Vassil Dobrev
French Institute of Archaeology, Cairo
Historical information concerning the end of the Old Kingdom raises a serious challenge to archaeology. According to later chronological sources the today's list of the archaeologically attested Kings of Dynasty 6 (Teti, Pepy I, Merenre I and Pepy II) is far from being complete. There are at least three other rulers : Userkare, Merenre II, and the famous Queen Nitokris. One of the best ways to prove that these missing Kings have really reigned would be to find out archaeological evidence of the existence of their tombs. The actually known pyramids of the Kings from Dynasty 6 are all in Saqqara, especially in South Saqqara. Therefore, this might be the site where the tombs of the missing Kings could be found.
Since
September 2000, the French Archaeological Institute in Cairo (IFAO) began work
on a archaeological map of South Saqqara (scale 1:2000); an area of more than 4
km from North to South and almost 2 km from East to West has been covered.
During the completion of the map the economy of the whole site and its
relationship with the neighbouring site Dahshur became clearer. It appears now
that the geographical position of the actually known Kings' pyramids at South
Saqqara followed the rule of several axes. The issue of finding the necropolis
of one of the missing Kings became more and more realistic.
In
parallel with the archaeological map, the excavation work of IFAO at South
Saqqara has concentrated on a small plateau (400 m N-S, 200 m E-W), located at
the north-western corner of the site, called Tabbet al-Guesh. During the first
season (October-December 2000), a series of small brick mastabas has revealed
an unknown cemetery from the Late Period. Some of the collected pottery shreds
were dating to that period and later; however, there was a considerable number
of sherds from the late Old Kingdom. This was a clear sign that an unsuspected
necropolis from that age could be present somewhere at Tabbet al-Guesh. The
first Dynasty 6 tombs were discovered during the second and the third
archaeological seasons (October-December 2001-2002). Several rock-cut tombs
came into light. It was a surprise to find this kind of tombs at that place,
because the quality of the rock ("gebel") was not really good. Why
the high officials buried in these rock-cut tombs did not build stone or brick
mastabas?
One
of the best preserved tombs belongs to the lector priest Haunefer, who was also
King's nobleman, chief of priests' phyle and khenti-she priest serving at the mortuary temple of the pyramid of
Pepy I (the 3rd King of Dynasty 6). Completely preserved polychrome walls,
build up with fine white limestone slabs, represent the priest with his wife
Khuti, priestess of Hathor, and their 13 children. On one of the door jambs of
the tomb's entrance, Haunefer appears with another woman whose name, Hatek, is
up to now unknown. She is King's acquaintance and priestess of Hathor. But this
so rare name is also the name of Haunefer's eldest daughter, represented inside
the tomb in between her father and mother. In this case, it is possible to
consider that the two Hateks were in fact one and the same person, represented
as a young girl inside the tomb and as a young woman on the door jamb, where
she and her father are shown as a couple. There is even a small girl, also
called Hatek, standing in between them, to complete the family image. The fact
that the faces of the man and the woman were deliberately scratched puts forth
an embarrassing question of a possible incest. Another serious problem comes
from the intentional removal of all biographical inscriptions that have been
carved on the walls around the entrance door of the tomb; the stones were cut
off, leaving just the beginning of Haunefer's biographical text : "I
was...".
Another
rock-cut tomb belongs to the lector priest Khnumhotep, probably the
father-in-law of Haunefer. Except for the entrance door, where the inscribed
limestone lintel and the lower parts of the limestone door jambs were found,
Khnumhotep's tomb does not bear other decoration. On the other hand, a dozen of
small limestone statuettes, discovered around and inside one of the tomb's
pits, represent the lector priest Khnumhotep in different positions of his
function.
In
the layers over the Old Kingdom rock-cut tombs were found numerous untouched
burials from the Late Period and the Greco-Roman Period (wooden anthropoid
sarcophagi, skeletons wrapped in vegetal nets, pottery sarcophagi). These
burials clearly show that the whole plateau has been massively reoccupied,
almost 2000 years later. For the moment, there is no trace of any burials from
the Middle and the New Kingdoms. Important mud brick structures (one of them 10
x 7 m and 3 m high) have been built over the rock-cut tombs. The function and
the date of these structures are still not clear.
The
presence on the plateau of Tabbel al-Guesh of a new Old Kingdom necropolis of
high ranking officials, away from all known pyramids at South Saqqara, arises
an important question : could this necropolis be royal?