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THE LONGITUDINAL CHAMBER
This more intimate part of the tomb, irregularly built, with non parallel walls, measure 3.90m in length by an average width of 1.5m. The height varies, being under 2.0m at the entrance and the rear end raising substantially higher, to about 2.8m (see Kampp aerial plan and Davies' side view plan). The entry, slightly in progress, din't include any decor. At the rear has been partially excavated a niche for one or more statues. The floor slopes downwards towards the rear end.
The decorative program which had been envisaged was obviously disrupted, because, excavated in a very unusual way, was a small chamber in the west wall, in which opens up one of the funerary shafts.
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The walls of the entry corridor had not been decorated.
However, the walls of the actual chamber had been smoothed over with a clay layer and then a thin wash of white applied. Part of the east (right-hand) wall has been decorated (see is-100). The background colour is golden yellow, usually reserved for shrines and kiosks, and also found in the Ramesside period. Two artists seem to have worked in parallel on a banquet scene. At the far end of the wall, on the top register, can be found a beautiful representation of an anonymous couple seated in front of a table of offerings. The scene was almost intact in the days of Davies, although even then, the front part of the head of the husband was lost. The missing fragment of the upper torso of the wife is nowadays at the Hanover museum (see akm-1962,69).
Opposite, at the right-hand end, another seated couple were represented, of which nearly nothing remains, in the time of Davies (see Davies' drawing) several parts were even guessed by him. In front them of them, facing them, is a girl who was probably holding a floral offering. To her left (that is, behind her), the artist had been over taken dramatically by time, and could only sketch in red the image of a standing lute player, accompanied by a squatting friend, possibly playing a flute (see is-98).
Then work definitely came to an end in the tomb, for a reason which will remain unknown forever.
THE CEILINGS
These, which not only contained colour patterns but also text bands, had all fallen onto the ground, and Davies spent much time trying to determine their original arrangement and position, and to discover on whose behalf the texts were inscribed. The results were somewhat unsatisfying. The patterns were however secured, but their apparent distribution was too hypothetical. The water-colour images produced by his wife Nina at least provide images of the eight known patterns (see opposite).
Of the preserved large number of fragments, only two or three are of any size, and few retain the colour perfectly. Hence, the repeat of the design is not fully known. From the eight patterns, as would be expected, two would be needed for each of the two bays of the transverse chamber, and one for the axial division of this room. Two patterns would be usual for the rear longitudinal chamber and one for the entrance.
The ceilings had the usual colour bands of a yellow background, both surrounding and separating the pattern designs. Those of the first, transverse, chamber contained the usual texts, with both Nebamon's (with the now usual loss of "amon") and Ipuky's name being found. The text bands of the inner chamber were found to be blank, although yellow. The partial reconstitution of the ceiling texts (which is important to determine the owner of a tomb) gives equal importance to Nebamon and to Ipuky, confirming that the burial was conceived jointly by the two men.
THE FUNERARY SHAFTS
The tomb includes two distinct burial shafts, maybe one for each of the deceased (see ndgd-plan). The first is in the north-west corner of the courtyard, and the second in the annexe of the longitudinal chamber. Thus is achieved a "duplicate funerary system" (Seyfried, Kampp) from which were recovered traces of 92 burials to date. The shaft of the annexe gives access to a complex underground system, formed of several very low chambers, which also connect to the shaft in the courtyard. This group is reminiscent of the ritual of the "funeral to Buto".
Davies, who was not the first excavator of the monument, didn't recover anything interesting, except for some ushabtis, of which one was of 26cm in white wood. He also found various fragments.
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Original pages created by Thierry Benderitter
Original text by Thierry Benderitter
English translation by Jon J Hirst
Photographs by I.S. (is), Aude Gros de Beler (od),
Christian Tepper (August Kestner Museum, Hanover - RFA (akm),
Serge Blanc (sb), Thierry Benderitter (tb)
Translation of German source texts : Georges Engel
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