Screen rites

How many Al-Ahram Weekly readers saw the marvellous British television documentary screened on Channel 5 on 10 July 2007? Jill Kamil describes the event for those who missed it

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It was quite by chance that I turned on the TV last summer and found myself watching the most gratifying coverage of an excavation I have ever seen. The subject of the documentary was an intact chamber at the bottom of a shaft not far from the tomb of Tutankhamun in the Valley of the Kings. No fewer than seven coffins were discovered -- two of them apparently intact -- along with 29 large storage jars. Since the step-by-step coverage of the excavation may not be screened again -- and even if it is, people may not have a chance to see it -- I shall describe the events that led up to the official opening of the large sealed coffin in an ongoing and enormously challenging project.

Otto Schaden, an American Egyptologist who has cleared and re-investigated several known tombs in the western Valley of the Kings over a period of 30 years, made this remarkable discovery back in February 2006. The chamber with its contents lay about five metres underground and, while the storage jars in the foreground seemed to be sealed and intact, most of the coffins to the rear of the chamber were badly damaged -- apart, that is, from one large one, and one small, that appeared to be intact. What happened during the rest of the archaeological season, right through to the opening of the intact coffin, was filmed down to the last detail.

How was this possible? How did a whole year's filming take place when, according to the antiquities law, the Egyptian inspector who accompanies each mission is committed to writing a monthly report on the work procedures, the mission's commitment to the regulations, and progress of work? Anyone who has excavated in Egypt well knows that no discoveries can be announced, let alone screened, without the authorisation of the SCA secretary-general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, Zahi Hawass. Well, actually, he featured briefly at the beginning of the documentary, when he is seen walking up the Valley of the Kings towards the shaft, and at the end when he says a few words about the significance of the discovery. But it is what happened in between that counts. Here is the all-inclusive archaeological drama as recorded and screened to the world's public last summer.

When Otto Schaden first entered the shaft and saw the objects in the unadorned chamber underground, he realised the potential importance of the discovery. Might the large intact coffin hold a body, and if so, might it be royal? In the earlier days of archaeological exploration, up to the mid-20th century, the storage jars in the foreground would have been rapidly removed, and also the damaged coffins, in order to give access to the one or two that might hold a body and provide vital clues. In this age of modern archaeology, however, before the coffin could be reached and examined, the storage jars had to be removed and their contents fully recorded. Schaden recruited specialists to help with this work.

Ken Armstrong, an expert in ancient human remains was the first to be drafted, and the film opens as he and Schaden enter the tomb. They comment about the musty smell, note that there is hard black resin on some of the coffins, and also that the wood on most has been seriously damaged by termites. They would be difficult to examine, let alone remove. The two confer, and mention is made of the need to work quickly because of the approach of summer. Schaden talks of rain and the possibility of flash floods, and stresses that so long as the tomb remains open the coffins are in danger.

Archaeologist Heather Alexander was the next to be recruited to join the mission. She supervised the removal of the storage jars -- a difficult and time-consuming task. Each had to be carefully wrapped prior to being lifted up the very narrow vertical shaft to ground level, and since each jar weighed up to 50kg handling them was a technical challenge. Schaden set up a lab in one of the chambers of a nearby empty tomb, and while the jars were being placed there questions naturally arose as to what they might contain. Perhaps there were texts that would identify the owners of the coffins. Hopefully there would be. Would there be evidence that might link the owners, or at least one owner of a coffin, to the nearby tomb of Tutankhamun?

Salima Ikram, a specialist in mummification rituals, was given the task of opening the jars. Each was sealed with a heavy layer of plaster and mud. "The most exciting thing is to open something that has been sealed for over 3,000 years," Ikram said to the camera before commencing her task. "Each time one opens a jar one is making a discovery, and it is rare to have that kind of experience for an archaeologist today." Rare for an archaeologist to be sure, but rarer still for a camera to be rolling and us to be witnessing all that was going on.

