The Golden Falcon

by David C. Clark

  The additions Ramesses ordered were considerable. We enlarged the mausoleum by driving two corridors, extended like outstretched wings, at right angles to the main corridor with both passages housing crypts in pairs facing each other. He permitted no additional chambers for funerary goods or sustenance, though he commanded a niche be quarried at the end of the main corridor with an image of Osiris carved into the rock as guardian over that section of the mausoleum. At the conclusion of the new work, the tomb would have fifty crypts, yet I was to extend it again later in his reign.

  How completely different was the tomb prepared for Queen Nefertari when compared to the austerity of the children’s mausoleum. Her sepulchre was the culmination of the efforts of the best decorators in the kingdom. It is not large, as the queen desired a feeling of intimacy pervade her final domain. A few modest rooms, stairways and three lavishly decorated treasury chambers augmented a pillared burial chamber where her delicately engraved sarcophagus rested.

  Even though Nefertari was a great royal wife, she was not permitted the inscriptions and decorations from the Books reserved for the exclusive use of pharaohs in their imperial tombs. In an act of singular honour, the high priest had personally selected texts from the Book of the Beyond to ennoble the queen’s tomb, as she was dear to his heart. He had gone further. He asked me to send the most meticulous painters to the Karnak temple where they were shown The Scrolls of the Divine, the most important and impressive papyrus in the kingdom, and allowed them to make copies of certain sections of the script and imagery.

  Nebwenenef’s homage to the queen sanctioned the creation of a tomb ablaze with vibrant colour. The most costly pigments were employed to bring a vivid richness to the images he had so carefully chosen. The decorations stand out in stark contrast to the purity of brilliant white walls edged with a broad black skirt painted at floor level. The principal deities are depicted in union with the queen, who makes offerings and performs acts of worship to those she honours. Over the lintel framing the burial chamber there is a sublime portrayal of the goddess Maat who spreads her wings, painted in serried rows of black, red and green feathers, in a welcoming embrace. The queen’s transition from the world of the living and her journey into the Kingdom of Osiris is rendered along the corridors before blending with a tableau of her transfiguration into Osiris and her admission to the Field of Reeds.

  Nefertari chose yellow quartzite, a glistening stone which rings like a bell when struck, for her sarcophagus, sculptured in the shape of a cartouche. Engraved around its sides are images of the queen and Anubis. The carved figures and hieroglyphs, black paint filled, stand out sharply against the translucent warmth of her delicate casket. The lid is inscribed with texts from the Book of the Dead. My wife wept at the beauty of the tomb when I took her to see it and few, privileged to visit the tomb, were left unmoved by its brilliance and the sentiment so evident – a king deeply enamoured of his queen. After her death, Ramesses caused this devotional be inscribed at the great temple:

  ‘Greatly favoured, possessing charm, sweet of love, rich in love, wearing the circlet diadem, fair of face, beautiful with the twin plumes, chief of the harem of Horus, Lord of the palace; one is pleased with whatever comes forth concerning her; who has only to say anything and it is done for her, every good thing at her wish. Her every word; how pleasing on the ear. One lives at just hearing her voice.’

  And now the king’s beloved wife would journey to her final home and we could only wait in sadness. Three months would pass before her encoffined body left Memphis on her last voyage down the river to the city she so loved. The days passed in numbed mourning until a royal messenger heralded the news that the king would arrive two days hence, escorting the late queen. On the morning of Nefertari’s return to Thebes, a multitude of people lined the river banks. Labourers, tradesmen, porters, boatmen, government employees, farmers and their families who came in from far villages, tailors, scribes and masons waited quietly to pay homage to their queen. The city was silent and even the usual cacophony of animals seemed muted on the day.

