In the Valley of the Kings

by Daniel Meyerson

  He was quick to use a legal argument against the excavators: The contents of an intact royal tomb belonged entirely to the Egyptian government, according to the never before invoked terms of Carnarvon’s concession. Carnarvon pointed out that Tut’s tomb had been robbed in antiquity and thus was not intact. “Rifled” was a better word for it, Lacau countered. True, unguents, perfumes, and jewelry had been stolen—but Tut’s mummy had been left undisturbed, Lacau insisted.

  From the beginning, this fact had been more or less certain. At the grand opening of the burial chamber, a huge gilded wooden shrine was seen to take up most of the room. When its doors were slowly folded back, the seals on a second, inner shrine were found intact. As it turned out, there were four gilded shrines covering the royal sarcophagus, and as soon as the unbroken seals on the second shrine were noted, it was understood that the body of the boy-king had not been touched.

  Later, when the shrines were finally dismantled and the two-ton sarcophagus cover was lifted, this surmise was proven correct: Tut was found lying in a nest of three “anthropoid,” or portrait, coffins, each one more exquisite than the last. The inner one was of solid gold and contained yet another amazing image of Tut, a gold portrait mask of unsurpassed beauty.

  Carnarvon had no intention of letting the matter rest at this. He had laid out huge sums during the unprofitable sixteen years of financing Carter’s digs (the last six years alone had cost him over forty-five thousand English pounds). If he had to, he would subpoena Tut himself to win his case.

  His share of the find in question, Carnarvon devoted the last six weeks of his life to figuring out how to make back some of his money. He negotiated with both Cinema Pathé and MGM for film rights, delighted with an MGM scenario starring a heroic earl. He sold exclusive photos to newspapers, journals, and collectors and advised Carter to paint “some really good piece” from the tomb, telling him that he would be able to sell it at a very high price. (Another irritating suggestion from his oblivious lordship, who, unlike Carter, had no sense of the difficulty and delicacy of the work ahead.)

  Of all Carnarvon’s moneymaking schemes, though, the one that would hang like an albatross around Carter’s neck was the exclusive (for a hefty sum) the earl granted the London Times. From the beginning, the needy nobleman saw that the three-thousand-year-old pharaoh was hot news. The story made headlines right away and stayed on the first page as day by day the hysteria grew: KING’S

  VISCERA GUARDED BY FOUR GOLDEN GODDESSES! QUEEN OF THE BELGIANS ARRIVES FOR TOMB’S OPENING! WILL TUT HIMSELF BE FOUND? And so on.

  The world could not get enough of Tut—even before Carnarvon’s death created absolute pandemonium—the curse!—with psychics and necromancers of every sort grabbing the limelight. The earl was laid to rest amid a chorus of dire predictions about those still working in the tomb, the foremost being, of course, the unbelieving, “arrogant” Howard Carter.

  But while the psychics might give interviews free of charge, any news given to the reporters descending on Luxor would have to be bought from the Times—an arrangement that included the Egyptian press, who were treated as foreigners in their own land. The reporting was, accordingly, hostile to Carnarvon and Carter, with Weigall in the front of the hunting pack, inventing freely, maliciously, stirring up as much animosity toward the “monopolists” as possible.

  Even under the best of circumstances, Carter was not a man to shrug off such attacks. But now they were magnified times ten, Carter being in the midst of delicate archaeological work. As temperatures climbed toward the end of the work season—100 degrees, 105, 110, 120—Carter was to be found working on his knees in the airless tomb, or hanging from a sling over the treasures in the annex, a room packed so solidly that it was impossible to walk safely among its vases and chests.

  With Carnarvon dead, Carter was shouldering the full burden of public relations as well as the delicate, all-consuming archaeological work: His nerves were on edge, and he was particularly vulnerable to Lacau, who had been carrying on a campaign of petty annoyances and restrictions all along. Finally, Lacau made his move. Informed that Carter planned on inviting the wives of his collaborators to view the tomb, Lacau sent an order from Cairo forbidding this.

  Not considering that he was walking into a trap, Carter closed the tomb in a rage and posted Lacau’s letter at the Winter Palace Hotel as a public denunciation of Lacau and the Egyptian government’s discourtesy, incompetence, and interference. Lacau immediately canceled the Carnarvon concession and sent in government officials to change the locks, claiming that Carter had abandoned his duty at a critical moment and thus no longer had a right to work in the tomb.

