KV34
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KV34 |
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|---|---|
| place | Valley of the Kings |
| Discovery date | February 12, 1898 |
| excavation | Victor Loret |
| Previous KV33 |
The following KV35 |
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In KV34 is the rock grave of the ancient Egyptian king ( Pharaoh ) Thutmose III. and one of the early graves in the Valley of the Kings in Thebes- West from the 18th Dynasty (New Kingdom), which still have a bent grave axis.
discovery
Workers Victor Lorets , the then general director of the Egyptian antiquities administration , discovered the grave on February 12, 1898. Loret arrived a few days later and a short time later the grave of Thutmose III was discovered. Son and successor of Amenhotep II ( KV35 ).
location
The access is at the top of a narrow rock gorge. It is the southernmost wadi in the Valley of the Kings. The cliffs above the grave were washed out by water over time. On the cliffs above the grave, paths lead to the ancient Egyptian workers' settlement in Deir el-Medina .
Interpretation of the kinked grave axis
The bent shape of the floor plan and the oval coffin chamber reflect, like all early graves in the Valley of the Kings, the curved rooms of the underground beyond . This picture of the afterlife began under Sesostris II, when the straight, north-facing corridor of the pyramid was replaced by an angled corridor system and the accents of the Egyptian belief in the afterlife were finally shifted from heaven to the underworld ( duat ). The winding paths to the beyond are mapped in the two-way book and “the Amduat shows these zigzag paths of the Sokar Land , especially in the fourth and fifth hours, and gives the whole underworld an oval, curved end, which can also be found in many scenes of the course of the sun ".
This idea gave Osiris and his mythical fate more positive traits. "Instead of distrust of the dark depths, there is gradually a happy insight into the need for constant regeneration, which is only possible there."
Architecture and decoration
An entrance in the north leads to the first corridor and further in a “rhythmic alternation of stairs and corridors” into a first chamber with a central ramp, a second corridor and a shaft to the trapezoidal upper pillar hall, which bends in the axis makes (at an angle of 72.64 degrees) and leads down a staircase to the burial chamber, which in turn has four adjoining rooms. As in all tombs of the 18th Dynasty, corridors and stairwells were left without decoration.
Manhole
A new element of the tomb architecture is the six meter deep shaft, the meaning of which has not yet been fully clarified and which was an element of the royal tomb until the end of the 19th dynasty. It is interpreted as an obstacle for grave robbers , but could also serve as a catch basin during rare but heavy rains. Erik Hornung clearly assigns it a religious meaning: "... as direct access to the underworld and cave of the god Sokar " The walls are merely decorated with a decorative frieze made of colorful bundles of reeds ( Cheker frieze ) and the sky symbol and the ceiling with yellow stars decorated on blue background. The walls are not yet painted with scenes of the gods, as in later graves with such a shaft, but the framework for these scenes is already given and made it “a place where the deceased Pharaoh enters the world of the gods” and so on to a place of transition from this world to the next, which serves to bring the dead back to life.
Antechamber
Another innovation in architecture is the trapezoidal antechamber. The two pillars are undecorated, but covered with a square net. The ceiling is in turn adorned with yellow stars on a blue background and the upper area of the walls with a cheker frieze. The walls show a catalog with 741 deities (without the hostile beings) from the Amduat , which is without parallel. The figures are only drawn in outline and each supplemented with a star (ancient Egyptian dw3 - Dua), an incense bowl and a symbol for the Ba soul .
Burial chamber
The 14.6 × 8.5 m grave chamber is rectangular with rounded corners and resembles a cartouche in overall shape . The walls are decorated with the twelve night hours of the Amduat, the arrangement of which is based on the real cardinal points and the notes in the text. However, this ideal could not always be maintained and due to lack of space certain adjustments and omissions had to be made. The figures are painted in black and red line drawings, the texts in italic hieroglyphics , the background is in a light yellow- red tone. This creates the impression of a monumental papyrus . The top of the walls is decorated with a cheker frieze. The ceiling, on the other hand, is again painted with yellow stars on a blue background, which represents the heavenly beyond, which is open to the Ba-soul of the deceased.
