Today the work in the tomb of Henenu continued successfully. However, the day started with the dismantling of the haime therein, since the wind put it down in the previous night. Once it was assembled again, we continued our work there. Kelly was in charge of the excavation of the north-eastern corner in the courtyard, while Sergio was taking measurements with the total station and documenting the rubble pile in this area. Jónatan, who as usually was processing the findings coming from the trench, was assisted by the archaeologist Hazem who was drawing the incised and painted relief fragments found a few days ago. Apart from this, the front entrance of TT 313 finally received a new matting to protect the limestone floor.
Meanwhile, in TT 315 Mohamed supervised the excavation of the western corner in Ipi’s courtyard. There new structures and interesting finds have been uncovered. Apart from ancient finds such as a funeral cone and fragments of a reed mat, other things have been revealed. Some of these were more pleasant than others: a piece of old bread on the one hand and a pile of feces on the other. According to Mohamed, it was his first time to get in touch with an especial find like this. However, it was the reed mat which needed special treatment before it could be completely excavated. Our conservator Mohamed Hussein was consolidating the fragile matting with a special chemical solution called paraloid. In a step by step process the sand and dust on top of it was carefully removed.
At midday, our colleague Sebastian Falk arrived from Cairo who will be leading and assisting excavations in the tomb of Ipi in the next weeks. We are happy to have Sebastian back! In exchange, sadly our conservator Eman had to leave due to other obligations. We hope to see her in the next season!
At the end of the day the site was very crowded as it was payment day. Antonio, rais Ali and Jónatan, the banker of the mission, were distributing the week salaries and the bills.
