Shabtis from tombs MMA 1151 and 1152 in western Thebes The site around two tombs on a little noticed hill in the Theban Necropolis, currently excavated by the Polish Center of Mediterranean Archaeology, has yielded a large number of shabtis. Marta Kaczanowicz explains what they can tell about the history of the site and the tombs’ occupants.
Photo: Marta Kaczanowicz
A small, nameless hillock located just opposite the south-west corner of the Sheikh Abd elQurna hill has rarely been noticed or described by scholars working in the Theban Necropolis. The hill, however, seems to have been a desirable place for burials at various stages of development of the necropolis: during the early years of the Middle Kingdom it gained importance due to its proximity to the royal mortuary complex in the nearby valley behind Sheikh Abd el-Qurna; since the Nineteenth Dynasty, Ramesses II’s Mansion of Millions of Years stood in the foreground, at the edge of the floodplain; and in the Late Period the area
Photo: Marta Kaczanowicz
Clay shabtis from tombs MMA 1151 and 1152.
EGYPTIAN ARCHAEOLOGY ISSUE NO 50 SPRING 2017
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