With the camera focussed on her gloved hands, and under the watchful and anxious eyes of Schaden, Ikram chipped away at the plaster of the first vessel. As she took hold of it she shouted, "Hurry up, I can't hold..." It was far heavier than she had expected. Then she peered into the jar, and "... look at that, look at that ! Oh ... oh... wooooohh....!" She pulled out a succession of objects. The carved wooden head of a cobra.... Her beaming face... Otto's gratified grin: "We'll keep it!" he says. Laughter. Ikram emptied the jars at the rate of five a day. A fragment with an inscription was found, then a second. Schaden takes them away for study. The text is in hieratic and reads, "Made during the fifth year of the reign of the Pharaoh." But the key word, the Pharaoh's name, is missing. Other material, including miniature bowls, however, suggest the 18th Dynasty -- the era of Amarna and Tutankhamun.

Work on the contents of the storage jars continues, especially the search for the illusive inscription that might explain the burial and reveal its owner. Some of them are found to contain inscribed seals made of mud, and Ikram explains to the camera: "Whenever the priests who were in charge of the Valley of the Kings closed something up they would put their stamp on it." The seals she found were those of the necropolis, the best piece of dating evidence. Unfortunately, the inscriptions were too small to read easily.

The next scene filmed is of a man peering into a microscope; then a spotlight on a portable computer -- a jar to the left, a ladder to the right. Then the rough wall of the chamber containing the coffins, and a shot of Earl Ertman, another scholar, handling the tiny seal fragments trying to make head or tail of them. Ikram delving into yet another jar to extract its contents. Schaden hovering anxiously. One begins to sense something. Frustration? Anticipation? Tension builds. And we, the viewers, are right there in the very heart of the action.

With my eyes glued to the TV, thoughts ran through my mind. How was it that this discovery could be filmed in such minute detail without it being generally known? Archaeological teams who work in Egypt have to abide by the rules and regulations of the SCA, the formal and complex procedures. How was this film shot without the visible presence of an SCA inspector? Simply, all those involved were sworn to secrecy. And the secret was kept until the official opening of the large coffin by Zahi Hawass. It took weeks before the team uncovered evidence that pointed to a particular Pharaoh... and still the members of the mission remained tight-lipped as to whom they thought it could be. They knew they would be in big trouble if they made any premature announcements that there was some small indication of a possible link with Tutankhamun.

Nadia Lukma, Egypt's top conservation expert, was called in to supervise the removal of the damaged coffins. She said that she "... left everything in Cairo to come here because this is very important, very unique." Seated in front of one of the disintegrated coffins, she commented: "It is a challenge. The wood is so brittle that it must be reinforced before any attempt is made to lift them." The camera followed Lukma as she filled tiny holes with cotton wool and a solvent, explaining that it "bonds the pieces of wood together as it dries". We watch her at work, a close-up of her hands as they tear small pieces of cotton and insert them with needle or spatula into tiny cavities in the wood. With assistants on hand working under her guidance, this process took nearly a month to complete. The team was getting anxious. Impatient. Egyptologist Edwin Brock spots damaged inscriptions on the rear wall of the chamber. The camera moves in, hoping that he can identify them. He shakes his head. "We will just have to wait and see, won't we?" he says.

Finally, Schaden shared his and his team's observations with SCA Inspector Mansour Boraik, who endorsed their findings. He inspected seals that have been found in some of the jars, accedes that there is evidence on at least one of them of the Aten, the sun-disk, which is clear indication that the burials date to the era of Akhenaten, the Amarna period and the parents of Tutankhamun. There is an intense debate beneath a makeshift tent, and it is decided that the time is ripe to make an official announcement to the SCA, and, once the last of the damaged coffins in the chamber is removed, get to the sealed coffins and see what they hold. Inspector Boraik is visibly on hand during this stage of the operation, and he is as anxious as everyone else to see if there were any inscriptions on the coffins. However, it is a painfully slow process to consolidate and then remove the broken coffins, and wait patiently is what they did. But eventually the day came when all of them had been removed from the chamber and the two intact coffins to the rear were accessible.

