Historical Notes
This tomb was found by Lord Carnarvon and Mr. Howard
Carter in 1914, at the head of a small lateral valley of the ravine at the
extreme northern end of the Theban necropolis, above " Dra Abu el-Naga
" .
The scanty foundations of the mortuary chapels of this Pharaoh and his
wife ( or his mother ), Queen Ahmose-Nefertari, had been found in 1896 and
1898-9 by Professors Wilhelm Spiegelberg and Percy Edward Newberry in the plain
below, so that Amenhotep I seems to have been the first Pharaoh to conceive the
idea of separating tomb and temple or chapel for the greater security of the
former .
The tomb was entirely rifled when found . It consisted of a
pit-entrance, giving access to a corridor, with a chamber and niche . which was
interrupted by a well with two small chambers opening off it at the foot .
After the well came a second corridor, which opened into the two-pillared
burial-hall .
The tomb, it will be seen, thus anticipates some of
the features of the later tombs in the Valley of the Kings, but differs from
them in its entrance being a well or pit, instead of a staircase or sloping
gallery .
Mr. Weigall, however, believes that the actual tomb of
Amenhotep I is that situated high up above the valley at its south end, and
almost overlooking Deir el-Madina .
This tomb has an entrance-flight of steps, from which
a low doorway leads to a chamber which communicates by a rough gallery with the
ruined burial-hall, and another chamber beyond it .
He believes that the funerary temple of the Pharaoh was the earliest
part of the 18th Dynasty temple at Medinet Habu .
The search for the Tomb of Amenhotep I
The glory of finally expelling the foreign Hyksos
rulers of the 15th and 16th Dynasties fell to the Theban
king, Ahmose, son of Kamose and founder of the 18th Dynasty and the
New Kingdom . By this action, Ahmose was to lay the foundations for an Egyptian
Empire which would ultimately stretch from the Euphrates in the north to the
fourth cataract on the Nile in the south .
The precise location of Ahmose's burial place is as
yet unidentified, but was perhaps at Dra Abu el-Naga . The royal mummy was
recovered from the Deir el-Bahari cache in 1881, while a shabti of the king, of unrecorded provenance, is preserved in the British
Museum .
Ahmose was succeeded by Amenhotep I, c. 1525 BC, who
consolidated his father's territorial gains abroad and embarked upon an
administrative reorganization of the unified Egyptian state . Together with his
mother, Ahmose-Nefertari, he would to be revered as the tutelary god of the Deir
el-Medina workforce, whose village community he had perhaps established . The
precise location of his burial place is, as we shall see, still a matter of
debate ; his mummy was discovered in the royal cache at Deir el-Bahari .
Two candidates for Amenhotep I's tomb are
traditionally suggested : KV39, located on the very edge of Wadi Biban el-Muluk
– the choice of Arthur Weigall ; and AN B, Howard Carter's preference, situated
outside the Valley of the Kings in Dra Abu el-Naga . It has to be said that, while
each has features which might justify the claims made for it, neither tomb fits
the bill completely . Other, perhaps less likely, possibilities have been put
forward ( notably DB320 ) ; and it remains to be seen whether the recent
candidature of the large, 17th Dynasty-style K93.11, also at Dra Abu
el-Naga, should be seriously considered .
The basic evidence we have for the siting of the tomb
of Amenhotep I is a reference in an official inspection of royal tombs in Year
16 of Ramses IX, Papyrus Abbott :
" The eternal horizon of king Djeserkara life!
prosperity! health!, Son of Ra, Amenhotep [I] life! prosperity! health!, which
measures 120 cubits down from its akay ( stela ) of Paˊaka, so called, north of the house ( temple ) of Amenhotep life! prosperity!
health! of the Garden …. Examined this day, it was found intact by these
inspectors " .
Papyrus Abbott thus locates the tomb 120 cubits down from its akay – a
word whose basic meaning would seem to be something which stands up, hence the
usual translation " stela " – and to the north of the " Temple
of Amenhotep, life! prosperity! health! Of the Garden " . The problem is
that neither of these landmarks has yet been identified with any certainty on
the ground .
The king's mummy
The mummy of Amenhotep I was discovered in the Deir
el-Bahari cache ( DB320 ) in 1881, and is one of the few not to have been
unwrapped by Gaston Maspero . It had been restored in Year 6 of Pharaoh
Smendes, 4th month of peret-season ( the second season [ winter ] in
the ancient Egyptian calendar ), day 7, when it had been furnished with a
replacement coffin very similar to that given to Tuthmosis II .
