DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4104#0045
36
ABYDOS III.
found the variation in size to be 18*5 X 7'8 X 5
inches to 16-7 X 8 X 4*9.
Around the entrance to the chamber of offer-
ings there were hundreds of offering pots.
They were all of the one kind, and, as far as
could be seen, were in no particular order;
sometimes they were scattered and sometimes
piled two or three deep. The great stele was
lying near the end of this chamber of offerings
(see pi. li).
64. This is one of the best steles I have
ever seen. It is seven feet high and of the
finest workmanship. It shows Queen Teta-
shera seated on a throne. Her head-dress is
the vulture with the drooping wings, and in her
hand she carries the flail. Before her stands
her grandson, Aahmes I, with the heavily-
laden table of offerings. The carving is the
very best work of the XVIIIth Dynasty, and is
both sure and clean.
65. The stele is a dedication by Aahmes to
his grandmother : "I bethink me of the mother
of my mother and the mother of my father, the
great queen and Eoyal mother Teta-shera,
justified, whose tomb and sepulchre is now
on the ground of Thebes." Very little was
previously known of this queen. She is men-
tioned in a papyras now in the Cairo Museum,
and was supposed by Erman to be a prince,
Teta the little (see A. Z. xxxviii, 150). The
papyrus places her at the end of the XVTIth
Dynasty. In the British Museum there is a
small seated figure of her, placed by Dr. Budge
as a queen of the latter part of the XVIIth
Dynasty.
The statement, "the mother of my mother
and the mother of my father," goes a little Avay
towards straightening out the tangle of the
families just before the XVIIIth Dynasty.
Aah-hotep's first husband, the father of Karnes
and Aahmes, was then her brother and of the
royal line. At her husband's death Aah-hotep
married the Berber Se-qenen-ra, and, as there
was no daughter in the first family, the
daughter by this marriage, Nefert-ari, became
the heiress. In this way Aahmes, who was
the direct royal descendant, became king only
by virtue of being the husband of Nefert-ari,
who may have been of royal blood on the
mother's side only.
To this great queen and royal mother king
Aahmes built this shrine and the neighbouring
pyramid ; " My majesty desireth to cause to
be made for her a pyramid and a chapel in the
sacred land." The reason is expressed at the
bottom of the stele : " because he loved her
more than anything ; never did the kings of
former times do the like for their mothers."
66. When the whole shrine had been
cleared, the structural walls and divisions were
found to be nearly symmetrical. The long
walls will be seen to be the same on both sides
of the chamber of offerings, but the cross walls
vary slightly.
The stele evidently stood immediately oppo-
site the entrance. When found it was lying
face up, with the top at least two feet lower
than the base. It would seem as if it had been
dragged out of its position and partly turned
round by plunderers hunting for the Ka statues,
which they had hoped to find behind it in the
inner room. This room, however, was filled
with brick rubbish, like the other sections of
the structure, and the way in which the bricks
lay leaves no doubt that this filling was
original.
The walls were substantially built, but are
not very true. The whole building is also a
good many inches out from squareness. All
the rubbish put in to make the sections of the
structure solid was cleared out by us, but the
only thing found Avas the broken figure of
Renutit, the snake-headed goddess identified
with Isis, shown on pi. 1. A few scraps of
pottery showed that the influence of Mediter-
ranean potters, especially those from Cyprus,
was being felt. This type of pottery was very
plentiful when we came to dig over some
the
town, built
different n
^own to ^e been
^thhershrine. l*e
tiiDt0 it for some tn
H Mr. Mace ther
,gandpropping, andj
.j stone casing the py]
^mass of loose stones
^possible means to reac
imstarted and pro]
riil was so loose and ran
i a, if the whole pyrarr
f of that hole. After w<
Imatgreat risk the atten
iepyramid retained its i
a» the time of these
ft to discover the hui
1 from the Aahmes ton
\ and hardly a da
ling being done, in 1
ereabouts. One day
^Pyramid be a "dun
^ion was made of t
^bythetomb, ino-
rock *ell in my m
ffas examined.
of r°ck cut th]
"the PFamid, and
len^^thepassa|
fiy r*sb k
teatr
Kw- Also
Nf nt% fov l
ABYDOS III.
found the variation in size to be 18*5 X 7'8 X 5
inches to 16-7 X 8 X 4*9.
