Beneath the Sands of Egypt

by Donald P. Ryan, PhD

  Carter, at the time, had been contracted to do some archaeological work for the eccentric American millionaire Theodore Davis. Davis, an amateur archaeologist, hired Carter to conduct excavations on his behalf in the Valley of the Kings. Davis had the concession to dig wherever he chose in the sacred valley, and despite his armchair background he was exceedingly successful in uncovering some wonderfully provocative tombs. He was also responsible for finding a cache of embalming materials belonging to a then-obscure pharaoh named Tutankhamun, a discovery that provided evidence that the king’s burial was yet to be found somewhere in the valley. When a small tomb was discovered in 1907, Davis concluded that this must be the woefully robbed tomb of the little-known king and moved on, although Carter himself remained skeptical.

  If Howard Carter’s notes regarding KV 60 are brief, Theodore Davis himself has even less to say about the experience: “During the season of 1904–5, Mr. Carter, while excavating for Mr. Davis, dug a trench across the entrance to this tomb, and discovered a tomb of the XVIIIth Dynasty, over which the tomb of Mentuherkhepshef had been cut. This earlier burial he found to contain the mummies of two women. The tomb had been plundered and contained nothing of interest.”

  The words “nothing of interest” certainly confirm the early-twentieth-century attitude about these smaller tombs, an attitude so blasé that the wrong year was given in Davis’s description of the find.

  Just a month or two before he encountered Tomb 60, Howard Carter discovered in the same vicinity the large, decorated, and looted tomb of the great Eighteenth Dynasty pharaoh Thutmose IV. In fact, an old rope, likely used by robbers three thousand years ago, was found tied to a pillar in order to facilitate the crossing of a deep shaft, and a large ancient cursive graffito records an inspection of the tomb after the robbery. Though the tomb was robbed in antiquity, there was an impressive residual collection of battered burial debris found along with the pharaoh’s magnificent stone sarcophagus, sans mummy, that dominated the spacious burial chamber.

  Given the prevailing outlook of the day and the continual search for more “significant” discoveries, it is not surprising that Tomb 60 drifted quickly into obscurity. Carter closed the tomb, probably filling it with the debris of continuing excavations, but its history was far from over. The tomb was likely entered three years later, in 1906, by another excavator, Edward Ayrton, while he was in the process of excavating KV 19. We know of this visit only indirectly, through a handwritten notation in the Egyptian Museum’s inventory catalog, the Journal d’Entrée, which records the acquisition of a coffin with a mummy, “recognized by Carter as having been found by him near Menthuherkhepeshef in 1903. It was brought away later by (Ayrton?).” No mention was made of the second mummy in the tomb, found lying on its floor. Might it and other burial remnants still remain within? Sometime, perhaps immediately, after this second modern visit to the tomb, KV 60 became once again buried and its specific location lost, destined to remain obscure for another eighty years.

  As Carter noted, the mummy in Cairo retrieved by Ayrton was initially identified by hieroglyphs on the coffin in which she lay, yet later research revealed that she was not the nurse of pharaoh Thutmose IV but rather served that role for Hatshepsut, the controversial woman who ruled over Egypt for about twenty years. Her name was Sitre (Daughter of the god Re), and her nickname was “In” (Fish). A shattered statue of this woman was discovered at the site of Hatshepsut’s temple, on the other side of the cliffs from the valley, and depicts her seated with the young queen/pharaoh-to-be seated on her lap. The location of Tomb 60 would perhaps seem to make sense, then, because the closest royal tomb of the appropriate date was indeed that of Hatshepsut nearby.

  Out of respect for Elizabeth Thomas, I added KV 60 to my list of requests to be submitted for approval to the Egyptian antiquities authorities. If the situation presented itself sometime during the next few years, perhaps I would spend a moment contemplating the location of this long-missing tomb. The scenario as it played out, however, would be quite different.

