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King tut papyrus11/14/2023 ![]() Dozens of small sacks containing natron were found in the pottery containers from KV 54 ( 1988.437.2). In principle, the mummification of a king concerned his human body, a part of his identity that he shared with all other human beings.Īfter a deceased’s body was washed and its organs were removed through an abdominal incision to be treated separately, the body was packed during several weeks (seventy and forty days are mentioned in the sources) in natron, a compound of sodium carbonate, sodium bicarbonate, sodium sulfate, and sodium chlorite (most recently described as sodium sesquicarbonate Na2CO3.NaHCO3.2H2O), which occurs naturally in Egypt, especially in the Wadi el-Natrun, west of the Nile Delta. Indeed, although people of lesser means and status had to be content with only parts (sometimes very rudimentary parts) of the treatment repertoire available for kings, the difference was for the most part in the amount of time, material, and expertise expended. The mummification of King Tutankhamun’s body may have been more careful than that of his higher status subjects-and his burial was certainly immeasurably more lavishly equipped-but in essence it was not different from the embalmment of any person of reasonable means during his time. The objects from the Davis pit became thus a means to reconstruct some real activities that took place at a royal funeral more than 3,000 years ago. This was not a simple matter of trash disposal, but reflected the belief that even traces of a person’s physical remains contain something of his or her identity. It appears that the ancient Egyptians did not simply discard the remains from the mummification process, but collected them in pottery containers or coffins and buried them in the neighborhood of a deceased’s tomb. ![]() He was thus able to identify the linen sheets and bandages and sacks of chaff and natron from the large jars as leftovers from the embalming of King Tutankhamun’s body. Winlock, the Metropolitan Museum’s curator and long-time excavator, had discovered assemblages of rather similar objects and materials in the neighborhood of several nonroyal tombs in western Thebes. Indeed, Howard Carter and Arthur Mace stated in The Tomb of TutankhAmen: Discovered by the Late Earl of Carnarvon and Howard Carter (London, 1923) that the Davis discovery had served as one of the leads by which the intact tomb of the king was finally located in 1922. However, the name of King Tutankhamun on some of the mud seals ( 09.184.260 09.184.261 09.184.262) and torn linens ( 09.184.220 09.184.693) in the Davis-Ayrton pots caused knowledgeable archaeologists to take notice. Rather disappointed with this discovery of what looked like scrap, Theodore Davis donated the whole lot to the fledgling Metropolitan Museum collection of Egyptian art in 1909. There were also considerable amounts of animal bones and other bits and pieces such as vessel covers of reed material, sticks, and little basins of unfired clay. When removed from the pit, they turned out to be filled with a multitude of at first sight unintelligible objects, such as bundled-up linen sheets ( 09.184.220 09.184.693), bandages ( 09.184.797), and headscarves ( 09.184.217 09.184.218 09.184.219) broken mud seals ( 09.184.260 09.184.261 09.184.262) that had once been attached to strings closing boxes and bundles sacks of various shapes containing powdery white natron ( 1988.437.2) and brownish sawdust ( 1988.437.1) faded floral collars ( 09.184.214–.216) and a great amount of mostly broken pots that were later joined by Metropolitan Museum conservators into whole vessels. Crowded into this fairly small space, Ayrton found more than a dozen gigantic pottery jars, 28 inches (71 cm) high with bulging bodies and necks. Measuring approximately 6 x 4 feet (1.90 x 1.25 m), the pit was in the 1920s still about 4 feet 6 inches (1.4 m) deep at the uphill south end and 3 feet 4 inches (1 m) at the downhill north end. It had been cut in antiquity through the surface gravel covering the hillside and into the bedrock on the eastern slope bordering the Valley of the Kings. The Davis-Ayrton pit is today identified as KV 54. Davis, discovered a pit in the Valley of the Kings about 360 feet (110 m) across from the mouth of the (then still undiscovered) tomb of Tutankhamun (KV 62). Ayrton, working for the retired New York lawyer and amateur archaeologist Theodore M. In the winter of 1907–8, the young British archaeologist Edward R.
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