyramid was so well hidden that it was not found until the ninth century AD, when the soldiers of Ma'moun, son of Haroun El-Rashid of Arabian Nights fame, opened it; this entrance is now known by his name.
As for the entrance to the subsidiary pyramid of an unknown queen of King Menkaura -- grandson of Khufu, the builder of the third pyramid at Giza -- this was cut into the rock and extends for about 19 metres, but is only about 15cms wide. At the end of the passage the pyramid builders put a granite slab to block the entrance to the burial chamber.
When I entered this pyramid I found myself launched on an adventure. I was accompanied by an American television anchorwoman, Suzy Gilbert, who was filming a live documentary on the pyramids of Giza. The film was a FOX TV production being shown on prime time in the United States. One scene was devoted to entering the pyramid.
Suzy and I crawled down the passage, but when I reached the granite slab and tried to squeeze into the burial chamber I got stuck. I could not move because I had a camera attached to my back. There I was, stuck, on live TV, and many of my friends who were watching the programme told me later they were worried. Luckily for me, Suzy came to my rescue. She removed the camera so as to enable me to enter the burial chamber unhindered.
I was not the first to enter the pyramid of the unknown queen. It had been opened in 1881, as was clear from the date written on the wall of the burial chamber, and George Reisner from the Museum of Fine Arts of Boston later excavated the pyramid. The amazing thing about it is that it was never used for the burial of a queen. I could not find any evidence that anyone had ever been buried in it.
Despite all attempts by the ancient Egyptians to protect their pyramids and tombs, they were broken into. The robbers usurped objects, and desecrated and stole the mummies of the Pharaohs and their funerary equipment. Only a few tombs have ever been found intact. Among them were King Tutankhamun in the Valley of the Kings and the royal tombs of the 22nd Dynasty at Tanis in the Delta.
Another intact tomb that was saved from destruction or pillage by robbers was the tomb of Queen Hetep- Heres, Khufu's mother. The story of this discovery is very interesting. In the absence of expedition director Reisner, the photographer of the expedition of Harvard University and the Museum of Fine Arts was working on the east side of Khufu's pyramid when he chanced upon an intact shaft. He immediately sent a telegram to Reisner in Boston.
As soon as Reisner arrived, excavation proceeded and the treasures of the queen were found buried in a 30-metre shaft but, surprisingly, there was no body. Reisner believed that the queen was originally buried in Dahshur, beside her husband, and that when the tomb was robbed during the reign of her son Khufu, he immediately sent officials to transfer her body and the contents of her tomb to Giza. The officials went to Dahshur at night and moved all the contents of the tomb to Giza as instructed, but could find no trace of Queen Hetep-Heres' body. Had thieves already stolen the royal mummy? The officials did not tell the king about the missing body of his mother. They simply sealed the shaft.
It is amazing that the tomb of Queen Hetep-Heres should have been robbed at Dahshur during the reign of the powerful King Khufu, the builder of the one of the greatest tombs ever, the Great Pyramid of Giza. This story reveals that the officials were somewhat scared to tell the king about the missing mummy of his mother. They simply dug the shaft and stored the treasure brought from Dahshur. Now in Cairo's Egyptian Museum, these were so remarkable and so numerous that Reisner spent 10 years in Egypt excavating the shaft and documenting its contents.
The ancient Egyptians were well aware of the activities of tomb robbers. They tried to protect their mortal remains by writing curse inscriptions. These texts were inscribed at the tomb's entrance and acted as warnings to thieves. In one of the tombs that I found in Giza, the owner, a certain Petty who was one of the artisans involved in building the pyramids, wrote:
All the people who enter this tomb
Who will make evil against this tomb and destroy it
May the crocodile be against them
And the snakes against them on land
May the hippopotamus be against them in water
The scorpion against them on landWe are still dancing with tomb robbers.
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