DISCOVERED, LOST, REDISCOVERED: USERHAT AND KHONSUEMHEB
Map of tomb TT 47 and its surroundings.
Map: Institute of Egyptology, Waseda University
and eventually brought to the Musées Royaux d’Ar t et d’Histoire in Brussels where the piece is now being exhibited. Before our rediscover y of T T 47, the las t repor t concerning this tomb comes from Ar thur Weigall in 1908. After this, the exact location of TT 47 remained lost for a century. We began working in the area of al-Khoka in December 2007, after modern village houses had been torn down when Qurna village was relocated further north. We cleaned a large shallow depression and identified the edge of a courtyard full of debris, which we assumed to belong to TT 47. Clearance of the western part of the courtyard exposed the lintel with
the name and title of the tomb owner facing to the east: ‘Overseer of King’s Private Apartment, Userhat’ (images below). The lintel is approximately 2.8 m long. Both the upper and lower edges are extensively damaged, to a surviving height of approximately 60 cm. The lintel is decorated with relief carvings of very high quality from the time of Amenhotep III, consisting of two scenes: on the right, Userhat worships Atum and a goddess (either Hathor or the Western goddess), while one the left there are images of Ra-Horakhty and Maat; the figure of Userhat on this side has been lost. In the centre of the lintel, the nomen and prenomen of Amenhotep III are
Line drawing of the lintel from TT 47.
Photo and line drawing: Institute of Egyptology, Waseda University
EGYPTIAN ARCHAEOLOGY ISSUE NO 50 SPRING 2017
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