  It was late June 1989 when we arrived in Luxor to begin our work on the valley’s undecorated tombs, and the intense summer heat had already arrived a couple of months before. We spent a day getting established, negotiating a reasonable long-term rate with our hotel manager, and rounding up the supplies we would need to begin work. I was accompanied by one of my former professors, Mark Papworth, a brilliant thinker and the unsung co-instigator of a major theoretical revolution that swept through American archaeology in the 1960s and ’70s. We were also joined by Hisham Hegazy, an inspector with the Antiquities Service who worked as a freelance archaeologist from time to time. I had met him the year before, while spending a few weeks on an excavation in the Nile Delta directed by another former professor. Handsome, charming, and with a reasonably good command of the English language, Hisham was a wonderful asset with his knowledge of local archaeology and the system that governs it.

  The morning of June 26 had been spent making sure all was in order with the local authorities, and by the time that had been dealt with, the solar inferno was in full effect. We set off to the valley that day to orient ourselves to our work site and drop off a few brooms, hoes, and buckets. The ride up the valley was especially searing, even with the windows of our rented car wide open. Our driver pulled up as close to the entrance as possible, the souvenir dealers having already locked up their little trinket kiosks and disappeared for the day. It was exciting to be in the valley on official business, not merely as a tourist. We rounded the corner by the old rest house, heading toward the valley’s eastern cliff, passing the remarkable tombs of Rameses I and Seti I. The well-maintained path soon ended as we walked a bit farther up a small path to the only visible shade at the entranceway of Tomb 19, the beautifully painted corridor tomb of Prince Montuhirkhopeshef. We put the tools down in a heap. “We’re here, let’s take a look around,” I offered, and we took a little stroll down the small wadi that contained the tombs in our concession: KV 21, 27, 28, 44, 45, and, lost somewhere in the area, 60.

  The environment was virtually unchanged from what I had observed in years before, a handful of shafts filled with rubbish, a small breeze blowing an odd bit of paper over the mixed surface of silt, rock, and stone chips. These last were the result of the carving of tombs by ancient workmen, whose detritus had been redistributed by Western excavators in the last couple hundred years. Some of the earlier excavators used a technique perhaps best described as “the human bulldozer.” Large numbers of local workmen, sometimes in the hundreds, were employed to clear portions of the valley, or other archaeological sites, to the bedrock. As they went from one spot to the next, earth and stones were removed by hoe and hand, placed into baskets, passed elsewhere, and dumped as the clearers surged forward. Some unfortunate later excavators were met with the task of removing the piled debris of their predecessors in order to conduct new excavations. A mountainous pile of stone chips, the result of Carter’s digging, overlooked the area where we would be working. From its level top, we had a commanding view of the tombs below, and we nicknamed it “the Beach” for its flat and sunny demeanor.

  The entrance of Tomb 21 was completely buried, but a small dimple in the overlying flood debris suggested a likely place to investigate. The other tombs—minus 60, of course—were all identifiable by visible shafts, each of which was filled with a variety of natural and human debris. Our initial inspection didn’t take long, and on the way back toward Tomb 19 I brought up the matter of the lost Tomb 60. Carter’s notes sprang to mind: “immediately in the entrance of Tomb 19.” Looking to the left and right, I saw nothing that seemed even likely as a place for locating a tomb. The entranceway to Tomb 19 had been cut in ancient times through a rock spur, with a gently downward-sloping ramp and vertical sides approaching a square door that had three decorated jambs. In many ways it resembles a modern single-car garage, but with a high ceiling and pharaonically painted walls. The ramp was covered with several inches of windblown sediment, a
nd when I spied a broom in our tool pile, an idea came to mind. Why should I doubt Carter? If he said immediately in front of Tomb 19, why shouldn’t I look?

  With the broom I began to sweep away several inches of loose sediment down to the bedrock starting just a few yards east from Tomb 19’s door. Hisham helped, and without much difficulty we were able to make progress, with a new swath cleared about every meter. The rock beneath glared white as it was exposed, and after less than a half hour’s work I noticed something unusual: a linear deformity in the bedrock. I continued to sweep along the break and found that this crack, of sorts, stretched horizontally nearly all the way across the entrance ramp of Tomb 19. One end disappeared underneath a rock wall to the south, while the northern end made a sharp turn to the west. At that point I removed my trowel and traced the edge of what appeared to be a pit or depression in the rock that was filled level with the white limestone chips and light brown sediment characteristic of the valley.

