The Enigma of KV 55 By Theunis W. Eloff The Valley of The Kings is a dry Waddi, or water course, in the hills on the West bank of the Nile at Thebes (Modern Luxor). It is here that most of the kings of the 18th and 19th Dynasties were buried. (c. 1567 – 1200B.C.). The existence of the valley has been known since antiquity and indeed several of the tombs have been open since ancient times. Excavating, or perhaps rather “Treasure Hunting” became popular during the 19th Century and it was only in the late 19th and early 20th centuries that more systematic archaeology began to be practised. Concessions to dig in The Valley were granted by the Egyptian Antiquities Department, to only one excavator at a time. In the early 20th Century, this was to Theodore Davis, an elderly, cantankerous American Retired businessman with no knowledge of archaeology, but a desire for “Anticas”. At first, he was prepared to fund exploration but leave matters in the hands of more knowledgeable men like Edward Ayrton and others. Supervision of the excavations fell to the Director of Antiquities for that district, Howard Carter then J. B. Quibell. But, in 1905, the new Inspector of Antiquities, Arthur Weigall, offered Davis a new contract, advising him to employ his own archaeologist and to get involved himself with supervising the work. This proved to be disastrous. He interfered with the work of his excavators and regularly argued with and overruled them. Ayrton complained that he found it difficult to work with the man and when Davis was present work went more slowly, was very unpleasant and things often went wrong. Between 1902 and 1914, there was a new tomb discovered almost every year. Prior to 1907, a number of finds were made, including the almost intact tomb of Yuya and Thuya, the parents of Queen Tiye and great-grandparents of Tutankhamen. There was also a pit containing a number of jars of embalming materials and refuse from the funeral of Tutankhamen. Davis declared that he had found all that remained of Tutankhamen’s tomb, but not all were convinced. On 6th January 1907, Ayrton uncovered the entrance to a tomb (KV 55), not far from the entrance to the tomb of Ramesses IX. Davis was informed on 7th and on 9th he, Ayrton, J. L. Smith, and Weigall entered the tomb. Smith started making sketches of the interior, and on 11th, R. Paul arrived to take photographs before clearing began. KV55 was arguably one of the most important, if not The most important site in the valley. It held valuable information on the closing years of the Amara Period and the end of the 18 Dynasty. Because of Davis ignorance, obstinacy and bullish attitude, much of this information was lost and even many of the artefacts were either destroyed of stolen. At this point I should say something briefly about the Amara period and the major people involved. Amenhotep III came to the throne in BC 1417. He married as his Great Royal Wife, Tiye, a noble lady, who was the daughter of Yuya, the High Priest of Min at Akmin and his wife, Thuya. Towards the end of his long and glorious reign, Amenhotep III took his second, but oldest surviving son, Amenhotep, as a co-regent as Amenhotep IV. He was married to Nefertiti and they had six daughters but no sons. Early in his reign, the new king changed his name to Akhenaten and moved to the new capital at Aketaten, abandoning not only Thebes, but also Egypt’s ancient religion with its many deities. Instead he fostered the worship of one god only, The Aten. Temples of other gods, especially those of Amen Ra, were closed and their sources of income were withdrawn. As a result he was later referred to as The Heretic or The Criminal of Aketaten. His reign and the early years of Tutankhamen comprise the Amara Period , named for the modern village of Tell El Amara, which occupies the site of Aketaten. In the closing years of his reign, he appears to have taken a co-regent. A young man, who was a close family member, named Smenkhara. Smenkhara seems to have died shortly after Akhenaten and was succeeded by the 9 year old Tutankhaten. Tutankhaten and his Grand Vizier, AY, returned the court to Thebes and restored the old religion, with the young king changing his name to Tutankhamen. Ay was the brother of Queen Tiye and father of Nefertiti. After the Death of Tutankhamen, the throne was assumed by Ay, who married Tutankhamen’s widow, Ankhesenamen. She was a daughter of Akhenaten and therefore Ay’s granddaughter. After his death all reference to Akhenaten, Smenkara, Tutankhamen and Ay was destroyed and