DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4195#0010
THE MASTABA OF PTAHHETEP
AND AKHETHETEP.
PAKT II.
THE MASTABA, THE SCULPTUEES OF AKHETHETEP.
GHAPTEE I.
THE MASTABA.
1. In May, 1899, a long winters work in
the mastaba which is the subject of the present
memoir havin»; been brought to a close, the
tomb was reburied, at a large cost in labour
and money, in accordance with the terms of the
Government permit. The expenditure might,
however, have been spared. A few months
later the mastaba Avas disinterred more com-
pletely than ever before by the Department of
Antiquities, and its rooms cleared and repairecl
for the admission of visitors. Really effective
measures for lighting and protecting the tomb
having been proposed, this forms a happy
termination to our enterprise. Unfortunately
I did not hear of this clearance undertaken at
the expense of the Government until on my
way home last winter, and I was therefore
unable to take advantage of it in preparing
this memoir.
2. Before commencing the description of
the mastaba, attention must be called to the
necessarily incomplete character of the clearances
on which my observations are based. The
accounts of the mastaba given by those who
first excavated it, or who saw it at that time,
were so strangely misleading,2 and their in-
accuracies so quickly exposed by the mattocks
of the labourers, that a thorough investigation
was at once seen to be desirable. But for this
we were by no means prepared. It was of
course useless to think of a complete recovery
of the mastaba from its buried state, restoring
it to its original dignity as a massive structure
sixteen feet or more in height. Neither funds
nor time admitted of it, especially in face of
1 Throughout the volame Mariette's Les Mastabas will be
abbreviated to Mab., Mast. ; The Tomb of Ptahhetep in
Quibell's Eamesseum to Beim.; and the Denkmäler of Lepsius
to L. D. The first volume of the present publication will
be quoted as Part I.
2 I rrmst exempt the worthy Sheikh Rubi, who was
formerly Mariette's reiyis, and is still in charge of the
tombs here. He retained a perfect knowledge of the
disposition of the building.
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