  None of us said much, but it soon became clear we were on to something. A few photos were taken from the hillside above, and afterward I hoed out a few centimeters in a small area in one of the corners. “Well, we’ll have to give this more attention, won’t we?” I concluded. Both Mark and Hisham were reserved yet hopeful, and although we optimistically discussed the possibility that maybe we had just stumbled across the long-lost Tomb 60, we dared not let ourselves get overexcited lest we become disappointed should our prospect turn out to be nothing more than a shallow pit or a natural feature.

  The next couple of days were spent excavating the pit. A few odd artifacts were beginning to turn up—some mummy wrappings and a couple of beads—but no immediate signs of a tomb. Two things changed that situation in short order. On the south end of our pit, a small stone shelf resembling a step began to appear, and on the north I noticed a few stones sinking downward as I worked my trowel, its metallic surface producing a characteristic high-pitched ringing sound with every scrape across the white limestone chips. A few more passes with the trowel revealed a tiny black slit, which proved to be a gap at the very top of a wall of boulders, blocking the entrance to some sort of corridor beyond. We were indeed on to something.

  As we progressed, it became necessary to move a modern stone retaining wall to get at the top of what was now revealed to be a buried, steep, and crudely hewn staircase carved into the pit and leading down to a blocked door. Miscellaneous bits of ancient burial debris continued to turn up in our pit and from behind the wall. Could some of this stuff, including a resin-coated wood fragment bearing gold leaf, actually be fragments of ravaged burial equipment from the nearby anciently plundered royal tombs of Montuhirkhopeshef or possibly Thutmose IV? Or were they from Tomb 60 itself?

  With excavating now well under way, we had to hire a small crew of workmen to assist in digging, moving stones, and hauling off the material. Our government-appointed antiquities inspector, Mohammed El-Bialy, recruited an assorted group of young men from the village of Qurna. Dressed in long gallabeyas and plastic slippers, they appeared strong, if not enthusiastic, and in the long run proved to be both, despite the hot Egyptian summer. The reis, or foreman, was a sturdy fellow named Nubie, a law student on a break from his studies.

  As the work picked up, we realized we needed some sort of work space to store our tools and to study and catalog the artifacts that were beginning to accumulate. El-Bialy suggested a traditional solution utilized by generations of archaeologists working in these old cemeteries. We could use a nearby tomb as an office of sorts, providing that we exercised the utmost care. The closest tomb was KV 19, of course, with its large gated, locked entrance. It was a simple structure except for the paintings on its walls, which included scenes of Prince Montuhirkhopeshef presenting offerings to the gods, with accompanying hieroglyphic text. The tomb was at the time considered “off the beaten track” and not available for public viewing. We exercised our privilege seriously and took great pains to see that our presence in no way harmed the physical integrity of the tomb. We outfitted Tomb 19 with some chairs and a small desk, along with a worktable put together from a couple of sawhorses topped with a large sheet of plywood. It was a cozy, magnificent office, and our respect for the artisans of old increased daily as we gazed in wonder at our surroundings.

  Small objects continued to appear from our excavation of the pit, and Papworth dutifully registered each in a notebook. With stairs leading downward, it was clear that in all likelihood we were excavating the long-lost KV 60. So our escapades with the broom seemed to be paying off. Another expedition had recently been working in the vicinity, experimenting with a variety of sophisticated remote-sensing devices to test their efficiency in locating lost or new tombs. Ground-penetrating radar, magnetometers, and electrical-resistivity methods all have proved somewhat effective at other archaeological sites, but none seemed ideal in the royal cemetery, due to the nature of the valley’s bedrock and stony debris. An even earlier project, in the 1970s, tried using sound waves to test the possibility of locating unknown artificial voids in the bedrock and similarly produced uneven results. Our simple broom, purchased for a couple of dollars in Luxor, accomplished what tens of thousands of dollars’ worth of high-tech equipment struggled to do. Thus, one example in which simple tools proved superior to expensive and complex gadgetry. The broom, however, was not acting on its own. Since we’d done our homework in advance (reading the notes of our predecessors in the valley) and considered those notes in the context of the physical terrain before us, a whimsical experiment had provided wonderful results.

