The History, People and Culture of the Nile Valley.

This UK publication first appeared mid 2000 and appears bi-monthly. Initially rather light-weight in content, it underwent a transformation under new editorship in mid 2004 and now carries articles of more scholarly import, though lacking footnotes.

‘Perilous descent: the Hall of the Mountain Kings’, Ancient Egypt 4.1 (July/August 2003), 30-35. An account of a descent of the Agatha Christie path and my first entry into the TT320 royal cache tomb in 2003.

‘Look on my words, and despair!’ Ancient Egypt 5.1/25 (August/September 2005), 16-19. Considering Shelley’s Ozymandias poem, one less well known by Horace Smith, and how the message may be applied to the current destruction of Egyptian monuments by rising groundwater.

‘So you want to know about… The Royal Mummies and the Valley of the Kings’, Ancient Egypt 5.4/28 (February/March 2005), 17-19. Helps to identify the most useful and available books and web-sites.

‘The Thrice (or more) – Buried Queen’, Ancient Egypt 5.6/30 (June/July 2005), 13-15. Concerning the mummy of Queen Ahmose Nefertari which apparently ‘fell into putrefaction’…and then recovered!

‘The (Royal) Mummy Returns…but is he Ramesses I?’, Ancient Egypt 6.2/32 (Oct/Nov 2005), 42-48. Showing that the mummy from the Niagara Falls Museum, returned by the Michael C. Carlos Museum to Egypt, cannot have come from the royal cache, and cannot be Ramesses I.

‘Strong Man – Wrong Tomb: the problem of Belzoni’s Sarcophagi’, Ancient Egypt 6.6/36 (June/July 2006), 22-30. Clearing up the confusion over which sarcophagi Belzoni removed when. In particular, the sarcophagus lid ‘given’ to him by Drovetti was not that of Ramesses III, and the base of the Ramesses III was not removed until later, by Athanasi.

‘Hadrian, Pharaoh of Egypt and the Birth of Egypt’s Last God, Antinous’, Ancient Egypt 9.4/52 (Feb/March 2009), 34-40. When Hadrian’s favourite, Antinous, drowned in the Nile the emperor had the young man declared a god. The circumstances were suspicious. What really happened?

My book Identifying the Royal Mummies (Part 4 of Refugees for Eternity) has received almost universally positive reviews – in KMT: A Modern Journal of Ancient Egypt; Current World Archaeology; Egyptian Archaeology etc.  Now, co-inciding with the discussions surrounding the DNA evidence on some royal mummies, comes another positive review in the journal MINERVA: The International Review of Art and Archaeology. The review is written by Peter Clayton, best-selling author of Chronicle of the Pharaohs.

It is becoming clearer now just how much we rely on the identification techniques discussed in the book to make sense of the recent DNA data. DNA turns out ot be just one more strand of evidence to be added to that surviving in the mummies and their inscriptions. We need to take account of all types of evidence when trying to discover or confirm the identity of a royal mummy. You can buy Identifying the Royal Mummies through this site. See also my article in News – ‘Have the DNA Tests Proved That Akhenaten was Tutankhamun’s Father? Or have they told us something else?’

NOTE: My book Identifying the Royal Mummies (as referenced in this article) looks at the various methods used to establish the identity of each royal mummy and may be purchased on this site.

A lot of questions have been raised by the recent announcement by the Egyptian Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA) of the results of DNA tests on certain of the royal mummies in the collection of the Egyptian Museum, Cairo. Here I outline both developments leading up to the publication of the results, and the discussions that followed. Those wishing to read more detailed discussions of the background evidence on the royal mummies may do so in my book Identifying the Royal Mummies, references to which are provided in the notes.

 The Egyptian SCA had always resisted calls for the DNA testing of mummies,¹ until it could be performed in Egypt, and in June 2007 a DNA laboratory was attached to the Egyptian Museum, Cairo. As a second laboratory was required to validate the results, another was constructed nearby at Cairo University, opening in June 2009.