  As Re’s golden barque rose higher in the sky, the fleet appeared down river. Centred on the royal barque, beneath a linen pavilion, was the gilded bier on which rested the coffin of shining gold. Behind it stood the king, head bowed, arms limp at his sides. Prince Khaemwaset and five brothers flanked him, all attired in the long white kilts of mourning. Ramesses wore no crown; only the modest nemes cloth adorned his head. Rowers shipped their oars, allowing the helmsmen to gently manoeuvre the barque alongside the quay. Ranks of archers lowered their bows, lancers reversed their spears and soldiers held their shields over their heads in veneration. The crowd stood, motionless and silent – there was no triumph being celebrated this day. Men and women wept openly, washing the sand with their tears.

  The barque moored and the king moved forward, with his sons supporting him as he walked stiffly down onto the quay, where he halted and looked back towards the coffin. Twenty heavily muscled priests boarded and inserted long timbers through the bronze hoops on each side of the bier. Grimly, they lifted it, and its awful burden, to their shoulders and the queen began her final, solemn passage to the great temple. No chariots on this journey. The king, princes, princesses, nobles, priests and the people all walked behind the coffin. No dust rose from their feet to sully the air, though they were thousands. The bearers delivered their charge into the temple through the portal in the massive pylon, accompanied only by the royal family.

  Two hours later, the priests re-appeared, the coffin on its bier resting high upon their shoulders, the sun’s rays causing her casket to gleam. The cortege re-traced its steps to the quay, the silence ethereal. Again, the coffin was replaced on its gilded pedestal and the royal family embarked for the river crossing. The oarsmen’s strokes were steady and no hammers beat out the cadence on this mournful voyage. Only the creaking of the rigging disturbed the silence.

  Once the barque departed, there was urgent movement – every vessel afloat was engaged to convey people to the western bank with barges, punts and fishing boats plying back and forward in an endless flow that only ceased when the sun dipped towards the horizon. We travelled across the river with the high priest and his attendants and accompanied the coffin to the boundary of the queen’s necropolis, where all bar the royal mourners and priests, halted.

  The bearers entered the tomb, the king and his children following. The high priest and his sem priest joined the small group attending the final chapter of Nefertari’s earthly existence. Ipi and I stayed only long enough to see the mourners depart the tomb and watched as the doors were closed and sealed. So was broken the earthly bond with our beloved queen and intimate friend. The shadows of the Theban hills, created by the descent of Re’s barque towards the western horizon, stretched out across the plain and soon only the light of the moon would caress the queen’s sepulchre in its chilly embrace.

  Chapter 19 - OF ROYAL REMAINS

  Paris and Cairo – Present Day

  Marie-Therese Schadlich’s morning had tested her patience. Breakfast was interrupted by her husband, an oil and gas trader, telephoning from Moscow to let her know he had to stay there for another two days as negotiations with Gasprom were going badly. ‘Rubbish,’ she fumed. ‘He just wants more time with his whore.’ She knew Udo was having an affair with his Market Analyst, Grethe Poppe. They had been travelling as a negotiating team for the past few years and their business trips always took longer than planned. Now, Udo’s flowers, chocolates and presents were gifts of guilty contrition rather than tokens of love. No matter, she liked gifts, whatever the motivation.

  Next, her eldest son, Max rang from Hamburg to discuss his latest gig. Max was a member of a heavy metal band who played a form of music his mother could never like, no matter how much she loved him. He needed some money, the usual reason for his infrequent calls, so she told him to ring his father. The penalty for his adultery should be just a little more expensive this time, she thought with some satisfac
tion. When she finally arrived at her office, she was tense and building up a head of steam. The report on her table with the latest results from the Egyptian project, did nothing to make her day any easier. She would have to ring Dr. Hussein in Cairo and give him some rather startling news.

  Professor Schadlich was the Director of the Instituit de Medicin Scientifique, a ground-breaking government research facility in Versailles. Though she had married a German, Marie-Therese was French to the marrow. Petite, smartly dressed under her white lab coat and, with her auburn hair well groomed, she was far from the stereotype of a female researcher. Even the gold rimmed glasses she was now compelled to wear added to the glamour, which successfully hid a brilliant mind, driving ambition and the qualities that separate managers from company directors.