According to a second coffin docket, the burial was
" renewed " again precisely a decade later – perhaps when it was
transferred to a subsequent place of burial ( the tomb of Queen Inhapi ? )
where, by Year 10 of Siamun ( according to dockets on the coffins of Ramses I,
Seti I and Ramses II ) it had come to rest before its final transfer to DB320
during the reign of Shoshenq I .
The coffin supplied for the reburial of Amenhotep I's mummy at the end
of the New Kingdom, from the royal cache at Deir el-Bahari . It had originally
been prepared for a wab ( " pure " )-priest by the name of
Djehutymose .
Tomb KV39
John Rose found two fragments of sandstone with
cartouches on which were clearly readable . He also discovered that the inside
of the tomb is different to what he had expected .
Tomb KV39 is one of the most mystifying tombs in (
actually on the edge of ) the Valley of the Kings, and has only recently been
investigated, by John Rose . The most extraordinary feature of the sepulchre is
its eccentric plan . KV39 seems to have started out as a fairly standard
corridor tomb which was left unfinished beyond the first chamber .
Subsequently, it was extended considerably, with a second descending corridor
running eastwards, parallel to the first, and a third corridor running out to
the south, each of these secondary cuttings terminating in a single chamber .
Interestingly enough, the south chamber has a cut in the floor to receive a
coffin, this pit then being covered with stone slabs – a feature reminiscent of
pre-New Kingdom sepulchres .
Rose's clearance of KV39 has produced over 1,350 bags
of finds : potsherds, calcite fragments, pieces of wooden coffins, textiles,
fragments of metal, mud jar sealings, cordage, botanical specimens and human
skeletal remains – " of at least nine persons " . Among the inscribed
material is a group of unusual sandstone dockets bearing cartouches in blue of
Tuthmosis I, Tuthmosis II and Amenhotep II . " A calcite fragment bearing
the title of the tomb owner … and a gold signet ring bearing the name of a
famous pharaoh of the 18th Dynasty " were also found, but,
tantalizingly, no further details have yet been released .
Arthur Weigall's view was that the mysterious akay of Papyrus Abbott was to be recognized as the group of workmen's huts
located on the ridge above the tomb – though he was unable to provide a
satisfactory candidate for the " Temple of Amenhotep … of the Garden
" .
Tomb AN B
Howard Carter said : " I believe I really have
found the tomb of Amenhotep I, at all events a great deal of inscribed stone
and as to its being a Royal Tomb there is no possible doubt " .
Until Rose's clearance of KV39, tomb AN B was
generally considered the more likely bet for the king's tomb . Discovered by
locals, its excavation yielded a number of stone vessel fragments inscribed for
: the Hyksos king, Apophis and his daughter, Princess Heret ; Ahmose I ;
Ahmose-Nefertari ; and Amenhotep I .
There was also evidence of ex-voto offerings, in the form of fragmentary royal and private statuettes .
For Howard Carter, tomb AN B had held a double burial of Amenhotep I and his
mother, Ahmose-Nefertari, the two patrons of the Theban necropolis, who shared
a funerary temple ( anciently called " Meniset " ) on the plain below
the tomb, on the edge of the cultivation ( " the Garden " ? ) .
Carter believed that the burial chamber was a later addition, and is supported
in this view by John Romer who asserts that the well – a characteristic feature
of kingly burials through-out the New Kingdom – was also cut later .
The basic weakness of Carter's thesis was his
reconciliation of the inspectors' measurements recorded in Papyrus Abbott with
the internal dimensions of AN B : since the tomb of Amenhotep I is recorded as
having been found intact, the interior was presumably inaccessible . If the
attribution to Amenhotep I is to be maintained, however, it might be possible
to recognize in the Abbott akay the cairn, or pile of rocks, located on
Carter's rough map of the area at an appropriate distance to the north of AN B
. Such cairns have received little discussion, but it seems undeniable that at
least some functioned as markers of some sort .
Carter's finds indicate that AN B was reused during
the 22nd Dynasty . The burnt finds included bronze eye-brows,
eye-sockets, pieces of lapis lazuli inlay, and decayed wood, recovered from the
bottom of the Protective Well .
The tomb KV39 was discovered in 1899 by Victor Loret,
and was excavated in 1989 by John Rose for Pacific Western University . And the
tomb AN B was discovered in 1907 by locals, and was excavated in 1913-14 by
Howard Carter for the Earl of Carnarvon .
The well of AN B appears to have been cut as an
after-through at the time the burial chamber was extended . The changes may
reflect the expansion of a queen's tomb – that of Ahmose-Nefertari – to receive
the ( re ) burial of a king – her son, Amenhotep I .
As neither tomb has any reliefs or inscriptions, the
question of which may be the genuine tomb of the king does not much concern the
visitor .
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