Two pages of the two pillars contain a short version of the Amduat book as a kind of table of contents. 76 figures of the litany of the sun are shown on four sides .
Another scene on a pillar is the representation of the king with his mother Isis in a boat, accompanied by family members. In addition, an unusual and well-known scene is briefly sketched: a stylized tree extends the king's chest. It bears the caption: "He sucks on (the breast) of his mother Isis". Since Thutmose's mother was actually called Isis, the scene could ostensibly be interpreted as the return of the king to his mother and rejuvenation, but the tree points to a goddess who otherwise grows out of the tree in the official graves as Nut or Hathor and the dead with his bird-like shape Ba offers cool water and offerings. That Isis is called here instead is due to the name of the earthly mother and the myth according to which the king represents the role of the god Horus on earth and returns to the protection of his divine mother Isis, who cares for and protects him.
Finds
In addition to the empty sarcophagus , Loret discovered only a few fragments of artifacts left behind by grave robbers, including the remains of a baboon and a bull, wooden statues of the king as well as stone faience , glass and ceramic vessels.
The royal sarcophagus has the shape of a cartouche and can still be seen in the grave today. The mummy Thutmose III. was discovered in 1881 in the cachette of Deir el-Bahari , wrapped in a shroud with the text of the sun litany. At the head and foot of the sarcophagus are carved depictions of the goddesses Isis and Nephthys , who kneel on symbols of gold. To the side of it are Anubis and the four sons of Horus . The inside and outside of the lid is decorated with the goddess Nut and the bottom and inside walls of the tub are decorated with the western goddess, Selket .
In 1921 Howard Carter discovered the founding additions of Thutmose III while clearing away the debris deposited by floods.
See also
literature
- Paul Bucher: Les Textes des Tombes de Thoutmosis III et d'Aménophis II. In: Institut français d'archéologie orientale du Caire. Cairo (IFAO) 1932.
- Aidan Dodson , Salima Ikram : The Tomb in Ancient Egypt: royal and private sepulchres from the early dynastic period to the Romans. Thames & Hudson, London 2008, ISBN 978-0-500-05139-9 .
- Erik Hornung : Valley of the Kings: the resting place of the pharaohs. 3rd, extended edition, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, Darmstadt 1985.
- Erik Hornung: The Valley of the Kings. Beck, Munich 2002, ISBN 3-406-47995-2 .
- Victor Loret: Le tombeau de Thoutès III á Biban el-Molouk. In: Bulletin de l'Institut d'Égypte. (BIÉ) 3 série, No. 9, 1899.
- Bertha Porter , Rosalind Moss : Topographical Bibliography of Ancient Egyptian Hieroglyphic Texts, Reliefs, and Paintings. Volume I. 2: The Theban necropolis: royal tombs and smaller cemeteries. Griffith Institute / Ashmolean Museum Oxford, Oxford 1964, pp. 551-554.
- John Romer: The Tomb of Tuthmosis III. In: Communications of the German Archaeological Institute, Cairo Department (MDAIK) Volume 31, 1975, pp. 315–351.
- Kent Weeks (Ed.): In the Valley of the Kings. Of funerary art and the cult of the dead of the Egyptian rulers. Weltbild, Augsburg 2001, ISBN 3-8289-0586-2 .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d Erik Hornung: The Valley of the Kings. Munich 2002, p. 19 ff.
- ↑ a b c d Excavations in the Valley of the Kings . On: kv5.de ; last accessed on April 13, 2017.
- ↑ Erik Hornung: Valley of the Kings. Resting place of the pharaohs. Darmstadt 1985, p. 123.
- ↑ Erik Hornung: The Valley of the Kings. Munich 2002, p. 178.
- ↑ a b Erik Hornung: The Valley of the Kings. Munich 2002, p. 20.
- ↑ Erik Hornung: The Valley of the Kings. Munich 2002, p. 37.
- ↑ Erik Hornung: The Valley of the Kings. Munich 2002, p. 21.
- ↑ Erik Hornung: The Valley of the Kings. Munich 2002, p. 85.
- ↑ Kent Weeks: In the Valley of the Kings. Of funerary art and the cult of the dead of the Egyptian rulers. Augsburg 2001, p. 139.