Friday, March 31, 2006

New Kingdom discovery near Luxor

The discovery of a 34 metre "hall" located in a rock cut tomb near Luxor has been announced by the SCA: "The Egyptian-Spanish team discovered the hall at Zira Abu al-Naga on the west bank of the Nile, as it was excavating the tomb site, the secretary general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, Zahi Hawas, said on Thursday.They believe the tomb belonged to an official responsible for temple and tomb decorations during the reign of Queen Hatshepsut in the 18th dynasty (1580-1314 BC), Hawas said. . . . The antiquities chief said that the 34-metre-long hall, which opens into the tomb area, was one of the longest such rooms unearthed to date.He added that the team found inscriptions on its walls and scenes that explain religious rituals practised by ancient Egyptians and show how they dug tombs."
See the brief article on the above page.

A slightly different version appears on today's Egyptian Gazette:
"An Egyptian-Spanish archaeological team, operating on the West Bank in Luxor, have discovered a room housing the tomb of the foreman responsible for decorating all the temples and palaces in the ancient city of Thebes (modern-day Luxor) in the reign of Queen Hatshepsut (1502 - 1482 BC). The discovery, announced by Culture Minister Farouq Hosni, also includes a collection of wooden and clay artifacts. According to Zahi Hawass, Secretary-General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, this important discovery sheds light on the design of the buildings that housed tombs in the 18th Dynasty. "The building is 34 metres long and there are many drawings carved on the walls, as well as the words of sermons Ancient Egyptians listened to at the time," he explained, adding that the finds will displayed in the Luxor Museum."

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

A third press report
http://snipurl.com/ogqg
[http://www.sis.gov.eg/En/EgyptOnline/Miscellaneous/000002/
0207000000000000001062.htm]
reveals the name of the tomb owner as "Gihoti" [Djehuty]. And by that
it proves to be 'old news', see
this Spanish dig diary on TT11:

http://www.excavacionegipto.com/diario/diario06.jsp

Ah well.

Aayko

Andie said...

It's like the reporting of the "new tomb" near Deir el Bahri that Francesco Tiradritti was said to have found, which turned out to be TT191 - reporting of interesting but somewhat old news, freely available via an online dig diary. Still, it's good that it was highlighted!

Thanks for the info, Aayko.

Andie