Around the entrance to the chamber of offer-
ings there were hundreds of offering pots.
They were all of the one kind, and, as far as
could be seen, were in no particular order;
sometimes they were scattered and sometimes
piled two or three deep. The great stele was
lying near the end of this chamber of offerings
(see pi. li).
64. This is one of the best steles I have
ever seen. It is seven feet high and of the
finest workmanship. It shows Queen Teta-
shera seated on a throne. Her head-dress is
the vulture with the drooping wings, and in her
hand she carries the flail. Before her stands
her grandson, Aahmes I, with the heavily-
laden table of offerings. The carving is the
very best work of the XVIIIth Dynasty, and is
both sure and clean.
65. The stele is a dedication by Aahmes to
his grandmother : "I bethink me of the mother
of my mother and the mother of my father, the
great queen and Eoyal mother Teta-shera,
justified, whose tomb and sepulchre is now
on the ground of Thebes." Very little was
previously known of this queen. She is men-
tioned in a papyras now in the Cairo Museum,
and was supposed by Erman to be a prince,
Teta the little (see A. Z. xxxviii, 150). The
papyrus places her at the end of the XVTIth
Dynasty. In the British Museum there is a
small seated figure of her, placed by Dr. Budge
as a queen of the latter part of the XVIIth
Dynasty.
The statement, "the mother of my mother
and the mother of my father," goes a little Avay
towards straightening out the tangle of the
families just before the XVIIIth Dynasty.
Aah-hotep's first husband, the father of Karnes
and Aahmes, was then her brother and of the
royal line. At her husband's death Aah-hotep
married the Berber Se-qenen-ra, and, as there
was no daughter in the first family, the
daughter by this marriage, Nefert-ari, became
the heiress. In this way Aahmes, who was
the direct royal descendant, became king only
by virtue of being the husband of Nefert-ari,
who may have been of royal blood on the
mother's side only.
To this great queen and royal mother king
Aahmes built this shrine and the neighbouring
pyramid ; " My majesty desireth to cause to
be made for her a pyramid and a chapel in the
sacred land." The reason is expressed at the
bottom of the stele : " because he loved her
more than anything ; never did the kings of
former times do the like for their mothers."
66. When the whole shrine had been
cleared, the structural walls and divisions were
found to be nearly symmetrical. The long
walls will be seen to be the same on both sides
of the chamber of offerings, but the cross walls
vary slightly.
The stele evidently stood immediately oppo-
site the entrance. When found it was lying
face up, with the top at least two feet lower
than the base. It would seem as if it had been
dragged out of its position and partly turned
round by plunderers hunting for the Ka statues,
which they had hoped to find behind it in the
inner room. This room, however, was filled
with brick rubbish, like the other sections of
the structure, and the way in which the bricks
lay leaves no doubt that this filling was
original.
The walls were substantially built, but are
not very true. The whole building is also a
good many inches out from squareness. All
the rubbish put in to make the sections of the
structure solid was cleared out by us, but the
only thing found Avas the broken figure of
Renutit, the snake-headed goddess identified
with Isis, shown on pi. 1. A few scraps of
pottery showed that the influence of Mediter-
ranean potters, especially those from Cyprus,
was being felt. This type of pottery was very
plentiful when we came to dig over some
the
town, built
different n
^own to ^e been
^thhershrine. l*e
tiiDt0 it for some tn
H Mr. Mace ther
,gandpropping, andj
.j stone casing the py]
^mass of loose stones
^possible means to reac
imstarted and pro]
riil was so loose and ran
i a, if the whole pyrarr
f of that hole. After w<
Imatgreat risk the atten
iepyramid retained its i
a» the time of these
ft to discover the hui
1 from the Aahmes ton
\ and hardly a da
ling being done, in 1
ereabouts. One day
^Pyramid be a "dun
^ion was made of t
^bythetomb, ino-
rock *ell in my m
ffas examined.
of r°ck cut th]
"the PFamid, and
len^^thepassa|
fiy r*sb k
teatr
Kw- Also
Nf nt% fov l