  Thus began the saga of lawsuits and political wrangling that would end some two years later in defeat—inevitably, for Lacau and the Egyptian government held all the cards.

  After losing his case in the mixed courts (so called from its makeup of both European and Egyptian officials), Carter appealed. While fruitless negotiations were carried on, locked out of “his” tomb, he left for a speaking tour in the United States and Canada.

  If there is one image that sums up Carter during this time, it is a scene that took place on the Canadian Pacific Railway, in the dining car of the Montreal-Ottawa train. The steward handed the world-famous explorer the menu, and according to Lee Keedick, his speaker’s agent, Carter frantically filled in the “patron’s comments” section with sarcastic, biting criticisms, going on to cover the entire bill of fare in his fine, precise handwriting.

  But this was typical of Carter’s last phase: embattled, bitter, futile. When he finally returned to spend a decade in the tomb, it was after signing an apology and humbly accepting the new terms imposed by the Antiquities Service and Egyptian government. Apart from renouncing (for the Carnarvon estate) any share in the tomb’s contents and accepting government supervision, he would be forced to wait every morning for a government official to hand him the keys to the tomb—he was no longer allowed to hold them.

  A colleague, Gertrude Caton-Thompson, wrote of a visit made during the last decade of clearing: “We found him [Carter] repairing some of the coffin cases; he showed us the multitude of things still awaiting attention and I pitied him cooped up for years in the electrified darkness of the tomb.”

  During these last years, Carter, walking in the desert, peered through his binoculars and caught a glimpse of an unusual sight: “a pair of jackals … making their way towards the cultivated land.”

  He described them in his journal: “They probably had cubs in the hills as otherwise it was early for them to descend to inhabited and cultivated quarters. But the great interest was, while one of them was of normal size and colouring, the other … was totally black, much taller and attenuated, resembling … the type found upon the monuments. This is the first example of that colouring and that type of jackal I have seen in Egypt in over thirty five years experience in the desert and it suggested to me the old and original Egyptian jackal, known to us as Anubis, god of the dead.”

  It was fitting that at the end of his career, these divine zoological throwbacks appeared to Carter. For during the course of his life, he had become just as much a part of Egypt’s past as they were. The era that had begun in the early 1800s with adventurers of every imaginable sort pillaging Egypt’s ruins ended with the tortured, sensitive, moody Carter. During his lifetime, Egyptology began to take its place among the scientific disciplines, leaving behind its “unrespectable” piratical origins.

  The study of Egypt’s past has since become more specialized. DNA testing of a lock of hair and a more accurate understanding of the ancient language have taken the place of the search for treasure.

  But who knows? There is no ruling out what still may be found! For as Carter wrote, in archaeology it is generally the unexpected that happens.

  The same divine jackals that Carter met still circle in the Valley of the Kings—they must, for the gods are eternal, are they not? Possibly they have their own plans for some student sett
ing out to study Egypt’s past—from a strictly scientific point of view, mind you. Conceivably, it will be one of you reading this book. For though you may be no lady or gent, jackals have their own way of judging such matters and may decide to lead you to the tomb of some nobleman or noblewoman, some Mitannian or Hittite princess come to Egypt long ago.

  Or perhaps they will bless (and damn!) you with an even greater find. The tomb of Ramesses VIII, say—at this moment still lying beneath the shifting sands, waiting to be discovered.

  A heartfelt thanks to:

  My editor, Jill Schwartzman, for helping to shape the book, for her many insightful suggestions, for her enthusiasm and love of the subject.

  My former editor, Nancy Miller, who believed in this book from the first and who kept me going. High intelligence, beauty, and kindness are a rare combination.

  My agent, Noah Lukeman, author of Macbeth II, for his constant support, encouragement, and interest in my work over the years.

  Lea Beresford, who patiently and competently handled the many questions that attended the preparation of this book. It is a pleasure to work with her.

  Mary Gow of the Brooklyn Museum’s Wilburforce Egyptian Library, whose expertise is staggering (what doesn’t this woman know?). Many thanks especially for help with the Hatnub Quarry material.

  Adam Lukeman, who, with his art, transformed me in the author’s photo.

  Berk Straun, for the beautiful and meaningful cover.

  Sona Vogel, copy editor with a jeweler’s eye, for putting this book through its paces with great care and diligence.

  Stephanie Madey, who was very resourceful in tracking down difficult-to-find material for me through a long, hot summer.

