EGYPTIAN
El-Sheikh Ibada (Antinoopolis): Fieldwork directed by Rosario Pintaudi (Istituto Papirologico ‘G. Vitelli’, Univ of Florence) concentrated on church D3 - mainly on further excavation of the unusual baptistry and adjoining buildings in the N cemetery. The baptismal chamber adjoins a small single-aisled, and probably once barrel-vaulted, chapel with a large E apse and an underground burial chamber. The chapel and the hall were both entered from additional rooms in the W. The font had not simply been abandoned in antiquity but had been filled with earth and debris and then carefully covered by a strong cement flooring spread over a strengthening substratum of fired bricks bound in lime-mortar. Baptism of the dead was strictly forbidden by the rules of the church and this baptistry in the N cemetery may have been rendered inaccessible by the church authorities to prevent the rules being flouted. Amarna: The Amarna Project expedition, directed by Barry Kemp, completed repairs to the animal houses on the N side of the North Palace, and a further season of excavation was undertaken at the South Tombs Cemetery where another decorated anthropoid coffin was discovered. The human bones were later studied by the Univ of Arkansas anthropology field school. www.amarnaproject.com Wadi Sikait (Mons Smaragdus): The Univ of Delaware/PCMA team, led by Steven Sidebotham and Iwona Zych, surveyed this Roman era beryl/ emerald mining region, c.120km NW of Berenike. The project produced detailed architectural plans and elevations of two major settlements: Middle Sikait and North Sikait, and continued work at Nugrus. The project also initiated excavations at a fifth-third millennium BC cattle cemetery in Wadi Khashab where initial survey work had been conducted in 2010. http://tinyurl.com/7w5llrd Berenike: The Univ of Delaware/PCMA team, led by Steven Sidebotham and Iwona Zych, continued geomagnetic surveys and geological coring, and excavated trenches in several areas of the site: in the early Ptolemaic area at the W end, in the Ptolemaic and early Roman rubbish deposits, in the SW harbour (where some Ptolemaic and many early and late Roman remains were recorded) and at the so-called Serapis Temple. http://tinyurl.com/7w5llrd
Abydos: As part of the Univ of Pennsylvania/Yale Inst of Fine Arts/New York Univ expedition, a team led by Josef Wegner continued work at the mortuary complex of Senwosret III. With funding from the Antiquities Endowment Fund of ARCE, a permanent building was constructed encasing the tomb’s entrance area to permit completion of the excavation and facilitate the tomb’s future opening to visitors. At the mortuary enclosure of Senwosret III expanding previous excavations produced new evidence for the dating and form of the subsidiary mastabas. Previously unknown structures contemporaneous with the tomb construction were discovered and investigated. At the nearby town site of Wahsut, excavation of the mayoral residence (Building A), where documentation of the building proper is now complete, revealed significant well-preserved deposits of ceramics and seal impressions, including a dense deposit of wellpreserved administrative debris from Building A. http://www.penn.museum/abydos.html
Karnak: 1. Archaeological research and restoration programmes continued inside the precinct of Amun-Re under the auspices of the CFEETK (MSA/CNRS USR 3172) directed by Mansour Boreik and Christophe Thiers. Mansour Boreik continued excavation at the Roman bath which covers c.3000sq m, with many archaeological features, such as the bathing pools and heating rooms, very well preserved. At the Ptah Temple, excavation, led by Christophe Thiers and Pierre Zignani, of the SW area brought to light different
ARCHAEOLOGY
Karnak. Part of a lintel of King Senakhtenre Ahmose of the Seventeenth Dynasty. Photograph: CFEETK occupation phases and a succession of mud-brick walls. A door jamb and part of a lintel from a gate of a granary dedicated to Amun-Re by the 17th Dyn king Senakhtenre Ahmose was found, shedding new light on the history of the SIPearly NK. Elizabeth Frood (Univ of Oxford) continued the study of hieroglyphic and hieratic graffiti. The restoration programme focused on the first Ptolemaic gate. The epigraphic survey of the barque-shrine of Philip Arrhidaeus is now mostly finished. The team led by Laurent Coulon (CNRS) continued the study of the chapel of Osiris Nebdjefa and undertook an epigraphic survey of the chapel of Osiris Ptah Nebankh, between the 10th Pylon and the Mut precinct. The chapel’s lintel was restored, and the mud-brick enclosure wall rebuilt. At the Treasury of Shabaka, Nadia Licitra (Univ Paris Sorbonne) found parts of wooden ceiling decoration made of coloured glass paste, and a stela of Ramesses III describing the construction of a mud-brick enclosure wall. www. cfeetk.cnrs.fr/
2. The OI team, directed by W Raymond Johnson, in co-operation with ARCE as part of its USAID-funded Luxor East Bank Groundwater Lowering Response Project, continued recording re-used blocks in the floors and foundations of the Khonsu Temple under the supervision of Brett McClain and Jen Kimpton. In room II is a large block with a name-frieze of Ramesses II, usurped from an 18th Dyn kheker-frieze. Krisztián Vértes and Keli Alberts documented blocks and fragments in the barque shrine, in rooms III, IV, V, and VII, and on the outside wall of room X. http://oi.uchicago. edu/research/projects/epi/
Luxor Temple: Conservation and monitoring by the OI, led by W Raymond Johnson, and supported by the World Monuments Fund, continued in the temple blockyard, supervised by Hiroko Kariya. Along the E outer wall of the Colonnade Hall 101 buried blocks were conditionsurveyed and photographed, and then reburied in clean sand. Yarko Kobylecky photographed 135 blocks of Ptolemy I after they were moved to a mastaba platform for study. Jay Heidel continued documentation, study and collation of blocks from a dismantled sixth century AD basilica ‘The Church of St Thecla’ in front of the Luxor pylons, focusing on Arch 1 of the sanctuary. This and a second arch will be studied for possible reconstruction along with the other blocks from the church sanctuary.
