KV21
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KV21 |
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| place | Valley of the Kings |
| Discovery date | October 18, 1817 |
| excavation | Giovanni Battista Belzoni |
| Previous KV20 |
The following KV22 |
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KV21 ( Kings' Valley no. 21 ) is an ancient Egyptian tomb in the Valley of the Kings ( West Thebes ). Due to the type of grave, it is dated to the time of the New Kingdom (18th Dynasty). The owner of the grave is unknown, but it is believed that members of the royal family were buried here. Two female mummies were found.
Discovery and Exploration
KV21 was discovered in 1817 by Giovanni Battista Belzoni , who did the excavation work for Henry Salt that same year . The grave was mapped by James Burton in 1825 and again by Eugène Lefébure in 1889 . It was not until 1989, 100 years after the last visit to Lefébure, that Donald P. Ryan's excavation was resumed. In 1990 the grave was provided with a security gate and wooden steps were installed.
State of the grave
Burton described the state of KV21 as a clean new tomb after completing his work . There was no damage from water ingress into the grave. The damage that Donald P. Ryan discovered during his excavation has all occurred in modern times, i.e. in the period afterwards. He found that the grave had suffered badly from rubble carried in by water. The artifacts in the burial chamber had also been damaged by the penetrated water. Water level marks were visible on the walls. The mummies had also been damaged by the water. Bat droppings in the grave also suggested that KV21 had been open to the public for a long time.
Architecture and equipment
The main axis of the grave is oriented east-west. Compared to other graves found in the valley, KV21 is quite small. The total size is 120.29 m². The basic structure is similar to the KV32 . The grave has an entrance area, two descending corridors that are interrupted by steps and finally the burial chamber with a smaller side chamber. It is undecorated, but the walls are smoothly hewn and red and black markings by the stonemasons are still visible on both the ceilings and walls.
In the 56.42 m² grave chamber there is a single pillar in the middle and a niche on the north side of the room that extends the entire length of the wall. Tutankhamun's burial chamber in KV62 has a comparatively large 26.22 m². The in the grave of Amenhotep III. ( WV22 ) burial chambers created for Queen Teje and Queen Sitamun also have a pillar in the middle of the room, so that in KV21 a queen's grave was assumed. The side chamber at a 90 ° angle to the burial chamber has a size of 10.36 m². In the side chamber there is a visitor's graffito: "ME 1826".
In addition to the two female mummies, KV21 found various types of stone, scarabs , seals of the necropolis , as well as parts of grave equipment and various jugs.
The mummies
Belzoni described the condition of the two female mummies that were in the burial chamber at the time of discovery:
"At one corner of this chamber, we found too mummies on the ground, quite naked, without cloth or case. They were females, and their hair pretty long, and well preserved, though it was easily separated from the head by pulling a little. "
In 1989 the mummies, some of which were badly damaged, were in Corridor B, which follows the entrance area. The mummies are in poor condition. They showed damage not only from the water that entered the grave, but also from severe vandalism. Ryan's examination of the broken remains of the mummies revealed that, due to the nature of the mummification, they must be of royal origin. In both mummies, the right arm was along the side of the body, while the left arm was bent over the chest and the hand was clenched. This posture is also found in the mummy known as the Younger Lady (KV35 YL), who was genetically determined to be Tutankhamun's mother. During his clean-up work in KV21, Ryan had the remains of the mummies returned to the burial chamber in wooden boxes.
The female mummies known as KV21A and KV21B were subjected to both a CT scan and a DNA test in 2010 as part of the King Tutankhamen Family Project . The results of the DNA tests were less successful than with the other mummies tested. The investigations did not allow identification. Both mummies have been in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo since the investigation.
KV21A
This mummy is less well preserved than KV21B. The skull and a lower leg are missing, but a large part of the spine is intact. The examinations showed that she was of medium height (about 1.62 m) and suffered from severe and painful deformity or deformity of both feet ( clubfoot ), which was congenital. Since no age-related damage or signs of wear and tear could be found on the examined bones, it is assumed that the person was relatively young at the time of death.
According to the DNA analysis, this mummy is the mother of the two fetuses from Tutankhamun's tomb ( KV62 ). The fact that she is a daughter of the mummy from KV55, who is regarded as Akhenaten , has not yet been genetically proven. It is therefore uncertain that KV21A is the mummy of Ankhesenamun , Tutankhamun's great royal wife .
KV21B
KV21B is less badly damaged than KV21A, even if it is “broken” into several parts, limbs are missing and the skull is badly damaged. This mummy was slightly larger than KV21A and also had a curvature of the spine and a clubfoot. Furthermore, the examined remains showed slight degenerative signs on the spine, which indicates a much older person than KV21A. The age was estimated to be around 45 years. Zahi Hawass thinks this mummy is a possible candidate for Nefertiti .
See also
literature
- Nicholas Reeves , Richard H. Wilkinson : The complete Valley of the Kings: tombs and treasures of Egypt's greatest Pharaohs. Thames & Hudson, London 1996, ISBN 0-500-05080-5 .
Web links
- Theban Mapping Project: KV21 (English)
- Donald P. Ryan: Some Observations Concerning Uninscribed Tombs in the Valley of the Kings. On: community.plu.edu ; last accessed on April 30, 2014.
- DNA analysis results 2010 → Zahi Hawass, Yehia Z. Gad, Somaia Ismail et al .: Ancestry and Pathology in King Tutankhamun's Family. In: The Journal of the American Medical Association. (JAMA) 2010, Vol. 303, No. 7, pp. 638-647, doi : 10.1001 / jama.2010.121 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c Zahi Hawass: Discovering Tutankhamun. From Howard Carter to DNA. The American University Press, Cairo 2013, ISBN 978-977-416-637-2 , p. 170.
- ↑ Nicholas Reeves: On Some Queens' Tombs of the Eighteenth Dynasty ( Memento of the original from April 26, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . In: Nigel Strudwick, John H. Taylor: The Theban necropolis: past, present, and future. (= Conference proceedings. ). British Museum Press, London 2003, ISBN 978-0-7141-2247-2 , pp. 69-73 (English).
- ^ Zahi Hawass, Sahar N. Saleem: Scanning the Pharaos. CT Imaging of the New Kingdom Royal Mummies. American University Press, Cairo 2016, ISBN 978-977-416-673-0 , p. 136.
- ^ Zahi Hawass, Sahar N. Saleem: Scanning the Pharaos. CT Imaging of the New Kingdom Royal Mummies. American University Press, Cairo 2016, ISBN 978-977-416-673-0 , p. 142.
Coordinates: 25 ° 45 ′ 0 ″ N , 32 ° 36 ′ 51 ″ E