  The IMS was a world leader in DNA research and, under her dynamic directorship, the Institute was assured of its technical prominence in this exciting and rapidly expanding field. She had led the team representing Europe in the Human Genome Project and the Institute’s collaboration with its Americans counterparts, engineered the first complete human DNA profile. The results broadened the whole field of genetic engineering, biomedical sciences and opened a new chapter, if not an entire book, in the fight against disease.

  When the Research Director at the Council of Egyptian Antiquities, Dr. Omar Hussein, first broached the subject of a DNA analysis on the New Kingdom royal mummies over dinner in London some three years ago, Marie-Therese’s interest was pricked. She had done some research before meeting the Egyptian and was impressed with his credentials. The discussion was stimulating and Marie-Therese was surprised to find Omar a very attractive man, one she physically reacted to over the dinner table. Memories of his flashing eyes, dark wavy hair and dusky skin momentarily brought a flush to her face.

  Dr. Hussein was the best qualified medical examiner in Egypt. After qualifying top of his class at the University of Cairo’s School of Medicine, he took a post graduate course in forensic medicine at Caltech in America. Before joining the Council, he had directed the Cairo Police Forensic Unit. However, as police science in Egypt was in its infancy and cutting up corpses not well regarded by the county’s Muslim population, he kept an eye open for a career changing opportunity, which he expected would only arise overseas.

  Omar revered his country’s history and took what opportunities he found to visit ancient sites and the national museums. Although he viewed the embalmed bodies on display with a more clinical eye than most tourists, he did not find himself intrigued or in any way drawn to the rather pathetic remains. He told his friends ‘Give me a fresh corpse and I am at home. These withered husks of the past are just where they belong, in glass cases’. His disinterest was to be overturned.

  Egypt’s new President, Mohammed Kamal, acknowledging that tourism was the country’s financial lifeblood, determined that insufficient emphasis was being placed on promoting and preserving the country’s heritage. Fully aware that the greatest portion of the tourist dollar came from the wallets of foreigners who wanted to see Ancient Egypt artefacts and not it’s Coptic or Muslim past, he directed that a larger percentage of the increased funding he approved flowed towards the Land of the Pharaohs rather than to the patriarchs and pashas of more recent times.

  The pre-eminent body administering Egypt’s patrimony, the Council of Egyptian Antiquities, was quick to seize upon the largesse about to flow from the Ministry of Finance. The majority of the Council’s Governors were men of learning and they looked hard at what Council functions could be enhanced. The more scholarly cynically disregarded the opinions of the political appointees to the board, who thought their principal role was to be photographed near monuments with crowds of grinning tourists.

  The Director of Operations, Dr. Abdullah Dief, was asked to prepare a comprehensive report on what should be done to bring the science relevant to antiquities into the modern age. He and his colleagues merely pulled out old files containing their dreams, brushed the dust off them, updated their content and made an impassioned presentation to the board. Dief, who was an old and gifted hand at political machinations, was able to get almost every project he had dreamed of funded and when the final budgets received the approval of the President’s office, he wept tears of joy and spent an hour in the Blue Mosque thanking Allah for his kindness.

  Dief long harboured dreams of establishing a high tech laboratory dedicated to the investigation of ancient human remains. Shortly after accepting his directorship, he met his department heads and reviewed their facilities. His visit to the existing laboratory was a journey back in time. Much of the equipment was dated, there wasn’t a computer in sight and no vestige of modern technology was to be found in its threadbare cupboards. The Research Director, a gentle and elderly scholar, was profuse in his apologies about the lack of facilities but an hour’s discussion with him quickly identified the problem. Dief’s predecessor had no interest in forensic science and almost completely neglected the subject. Ironically, his attitude was almost identical to those held by the man who would soon become the new Research Director - mummies were dried husks best housed in glass cases or sent back to the tombs from whence they came.

