The Sistine Chapel of Egypt

"It is a place that strikes you into silence." - Amelia Edwards, 'A Thousand Miles Up The Nile', 1876

Nefertari, the Great Royal Wife of Ramses II, one of Egypt's greatest pharaohs, occupied a major part of the first three decades of Ramses' almost 70 year reign.  She is immortalized in statues and monuments all over Egypt, most notably the temple Ramses dedicated to her at Abu Simbel, in Nubia.  But it is her tomb, in the Valley of the Queens in Thebes, where you can see for yourself the love and affection that the great Pharaoh had for his queen.  Nowhere else in Egypt are there carvings and paintings with such grace and elegance.  It has been called the Sistine Chapel of Egypt and for good reason.

"The foreigner Nesamun took us up and showed us the tomb of King Ramesses VI ... And I spent four days breaking into it, we being present all five. We opened the tomb and entered it. ... We found a cauldron of bronze, three wash bowls of bronze ..." - New Kingdom papyrus, c. 1110 BCE

The tomb was discovered in 1904 by Italian archaeologist, Ernesto Schiaparelli.  It was immediately evident to him what an amazing and unique discovery he had made.  Almost all the treasures were long gone, robbed in antiquity.  A pair of sandals, a piece or two of gold jewelry and two mummified legs (recently confirmed to be those of the great queen) were all that were in the tomb.  But it was what covered the walls and columns that caught Schiaparelli's eye.

But within a few years, the walls of the tomb were starting to crumble and many of the paintings were lost.  Egypt closed the tomb to visitors for many decades.  Then, in the late 1980s, the Getty Institute of Los Angeles, California, took on a 6 year project to conserve the tomb.  It was soon discovered that in the rather second rate limestone that the tomb had been dug into, salt crystals were forming behind the plaster that covered the limestone.  This caused the plaster to separate from the walls and in some instances break apart.

Using an international team of scientists and artisans, the entire tomb was worked on and conserved.  It wasn't 'restored', that would mean adding modern painting and carving to make it look original.  By 'conserving' the tomb, the Getty Institute was able to save what was still in the tomb.  When you are in the tomb, you can see what a remarkable job they did.  Although some of the carvings are gone, most are still there and look like they were carved and painted yesterday.  They are over 3200 years old.  In only conserving the tomb, you know that when looking at the artwork you are only looking at things carved and painted by the ancient artisans.

The carving and painting in the tomb was an early and very successful instance of what was then a novel technique.  The number of colors used was a totally new and as we know now, this was the apex of Egyptian art of the New Kingdom.

"Rig your Boat, travel near and far, look for a wise partner, knock his door, seek his knowledge, welcome him in your home, this is how your people will prosper." - Amenophet, 2.500 B.C.

As in other royal tombs, the artwork is all religious and there are no references to any historic events. There are no 'daily life' scenes, such as there are in the tombs of the Nobles.  But this tomb is different than other royal tombs.  It's kind of hard to put in into words, but when you first enter the tomb you feel it immediately.  There is love and affection everywhere.  Although Ramses II only appears in a few places, you can feel the love he had for his queen.  And, if you are to believe these things, the warmth and affection the Egyptian gods had for her was exceptional. In many carvings, Nefertari is seen being led, hand in hand, by Isis, Nepthys, Hathor and other gods to the afterlife.  There are amazing paintings of leopards, birds, cows, cobras, vultures and one of her playing the game of sennet, the Egyptian version of chess.  Some of the most beautiful paintings of Ma'at, the Egyptian concept of truth, order, harmony and balance are in this tomb.

Last year on our tour, Amy and I and about 10 other tour members paid an inordinate amount of money to go into the tomb for 15 minutes.  At the time, it was closed to the public and you had to get a special exception from the Antiquities Department to open the tomb.  Of course, enough dollars and no problem.  But last May the government decided to open the tomb to a limited number of tourists.  You can visit for the supposed maximum of 10 minutes for 1000 Egyptian pounds, about $60.  But we had the Luxor Red Pass ($200 for 5 days) and this allows you to visit the tomb once per day for five days.  

Since we arrived late in the day each time and we knew someone who knew someone who knew the inspector, we were told to take all the time we wanted, no time limit (it's nice to know someone who knows someone who knows someone in Egypt...this always helps).  On one of the visits I had my iPhone (usually I never took a camera in there as photos are prohibited) and the guard said, no problem, go ahead and take pictures (for a little baksheesh, of course).  So here we are now with some nice photos of the tomb.  Of course, like with any other great monument or work of art, you really have to see it in person.  Hopefully, this will inspire some of you to visit this amazing country and see these things for yourselves.

We enter the tomb...

One of our guards...

Nefertari playing Sennet...

The burial chamber...

The Inner Ramp, leading to the burial chamber...

Me and Ma'at...

Amy in a side chamber...

Nefertari offering fabrics...

Isis greeting Nefertari...

Isis taking Nefertari's hand to lead her to the Great Beyond...