  For the following friends, without whose help this book could not have been completed: Constance and John Skedgell, Mohsin Rashidi, Mark Roberts, Rosalie Kaufman, Brenda Shoshanna, Leah and Jonathon Kohn, Princess Ankherut, Vivian Heller, Prof. Maura Spiegel, Prof. Thomas Cohen, Prof. Ross Borden, Jumay Chu, Francine Plavé, Belle Plavé, Charles Mandelbaum, Avi Dov Orzel, Jacob Orzel, Les and Marta Szczygiel, Sylvia Levy, Yoleine Attanas, Helen Auerbach, Goldine Shamas.

  ABBREVIATIONS

  GI: Griffith Institute, Ashmolean Museum, Oxford

  MMA: New York Metropolitan Museum of Art

  ASAE: Annales du Service des Antiquités de l’Égypte, Cairo

  PART ONE: EXPENSES PAID AND NOTHING ELSE (BUT FATE)

  EPIGRAPH

  1 “Let the one who enters here beware” Arthur Weigall, Tutankhamen and Other Essays (Port Washington, NY/London: Kennikat Press, 1924; reissued 1970), 137. From the tomb of Ursu, mining engineer.

  CHAPTER 1

  8 Ironically, it was a harsher method Joyce Tyldesley, Judgement of the Pharaoh: Crime and Punishment in Ancient Egypt (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2000), 73.

  11 “He was one” GI, Carter mss., VI.2.1.

  11. “However, if a son” Ibid.

  12. “I have next to nothing” Ibid.

  12 “For a living” Ibid.

  14 “It was the Amherst Egyptian Collection” Ibid.

  14 “Give him the stick!” T. E. Peet, The Great Tomb Robberies of the Twentieth Egyptian Dynasty (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1930), 48.

  14. “We went up in a single” Ibid., 176.

  15. “My father ferried the thieves” Ibid., 177–180.

  16. “If you come across” Francis Llewellyn Griffith to John E. Newberry, February 2, 1891, GI, Newberry mss., 1.2/9.

  17. “These venerable people” GI, Carter mss., VI.2.1.

  CHAPTER 2

  19 “a dominant personality” Emma Andrews diary, January 17, 1902 (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society): a transcription. Copy in MMA Department of Egyptian Art.

  19. “some scaly, a few furred” GI, Carter mss., VI.2.1.

  20. “The ground gave way” Howard Carter, “Report on the Tomb of Mentuhotep 1st, known as Bab El Hosan,” ASAE 2 (1901): 201–205.

  20. “All that I received” GI, Carter Notebook 16, 109, quoted in H. V. F. Winstone, Howard Carter and the Discovery of the Tomb of Tutankhamun (London: Constable, 1991).

  21. “After working down” Carter, “Report on the Tomb of Mentuhotep 1st,” 201–205.

  22. “I am hard at work” Carter to Lady Tyssen-Amherst, December 19, 1900, Amherst Letters, in the possession of Dr. Bob Brier, quoted in T.G.H. James, Howard Carter: The Path to Tutankhamun (Cairo: American University in Cairo Press, 1992), 98.

  22 “Consider the circumstances” GI, Carter Notebook 5.

  24. “a young excavator” Ibid.

  25. “gone some way toward” W. M. Flinders Petrie, Ten Years’ Digging in Egypt: The First Discovery of Tanis, Naukratis, Daphnae and Other Sites (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1989; unchanged reprint, London: Methuen, 1891), 130–132.

  25. “There is the lack” Ibid.

  26. “The season’s work” Gertrude Caton-Thompson, Mixed Memoirs (Gateshead: Tyne & Wear, 1922), 84.

  26. “a lowly kingdom” Ezekiel 29:6–7, 29:14, Nosson Scherman and Meir Zlotowitz, eds., The Chumash [The Hebrew Bible] (Brooklyn: Mesorah Publications, 1993), 1149.

  27. “I had everything prepared” GI, Carter Notebook 5, quoted in H.V.F. Winstone, Howard Carter, 89.

  29 “I cannot now remember” Ibid., 90.

  29. “Carter had announced” Maspero to Naville, January 8, 1901, Archives of the Bibliothèque publique et Universitaire, Geneva, 2529, 223.

  30. With a touch of madness? Adel Sabit, A King Betrayed (London and New York: Quartet, 1989), 99, quoted in Nicholas Reeves and John H. Taylor, Howard Carter Before Tutankhamun (London: British Museum Press, 1992), 180.