Aketaten was demolished. Let us now return to 1907 and KV 55. KV 55 is a small, unfinished tomb from the 18th Dynasty. The size of the entrance, which is cut deeply into the overhanging rock may indicate that this was originally planned as a Royal tomb. A flight of steps lead down to a blocked doorway, which also had a secondary blocking, then to a sloping passage and a burial chamber. To the side of this chamber, was a recess which had been used to hold canopic jars. This was certainly the beginnings of a second chamber. Masons marks on the entrance and other parts of the tomb show that the intention was to build a much larger tomb. The walls of the chamber had been plastered, but not decorated. This may suggest that it had been prepared for a Royal burial. At first glance, the tomb appeared to be in complete disarray. The door and side of a gilded funeral shrine lay abandoned in the corridor, while the burial chamber contained a variety of apparently broken objects scattered with total disregard for any logical order. Modern re -examinations of the contemporary photographs and drawings, as well as of the written record, seem to show a somewhat different picture. The tomb had clearly been opened and desecrated in ancient times. This was first indicated by the secondary blocking. At the foot of the flight of steps was the remains of a blocked doorway, plastered over and stamped with the seal of the Necropolis Guards. This indicated an ancient entry that had been resealed at a later date. Weigall claimed to have seen the seal of King Tutankhamen on the doorway but as no photographs of this survive, it cannot be proved and is open to doubt. An opening in this plastered wall had subsequently been blocked with a rough limestone wall resting on the rubble filling of the passage beyond. The rubble in the passageway had also been disturbed and flowed into the chamber at its end. On top of the rubble filling lay the door and side of a large , but fragile gilded wooden shrine, which had been a funeral gift from Akhenaten to his mother Queen Tiye. Contemporary sketches show figures of The Heretic and his Mother making offerings to The Aten. Tiye’s name is intact but the name and figure of Akhenaten have been chiselled out and the name of Amenhotep III has been written in in ink. One of Paul’s photographs shows further pieces of this shrine in the southeast corner of the chamber. Little attempt was made to conserve these artefacts with the result that now very little remains. The presence of this shrine in KV55 suggests that Queen Tiye may have been deposited here at some stage. It would appear that it had been fully erected in the chamber, where it would have occupied about 2/3 of the available space. At a later stage, it was disassembled and was being removed, when it was abandoned, owing to the difficulty involved in removing it. On the floor, in the western portion of the chamber, lay a badly preserved mummy-form coffin of heavily gilded wood, inlaid with semi-precious stones and glass in a rishi pattern, typical of the late 18th Dynasty. Although not originally intended for a king, its quality and workmanship are of a Royal standard. The head had been fitted with a gilded and inlaid uraeus, and a false gold beard of the gods, while the Crook and Flail of Kingship had been placed in the hands. The Head-dress is of a full, “Nubian” style wig, more commonly associated with female dress, which has led to the suggestion that it was made for a woman. The inscriptions had been altered to suit a king, but the Royal Cartouches and been excised. The gold leaf covering the face had been ripped off, obliterating the features from below the eyes. The golden bier on which it had rested, had collapsed in antiquity, and the fall had caused the coffin lid to become dislodged. We will return to the coffin and its contents later. Beside the coffin was a recess, clearly the start of another chamber. This had been pressed into service to hold the canopic jars, intended to hold the viscera of the deceased. The canopic jars are made of calcite and have well carved portrait head stoppers. Again, typical of the late 18th Dynasty, these took the form of a likeness of the intended owner. Once again they were intended for a woman, a princess or perhaps a Queen, wearing a “Nubian” wig. They had been adapted for the use of a king, by having glass uraeui attached to their foreheads. These had been snapped off in ancient times and the inscription, which contained the name of the owner, had been erased completely.