  Abdullah was a man in a hurry. Quickly determining how much funding was required to create a fully equipped laboratory, he early realised he needed an energetic Egyptian to be its new director. He knew of Dr. Hussein through his social connections and, after a few phone calls, Abdullah decided Hussein was the man he wanted. In short order, he rang the Dean of the School of Medicine at the University, Cairo’s Police Commissioner and had lunch with them and the Board of Governors Chairman, where he told them of his desire to extract Dr. Hussein from the Police Forensic Unit and assign him the laboratory’s directorship. Having pulled the political strings tight, he then arranged another lunch with the Police Commissioner, the Dean, himself and their unwitting victim, Omar Hussein.

  Dr. Hussein’s fate was sealed. The Commissioner freed him from his position, whilst praising him for his past achievements and the Dean extolled the new position’s significance to the nation. Dief put the cream on the cake when he mentioned the President approved of his appointment. Dr. Hussein, buried under an avalanche of political pressure, had the good grace to accept his new responsibilities with aplomb. That night, his girlfriend, who was overjoyed with the news of her partner’s newly acquired fame and salary increase, was nonplussed when he said to her ‘Now I know what done like a turkey dinner means’.

  Even though the Commissioner had assured him he would be called upon to conduct autopsies in difficult cases, Hussein unhappily believed his future activities would revolve around unlimited paperwork and a slew of desiccated bodies. When he reported to the Council offices three months later, he was more than surprised by the degree of complexity involved in building up a forensic and research facility from almost nothing. Apart from identifying what equipment was required, he had to interview potential technicians, create a resources library and attend Council meetings to determine the priorities of the revitalised facility.

  In addition to the clerical jungle inherent in any Egyptian bureaucracy, Dr. Hussein had to immerse himself in Egypt’s immense history and in particular its preserved human and animal remains. He had not realised there were thousands of mummies in storage, in museums and tombs, not only in Egypt but all over the world. Mummification was not unique to the Ancient Egyptians as he came to learn when he read through the large body of literature pertinent to preserved bodies.

  At the end of of his first year, Dr. Hussein had developed a new respect for his responsibilities as the laboratory was involved in more than just working with dehydrated corpses. It employed specialists in the study and analysis of foodstuffs, materials as diverse as resins, paints, cosmetics, timber, textiles, leather, papyrus and other organic matter, biology and bacteriology. His department also providing field liaison officers and technicians, who worked in collaboration with archaeological missions. However, none of these activi
ties ignited Dr. Hussein’s interest as much as the study of preserved remains because this field drew heavily on his training as a doctor and opened new pathways into his speciality, forensic medicine.

  His research disclosed that Egyptians, during the Archaic Period, some 4,500 years ago, observed that bodies buried in the desert desiccated naturally because heat retained in sand inhibited the decomposition of flesh. With the maturing of religious concepts, the nature of the relationship between life on earth and the immortality of the soul developed to the point that it became a fundamental tenet that the human body must be preserved. In the early dynastic period, informal experiments were undertaken to determine how best to limit decomposition. The initial efforts saw corpses tightly wrapped in linen bandages, which did little to impede decay.

  Fishermen and butchers knew, that if organs were extracted, a body could better resist decay. This knowledge led to the removal of internal organs before the body was bound up and this practice led to greater success but perfect preservation remained illusive as body fluids still led to corruption. To maintain the human image, early linen wrapped bodies had representations of human details such as fingers, facial features, genitals and breasts painted onto the fabric to provide a vestige of normal appearance.

  By virtue of fortuitous, but unrecorded, trials, those involved in preparing bodies for burial used various types of salts in their efforts to preserve human flesh, drawing on the techniques used to conserve meat and fish. The first attempts were not always successful and it was not unusual to find ancient bodies with the skeleton intact but skin, muscles and other soft tissue so excessively treated, they disintegrated when touched.