The construction of the second lab was partly prompted by the scepticism over the value of DNA tests conducted at the time that one of two female mummies from tomb KV60 was identified as Hatshepsut. The two KV60 females were found laid-out with the left hand on the chest and the right arm straight down by the side – a pose sometimes believed to be associated with queens – and the association with Hatshepsut was made because one of the mummies lay in a coffin base bearing the title and name, ‘Great Royal Nurse, In’, who might be the same In-Sitre, a wet-nurse of Hatshepsut, known from a statue discovered at Deir el Bahari. This association had previously led Elizabeth Thomas to make the suggestion, with the ‘utmost temerity’ that one of the KV60 mummies might, in fact, be Hatshepsut herself.² The SCA arranged for the skulls of the mummies of Thutmose II, Thutmose III, and the unidentified man [CCG 61065] sometimes thought to be Thutmose I, to be CAT-scanned to produce a composite, generic, ‘Thutmoside’ profile, which turned out to most closely match the KV60 mummy without a coffin (KV60A). The identification of this mummy with Hatshepsut was thought then to have been proven when a CAT scan of a jewel-box labelled for Hatshepsut (found in the Royal Cache tomb TT320) showed that it contained part of a tooth which appeared to fit with the part-root still remaining in the KV60A mummy. The identification is unlikely to be correct because, as was shown in a letter from a dentist to KMT,³ the tooth in the box was from the wrong jaw, but it scarcely needs pointing out that neither the tooth nor the liver found in the jewel-box need have anything to do with the person named on it. The identification of either KV60 mummy with Hatshepsut remains widely doubted.⁴

DNA tests carried out subsequently included both KV60 females, the supposed Thutmose I mummy (unknown man 61065), and Queen Ahmose Nefertari – who was probably an ancestor of both Hatshepsut’s father, Thutmose I, and mother, Queen Ahmose – but, curiously, not Hatshepsut’s half brother and husband, Thutmose II.

The difficulties involved in obtaining DNA from ancient remains, particularly mummies, have been widely reported, and even when DNA samples are obtained from a mummy, they are only of any use if they can be related to samples from another, securely identified, individual. Although most of the mummies of ancient Egyptian royalty which we possess are probably accurately identified, they had often been rewrapped and reburied following the wholesale plunder of their tombs, and the most securely identified royal mummies are those from the relatively intact burials of Yuya and Thuya, and Tutankhamun.⁵ Apart from the glamour of the grave goods from these tombs, and the impact of the name Tutankhamun in any press-release, these mummies frame the ever popular Amarna period, with such enigmatic and attractive figures as King Amenhotep III and Queen Tiye; King Akhenaten and Queen Nefertiti; King Smenkhkare and Queen Meritaten; and Tutankhamun’s wife, Ankhesenamun. The identity of the mummy from tomb KV55 has been widely disputed as either Akhenaten or Smenkhkare, the age-at-death in the early to mid 20s generally ascribed to the bones perhaps tending to militate against Akhenaten;⁶ but there has also been a temptation to ‘find’ Amarna royalty in otherwise unidentified mummies. A particular instance of this is the denuded group of two women and one boy found in side-room ‘C’ of tomb KV35, the tomb of Amenhotep II – which was also found to contain not only that king in his sarcophagus, and an anonymous mummy on a boat, but also a further nine royal mummies in another side-room ‘B’. Indeed, one of the mummies from side-room ‘C’ had been previously identified as Queen Tiye through comparison of her hair with a lock from a coffinette bearing Tiye’s name found in Tutankhamun’s tomb; though the techniques employed in the comparison had subsequently been questioned.⁷ The stage was therefore set for exciting discoveries to be made.

The rumoured results of DNA tests conducted to elucidate membership of the Amarna royal family were, in fact, widely circulated prior to March 2009, before the second DNA lab was commissioned. By late 2009 it became clear that an announcement of results was imminent, and a general sense of anticipation was mixed with some trepidation. Exciting discoveries would undoubtedly be fed to the general press, but would the results stand up to scientific scrutiny?

By commissioning a second, independent, laboratory the SCA had answered some of the requirements of scientific legitimacy (though corroboration by a completely independent, foreign lab would have been preferable), but had the tests been designed with sufficient rigour to be completely impartial? Had a suitable number of mummies been included in the tests as ‘controls’? Ideally these Controls should have included royal mummies from other eras, and non-royal mummies from various periods (e.g. Ptolemaic, Middle Kingdom, pre-dynastic eras). The tests on the samples should also have been conducted ‘blind’ so that the operators did not know the supposed identity of the mummies they were comparing until the apparent relationships between them had been established – and only then should the code have been broken, and their identities revealed. These are standard precautions built-in to scientific tests to try to remove operator bias and ensure that any flaws in the experimental design or equipment are picked up. Thus if Tutankhamun turns out to be descended from a Ptolemaic mummy, you know you have a problem!