the entrance to MIDAN.05 was found, and the remains of a mud-brick structure with a sloping surface ending with steps roughly aligned towards the main door of the tomb. Excavation of the N part of the transverse hall of the tomb revealed the remains of a painted ‘banqueting’ scene on the E wall, showing the tomb owner and his wife seated in front of a table of offerings, with guests and musicians. http://tinyurl.com/6t6wepe. 2. The Spanish National Research Council mission working at Dra Abu el-Naga, directed by José M Galán, continued restoration inside the tomb-chapel of Djehuty (TT 11). The funerary shaft at the innermost chamber of the tomb-chapel of Hery (TT 12) was excavated. It descends 7.5m, and ends in two burial chambers. One was filled in the Ptolemaic Period with animal mummies, probably mainly ibises and falcons. Two large demotic graffiti (probably mid second century BC) were uncovered in an annex gallery. NE of Hery’s monument the owner of a mid-18th Dyn tomb chapel was identified by 50 funerary cones (Davies and Macadam no.334) and four stamped corner bricks lying on the floor at its entrance as ‘The Overseer of Weavers, Ay’. 3. At Qurna, Margaret De Jong and Susan Osgood of the OI team, directed by W Raymond Johnson, continued epigraphic documentation of the inscribed N wall and one column of the sunken court of the tomb of Nefersekheru (TT 107). Yarko Kobylecky photographed a group of small, inscribed wall fragments for later incorporation with the reliefs which depict Amenhotep III’s Steward of the Jubilee Palace at Malqata, the noble Nefersekheru. They were carved in bad limestone whose condition has been made worse by flooding. http://oi.uchicago.edu/research/projects/epi/
4. The Centro di Egittologia Francesco Ballerini, Como team, led by Angelo Sesana, concluded their work at the ‘Temple of Millions of Years’ of Amenhotep II. Three TIP burial shafts were completely investigated; they contained ushabtis, pottery sherds, coffin fragments and human skeletal remains. In one shaft the poor remains of two boxes were found, containing two sets of limestone canopic jars. On four of them the name of the owner, Bakenptah, was written in black ink. On the E side of the temple a niche cut into the conglomerate was discovered. Within were two, probably SIP, mud-coffins with the remains of two individuals still in perfect anatomical connection. Restoration continued of the mud-brick boundary wall, the remains of the second pylon and two mud-brick chapels inside the columned courtyard. The aim is to protect the remains of the ancient structures from degradation and to prepare the area for possible visitors. www.cefb.it 5. The work at the Funerary Complex of Harwa (TT 37) and Akhimenru (TT 404) of the Missione Archeologica Italiana a Luxor, directed by Francesco Tiradritti, concentrated on study of the large amount of material found in recent years in the Tomb of Harwa, with no excavation. Particular attention was paid to over 500 fragments of papyri recovered in 2009-10. They are mostly funerary in nature, written in hieratic and cursive
http://oi.uchicago.edu/research/projects/epi/
Western Thebes: 1. The Univ of Pisa team, directed by Marilina Betrò, continued the clearance of the forecourt of MIDAN.05 at Dra Abu el-Naga. In front of the main entrance of the tomb, three decorated and uninscribed offering tables were found, surrounded by remains of what was probably an ancient funeral ritual or festival; thick layers of garlands and vegetal remains with dark layers of burnt organic material and several jar stoppers. During the clearance of the W side of the courtyard, the mouth of a shaft, excavated into the bedrock of the forecourt S of
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Dra Abu el-Naga. Three offering tables found during the excavation of tomb MIDAN.05. Photograph: Gianluca Miniaci © Missione dell’Università di Pisa