There is nothing quite like the opening of a sealed coffin to stimulate adrenaline, and this is a photo opportunity of the first order for the charismatic Zahi Hawass, the guardian of the monuments of Egypt, who so courts the spotlight. Wherever he goes high ranking officials and the press photographers go with him, and here was no exception. Foreign missions sometimes accuse him of creating so much bureaucratic red-tape that he hinders their activities, but he responds, "I safeguard our monuments, our heritage."

And so Zahi Hawass is filmed marching towards the shaft in the Valley of the Kings followed by his entourage and the press. He descends the ladder to the tiny chamber -- and scrambling after him, in close succession, come officials, reporters, photographers, and some who always manage, on such occasions, to squeeze their way to the front ranks. We get a shot of Boraik trying to control the mass of "-- hangers on", and of conservationist Lukma trying to push a photographer away from the coffin, fearing it might be damaged. And then the next moment she places her hand over her mouth and her eyes shut in an expression of total frustration. The scene is one of chaos, utter chaos. By the time Hawass had taken his position beside the large coffin and turned round, the chamber is chock-a-block full, and to his horror Hawass realises that Otto Schaden is not beside him. After three exhausting months of work the discoverer of the tomb had been unable to follow the scramble into the tomb! A close up of Hawass sweating profusely, his usual poise gone, yelling that he would dismiss everyone from the tomb if there was not some sort of order. He said, "I repeat this to you, in English and in Arabic." And then, "Dr Schaden, please come in...make way for Dr Schaden."

Finally the stage is set for the grand opening. The small coffin proves to be a disappointment. It contains nothing of interest. The lid of the large coffin is now carefully prepared for raising and lifting to safety. Schaden and Hawass lean forward to shine their torches inside. There is a close up of their faces peering... anxious moments... then the camera focuses on the image of the face of a woman on a wooden inner coffin... and the sound of Lukma's voice saying, "... the princess." But who is she? What could have been a spellbinding moment in the history of archaeology was suddenly less than that. Although the face on the coffin is beautifully carved, and in fairly good condition, there is no indication of for whom it was made. Nor are any of the funerary objects particularly noteworthy in the light of what had been expected. The mummy, moreover, is missing. No body, no proof.

Yet the filming continues. Hawass is on site. And so he does the best he can in such circumstances. He opines that the coffin must belong to the mother of Tutankhamun. "I feel from the way the eye is drawn, and the nose and the lips -- I can feel from the art style that the face is similar to that of King Tut," he says. And then, "this could be the face of Tutankhamun's mother...Kia."

Does what is now known as Tomb KV 63 hold the key to Tutankhamun's lost family? Only further study will show. Conclusive proof is needed but there remains a mystery.

As the 2007/2008 archaeological season begins, we hear that Schaden will receive clearance of his papers by the SCA by January 2008, and then work can re-commence in the royal valley.

Postscript

WHEN I returned to Egypt and started to write up the documentary drama on the discovery of KV 63, I learned that the programme had attracted a total of 407,000 viewers in one record-breaking time slot on Discovery Channel Canada, followed by 314,000 viewers in another. Also, that Zahi Hawass, secretary-general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, had changed his opinion on the significance of the discovery three times during the excavation. In his first announcement he speculated that "the tomb" contained the bodies of important officials. A month later, on 3 March 2006, he admitted that he had been mistaken, and said that the structure was not a tomb at all, but a "storage chamber" containing burial and embalming equipment -- in other words it was a chamber for carrying out mummification. Finally came the declaration, as filmed in the documentary, that KV 63 was indeed a tomb, a royal tomb, and that it was for King Tutankhamun's mother Queen Kiya.

The puzzle is that it is not known with any certainty who was King Tutankhamun's mother; there are no inscriptions within the tomb, nor tomb artefacts that give specific evidence for whom the chamber was made; and there was no mummy in any of the seven coffins!

C a p t i o n : from left:Otto Schaden on site; Kia's coffin

Al-Ahram Weekly Online : Located at: http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2008/880/heritage.htm