  30 “Let the one” Weigall, Tutankhamen, 136.

  PART TWO: NAKED UNDER AN UMBRELLA

  EPIGRAPH

  31 “Archaeology is not a profession” Margaret Drower, Flinders Petrie: A Life in Archaeology (London: Victor Gollancz, 1985), 280.

  CHAPTER 3

  34 “emerge just before dawn” Drower, Flinders Petrie, 98.

  34 “I have known him” Arthur Weigall to Hortense Weigall, undated letter [1901?], Arthur Weigall Archive, quoted in Julie Hankey, A Passion for Egypt: Arthur Weigall, Tutankhamun and the Curse of the Pharaohs (London and New York: I. B. Tauris Publishers, 2001), 32.

  34. “Petrie was a man” Charles Breasted, Pioneer to the Past: The Story of James H. Breasted (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1943).

  35. “a man who did not suffer” GI, Carter mss., VI.2.1, quoted in Reeves and Taylor, Howard Carter, 24.

  36. “Exploring on foot” Caton-Thompson, Mixed Memoirs, 84.

  36. “unconsidered trifles” W. M. Flinders Petrie, Seventy Years in Archaeology (London: Methuen, 1931), 19.

  37. “The observation of the small things” Ibid.

  37. “I traveled here” James H. Breasted, Ancient Records of Egypt: Historical Documents, Vol. I (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1906), 212.

  38. “The key to archaeology” Petrie, Ten Years’ Digging, 158.

  39 “I found him puzzling” GI, Carter mss., VI.2.1, quoted in Reeves and Taylor, Howard Carter, 24.

  39. cartonnage I am indebted to Margaret Drower for her comparison between cartonnage and papier-mâché. Drower, Flinders Petrie, 149.

  40. “It is no use” Petrie journal, January 3–9, 1892, in the Petrie Museum, University College London, cited in James, Howard Carter, 36.

  40. “the stealthy convergence of human lots” George Eliot, Middle-march (New York: Bantam Books, 1985), 85.

  41. “Even the British Museum” Petrie to Edwards, April 1988, quoted in Drower, Flinders Petrie, 138.

  CHAPTER 4

  44 “dead men on leave” Christopher C. Lee, The Grand Piano Came by Camel: Arthur C. Mace, the Neglected Archaeologist (Edinburgh: Mainstream Publishing, 1992).

  44 “short, round headed” Drower, Flinders Petrie, 137.

  44. “a procession of gilt mummies” Ibid., 138, and Leo Deuel, Memoirs of Heinrich Schl
iemann: A Documentary Portrait Drawn from His Autobiographical Writings, Letters and Excavation Reports (New York: Harper & Row, 1977).

  45. “Degradation is followed” W. M. Flinders Petrie, Diospolis Parva: The Cemeteries of Abadiyeh and Hu, 1898–9 (London: Egyptian Exploration Fund, 1901).

  46. “It is certainly” Drower, Flinders Petrie, 138.

  46. “one of the greatest applied” D. G. Kendall, “Some Problems and Methods in Statistical Archaeology,” World Archaeology I (1969): 68ff. For further elucidation, see “A Statistical Approach to Flinders Petrie’s Sequence Dating,” Bulletin of the International Statistical Institute 40 (1963): 657ff.

  47. “A new scientific truth” Max Planck, Scientific Autobiography and Other Papers, F. Gaynor, trans. (New York: Philosophical Library, 1949), 33–34.

  47 “in the strongest terms” Drower, Flinders Petrie, 138.

  47. “the struggle for existence” GI, Carter mss., VI.2.1, quoted in Reeves and Taylor, Howard Carter, 30.

  48. “smelly dining salon” Ibid.

  49 Photos of Alexandria in the 1890s Robert T. Harrison, Imperialism in Egypt: Techniques of Domination (Westport, CT, and London: Greenwood Press, 1995). The photos mentioned are from the Huntington Library, San Marino, California, Lady Anna Brassey Collection.

  51. “With our luggage” GI, Carter mss., VI.2.1.

  52. Eadweard Muybridge Men Wrestling; Animal Locomotion, plate 345. CF Tomb #13 in Percy Newberry, Beni Hasan I–IV (London: Egyptian Exploration Fund Archaeological Survey Memoirs, 1893–1900).

  52 “horrified” GI, Carter mss., VI.2.1.