Into the Valley of the Kings and the Valley of the Queens

Model depicting various tomb shafts dug into the mountain housing the Valley of the Kings
Arriving from the Entrance

We still don’t know how many tombs, both royal and otherwise, were dug into the hills west of Luxor (Thebes) across the Nile. For an aerial view, you might look back at our ballooning adventure. The Valley of the Kings and the Valley of the Queens are, as is true for much of Egypt, active archeological sites.

Tutankhamen

All that remains in the tomb is a mummy stripped of finery, too fragile to move.
Not even vulture-winged maidens could protect him in death.
His sarcophagus is surrounded by beautiful paintings.
A Surround to the Sarcophagus
Canopic jars to store the King’s internal organs
Among the items removed from King Tut’s tomb and on display at the Egyptian Museum

Ramses III

The Passageway deep into the Tomb.
Don’t you wish you knew what was going on?

Ramses IX

Once again, following the pharaoh’s last journey for thousands of years.
Inner Burial Chamber
Egyptians loved their bees.
They were also a symbol of kingship.
Vulture motif on back wall of Inner Chamber
Looks more like a protective Horus (falcon), than a vulture.
Baboons guarded the first gate of the underworld.
Figure felled by a serpent?
Evil spirits were controlled by enclosing them.
Royal tombs were not cookie cutter affairs. Each is unique in what it has to say and how it’s said.

Mortuary Temple of Hatshepsut

Throughout the thousands of years of Pharaonic rule in Egypt, we know of only a handful of female pharaohs. Hatshepsut is prominent among them. Her mortuary temple is directly across the river from Karnak Temple. As might be expected, subsequent rulers (including her direct successor) made great efforts to erase her from the historical record, so we are fortunate that so much has survived in comparatively good condition from the 15th Century B.C. Her coffin, by the way, can be seen at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

Pile of gold as offering
A missing counterpart.
Lots of erasure here (left side).
Tributes to Hathor (Goddess represented as a cow and who nurtured Horus for his mother Isis) were natural to Hatshepsut as a female pharaoh and important to her claims of legitimacy as a divine ruler.

Valley of the Queens

After visiting the Valley of the Kings & the Mortuary Temple of Hatshepsut on the side of the hills facing the Nile opposite Luxor (Thebes), we went over to the other side of the hills to visit the visually stunning Tomb of Nefertari Meritmut (“beautiful companion, beloved of Mut”), first among the Great Royal Wives of Ramses II, Ramses the Great. This, from the 13th Century B.C.

Ramses the Great seems never to have gotten over the loss of Nefertari.