In the tomb of Henenu work has been progressing as usual: Kelly and Sergio were documenting and supervising the excavations in two different units in the upper courtyard, while Jónatan and Ana were in charge of the incoming finds from these trenches. A basket full of finds which still awaited recording and sorting from yesterday revealed the find of the day: four beautiful papyrus fragments with a neat hieroglyphic handwriting! Of course, everyone –especially our epigrapher Dina– was excited about this discovery. In the next days, hopefully we will be able to say more about its contents, context, and date! As in the days before, Hazem was drawing selected relief pieces (and was responsible as well for the selection of background music in the computer!). In the morning, Sebastian was continuing taking pictures in the photo lab, this time set up outside in the haima, where Antonio helped him with some of the largest pieces to be photographed.
Meanwhile, in TT 315 the excavation of the northwestern trench has continued and the finds coming from there – among them some well preserved parts of a mummy and a fragment of a mummy mask with paint remains– have been documented by Raúl. Finally, we were able to start the cleaning and clearance of the tomb of Meseh, located in the eastern part of the courtyard of Ipi. This subsidiary tomb is well known since in this place Winlock found the famous Heqanakhte papyri. Because of the possibility of discovering more papyrus fragments, the material and soil coming from this area had to be sieved carefully. It was Sebastian the one supervising the process of sieving as well as excavating inside this tomb.
Unfortunately, yesterday our two conservators Mohamed and Rawda had to leave due to other obligations. We will miss them a lot and thank them for the great times and work together! We hope to see you soon, inshaallah!
Today Lea Röfer, an Egyptologist working at the German Archaeological Institute in Cairo, visited our archaeological site to learn more about our work. We were very fond to show her around.
Apart from this, in the afternoon the moudir decided to play a joke with the team members. He announced that he himself found a mysterious object in one of the tombs: an ostracon inscribed with blue ink. In the upper part, it shows floral decoration, and in the lower section the object shows a list of 19 names accompanied by strange symbols. It must be somehow related to the work going on in Deir el-Bahari and the roll call for checking the attendance of these workers to their duties. The kind of composition and the word “Antoniohotep” gives a clue for the dating of the object. This enigmatic personal name is attested since the Middle Kingdom and can be translated as “Antonio is satisfied”.
