Today was a misty day in Deir el-Bahari, which combined with the hot Egyptian sun made us sweat a lot! In the tomb of Henenu Sergio and Kelly decided to start a new trench in the northwestern corner of the courtyard. After the largest stones were removed and the digging started, an old newspaper –which was probably written and read in the time of Winlock appeared in the area. Also fragments of a heart scarab were unearthed. We hope to find more fragments to be able to read the hieroglyphs and assign a date to the object. Up till now a provenience from the Middle Kingdom period seems possible. Apart from this, the drawing documentation of the northeastern corner with the alabaster vein was undertaken. For this purpose, Kelly and Sergio used measurement tapes reference.
Meanwhile, Hazem was drawing the uncovered relief fragments according to the drawing conventions which were discussed yesterday. Jónatan, who continued with the management of objects and small finds, found an interesting reference from the Metropolitan Museum of Art that was published in the 1920s. Finally, the lights for TT 313 have arrived and were installed in the shafts and chambers, which makes work much safer and easier from now on!
In the tomb of Ipi the finds of the last field seasons have been revised by Antonio, Raúl and Dina. These were rearranged and put in a new order to facilitate the deposition of new materials such as reed boxes and foam which have been bought in Luxor the day before. After this process was finished, Rawda, Ana, Raul and Dina continued the sorting of materials and finds coming from the western courtyard façade.
Except from the ancient material, we found several fragments of a French newspaper which could be dated to the year 1882. Inside the sarcophagus chamber, Mohamed the conservator continued the cleaning of the inner eastern wall of the sarcophagus to clean and make more hieroglyphs visible for further epigraphic analysis.
The progress of today´s work was overshadowed by the incoming news on the terrorists attachs that happened in Tanta (north of Cairo) and Alexandria. Our hearts and thoughts are with the victims and their families and friends.