  From the very first realization that we had found some sort of blocked doorway, I decided that I would not venture a peek to see what lay beyond it until everything was ready for a formal opening. It certainly would have been easy; it would have involved only removing a few small stones and shining a flashlight through the hole. But as we cleared the pit to reveal more and more of the boulder-blocked door, I took pains to ensure that all would remain a surprise until the proper moment. This sort of attitude may seem surprising, but think of a nicely wrapped gift. The size and shape of the box and the color of the wrapping paper all invite speculation and fuel a great sense of excitement in the anticipation. But once the box is opened and its contents are revealed, the surprise is over. The gift might be well appreciated for many years, but its initial sense of mystery has been lost. Such can be said, too, about the finding of a tomb or some similar discovery, but in the case of the archaeologist the end of the initial surprise means the beginning of a whole lot of work. Howard Carter worked nearly ten years before he was finished with his efforts in Tutankhamun’s tomb, and its contents and findings still remain only partially published even today.

  Over a week had passed since we’d located the pit. It was July 4, a mere coincidence to myself and Mark Papworth. There would be no fireworks or family barbecues across the river in Luxor; opening a tomb at 10:00 A.M. would have to suffice for us. It was already brutally hot in the late-morning sun, although the fleeting shade from the valley’s walls above provided some minor relief. I arranged a small group of our workers on the tomb’s steep and narrow steps, whose bright limestone surface now glared vibrantly in the sun. Hisham and our inspector, Mohammed El-Bialy, were there, of course, as were a couple of the benefactors of another project operating in the vicinity, and a few other folks who had wandered up to watch the unfolding events.

  To brighten things up, on a nearby wall I hung the flag lent to me by the Explorers Club of New York. It was the very same flag that had flown from the mast of the famous Kon-Tiki raft in 1947, skippered by my boyhood hero, the Norwegian explorer and archaeologist Thor Heyerdahl. The irony of this totem barely fazed me; the flag that once traversed the rolling waves of the Pacific now celebrated the opening of a timelessly static tomb in a bone-dry desert. In an attempt to make the moment even more special, I felt that some quiet music might add to the occasion. Unfortunately, modern archaeologists from Egypt, America, Europe, and elsewhere are unable to rel
iably reconstruct the long-lost melodic funeral dirges that accompanied the rites of the pharaonic dead. This being the case, I chose to foster a somewhat calming and dignified atmosphere and selected to accompany our work three Beethoven sonatas softly broadcast from a portable tape player. The melodies of the Moonlight, Pathetique, and Appassionata sonatas served as a kind of tribute, although clearly European, to a tomb from a mostly extinct culture.

  I descended the pit’s crudely carved stairs and proceeded to dismantle the wall of stones, rock by rock, and passed them upward. As the stones from the top of the blocked entrance became larger and heavier, the light began to reveal the beginning of the expected corridor beyond. A few boulders were rolled outward into the pit, and a gap large enough to stoop through was created. The sense of excitement was nearly overwhelming. I ditched my hat, and both El-Bialy and I made sure our flashlights were operational. In just a few minutes, we crouched to enter the tomb, stepping onto a short, downward-sloping pile of stone rubble. We lingered hunched down just inside the doorway for a few moments until our eyes could adjust from the blinding glare outside to the murky darkness beyond. Peering into the distance, we could begin to make out a square door at the end of the irregularly fashioned eight-meter-long corridor with its rubble-strewn floor.

  The crudely carved steep steps leading down to the blocked entrance of KV 60.

  PLU Valley of the Kings Project

  Just inside the door on each side of the corridor was a roughly carved niche containing the shattered remains of wooden grave goods. The majority resembled broken-up sticks of fresh kindling. Most striking among this debris was a chunk of wood that even in its ruinous state was readily identifiable as a face piece from a coffin. It had been badly smashed, its inlaid eyes torn out. A few flecks of gold still clung to the once-gilded wooden surface, which also bore telltale adze marks. We would later find specks of gold flakes in the dust nearby. It seems that ancient tomb plunderers may have done some of their damage close to the tomb’s entrance, where there would be more light to allow them to accomplish their devious work. The gold could be scraped off gilded objects, collected, and then melted down, thus rendered anonymous and leaving future buyers clueless that their purchase was “recycled” from a royal cemetery.