A priest with his leopard skin cape...

Nefertari and her vulture headdress...

Wonderful Ibis...

Nobody is really sure what this baby is all about...

Nefertari's cartouche...

A Day with Dr. Hamdy

"See the pyramids along the Nile

Watch a sunset from a tropic isle

Just remember, darling, all the while

You belong to me.” - 'You Belong To Me', Chilton Price, Pee Wee King, 1952

Saqqara, south of the Giza pyramids, is one of the great sites of ancient Egypt. For thousands of years, people were buried here, both pharaohs and nobles alike. It is here that the first large stone structure was built almost 5000 years ago, the Step Pyramid. But there are also many fantastic tombs dating back to the 4th Dynasty. 

Through our friend, Vicky Jensen, the president of the Northern California chapter of ARCE, the American Research Center in Egypt (an organization that does a lot of archaeological work in Egypt), we were introduced to the chief inspector of the entire site of Saqqara, Dr. Hamdy Amin. We set up a time to meet him and he said he would take us on a tour of Saqqara.  But first we had to drive there. Zak, our driver from Luxor, whom we had had for the last four days, drove us out there. What ensued was our own version of Mr. Toad's Wild Ride!

Zak is not from Cairo, and unbeknownst to us, had absolutely no idea how to get to Saqqara. But he has an iPhone and a GPS, so no problem. Except the GPS also had no idea how to get there. We started off almost immediately going in the wrong direction and Zak, being Zak, asked almost everyone we passed how to get there. This proved to us, once again, now friendly and helpful Egyptians are. Here we were, in super heavy traffic, and every taxi we drove by Zak would lean out the window and asked where to go. At first this didn't work so well, the directions were off and we ended up going back and forth across the same bridge three times. But eventually we got on the correct road, saw a sign that said "Saqqara" and we knew we would be okay. We arrived only 10 minutes late, Dr. Hamdy waiting at the entrance. 

“Egypt is a great place for contrasts: splendid things gleam in the dust.” 

…Gustave Flaubert, Flaubert in Egypt: A Sensibility on Tour

First, Hamdy took us to a couple of New Kingdom tombs that were discovered about 20 years ago and recently open to tourists. One was the tomb of Maya, who is thought to be the wet nurse and nanny to King Tutankhamen. There is a wonderful carving of her and Tut. 

Next to Maya is the tomb of Nemtymes. There are some remarkable carvings here, but the really amazing thing is Surapis bull carved carved coming right out of the tomb wall. This is unique in all of ancient Egypt. 

"Man fears time, but time fears the pyramids." - Arab proverb

Next we went into the Step Pyramid complex, a huge enclosure of 37 acres. The Step Pyramid is one of the great marvels in the world. Over 200 feet high, it was designed by the first great architect, Imhotep. Not much is known about him, his tomb has never been found and there are only a couple of statues of him ever found, but we know he invented the pyramid and this was his building. It was for the pharaoh Djozer and was built around 2700 BCE. There are miles and miles of passageways underneath the pyramid, including a couple of burial chambers. No treasure has been found and the mummy Djozer is nowhere to be seen, plundered in ancient history. 

Next, Hamdy took us to the Unas Pyramid. Unas was a pharaoh 5th Dynasty and although this pyramid is mostly gone, the amazing burial chamber is intact.  The walls are totally covered with hieroglyphs and have been a great help to Egyptologists in understanding the ancient religion. 

"Egypt is an acquired country - the gift of the river." - Herodotus, c. 450 BCE

Hamdy had to leave us for an hour, so he pointed the way to the Serapeum, the great tomb in which 24 sacred bulls, the Serapus, were buried in giant sarcophagi. It was about a kilometer trek across the desert to this and how archaeologists found it over 100 years ago way out in the desert is amazing. These huge corridors and burial chambers were carved out of the solid limestone and the sarcophagi, made out of basalt and weighing up to 64 tons, were somehow dragged down here. 

“Listen all of you!  

The priest of Hathor will beat twice any of you who enters this tomb or does harm to it.  

The gods will confront him because I am honored by his Lord.  

The gods will not allow anything to happen to me.  

Anyone who does anything bad to my tomb, then the crocodile. hippopotamus, and lion will eat him.” 

Curse inscription from the tomb of Petety, circa 2500 BC

We trudged back across the desert sands (we should have taken a camel) to meet up with Hamdy again.  He then took us to some New Kingdom tombs, four in all. The best was the tomb of Horemheb, the last pharaoh of the 18th Dynasty. But when this tomb was built he was the general of the army. It was only after he became pharaoh, not too long after King Tut, that he built a new and gorgeous tomb in the Valley of the Kings in Thebes. 

Tickets for the various places in Saqqara...

So with that, Hamdy had to leave us and we visited a few other tombs of nobles with amazing carvings. It was a marvelous day and a very friendly gesture of Hamdy's to spend his time with two Egypt nuts and their driver, Zak. 

Lunch at the Saqqara Palms Resort...