Finally, on February 17^th 2010, the results were published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA),⁸ and announced to the press. The fact that the study appeared in a credible journal was a definite plus, and it was clear from the content that a great deal of trouble had been taken to rule out contamination, and ensure the validity of results from each individual in the study through the taking of samples from multiple sites on the body.

The initial press reports were encouraging, suggesting that some mummies had indeed been employed as controls in the study:

‘In addition to Tutankhamun, 10 mummies (circa 1410-1324 B.C.) possibly or definitely closely related in some way to Tutankhamun were chosen; of these, the  identities were certain for only three. In addition to these 11 mummies, five other royal individuals dating to the early New Kingdom (circa 1550-1479 B.C.) were  selected that were distinct from the supposed members of the Tutankhamun lineage – a sort of mummy control group.’⁹

It was both surprising and impressive to discover at this point that two of the mummies in the study were the body remnants recovered by Donald Ryan from KV21, since these should have been reasonable ‘controls’. A quick glance at Table 1 in the JAMA report quickly revealed otherwise, however. There the mummies are grouped as follows:

- Tutankhamun

Putative Members of the Tutankhamun Lineage (‘Amarna Group’)

- Thuya

- Yuya

- KV55 male

- Amenhotep III

- KV35 Younger Lady

- KV35 Elder Lady

- Foetus 1 from KV62

- Foetus 2 from KV62

- KV21 female A

- KV21 female B

Morphological and Genetic Control Group of 18^th-Dynasty Mummies

- CCG61065 the so-called ‘Thutmose I’

- Thutmose II (CAT scanned but not DNA tested)

- Ahmose Nefertari (not CAT scanned)

- Hatshepsut (KV60A)

- Sitre-In (KV60B)

It may immediately be seen that the KV21 mummies were not in the Control Group but were, for some unspecified reason, considered as putative members of the Amarna Group. The two female mummies from Tomb KV21 had been laid-out, as were the two females from KV60, with the left arm across the chest, and the right arm straight down by the side: a pose sometimes equated with female royalty, as mentioned above. The probability is that all these women were senior courtiers (perhaps wet nurses) of Thutmose IV and Hatshepsut, whose tombs stood nearby. It seems most probable that the KV21 mummies were included in the study in the hope that they would provide more missing queens, and the fact that they were listed in the Amarna Group suggests that the tests were not conducted ‘blind’.

It should further be noted that the Control Group comprised simply those mummies previously examined in the exercise aimed at identifying the mortal remains of Hatshepsut, and that because the mummy of Hatshepsut’s half-brother, Thutmose II, was curiously never DNA tested, the Control Group for the DNA tests comprised just four mummies.

Having noted that mummy CCG61065 (the so-called Thutmose I) differed from some of those in the Amarna group,¹⁰ the report went on to tabulate the complete DNA data sets across 8 loci obtained for Yuya and Thuya from KV46; the Elder Lady and Younger Lady from KV35 (KV35EL and KV35YL respectively); Amenhotep III; the KV55 mummy; and Tutankhamun. Some of these results were replicated in the second DNA laboratory.¹¹ Partial data sets only, were obtained for the two female mummies from KV21 (KV21A and KV21B); and Foetus 1 and Foetus 2 from KV62. From this data the transmission of alleles across the generations could be traced as shown in Figure 1 of the JAMA report:

‘…the most plausible 5-generation pedigree was constructed. We identified Yuya  and Thuya as great-grandparents of Tutankhamun, Amenhotep III and KV35EL  as his grandparents, and the KV55 male and KV35YL as his sibling parents.’¹²

From this it seems clear that the KV35 Elder Lady is indeed Queen Tiye, because she shows consistent transmission of markers from both Yuya and Thuya. The KV55 mummy appears to carry markers of Amenhotep III, and Yuya and Thuya as transmitted by KV35EL, showing that he is most likely a son of Amenhotep III and Queen Tiye. This means, of course, that he could be Akhenaten, and the study supported this identity with new estimates of age-at-death of 35-45 from CAT scan observations.¹³ Similarly, the KV35 Younger Lady also carries markers of Amenhotep III, Yuya, and Thuya consistent with transmission via KV35EL/Tiye, suggesting that she was a daughter of Amenhotep III and Queen Tiye, and sister to the KV55 mummy.¹⁴ Tutankhamun appears to be the son of this pair, and cannot be the child of either Amenhotep III or Queen Tiye. It is, of course, possible that the KV55 mummy is a son of Amenhotep III and Queen Tiye, and father of Tutankhamun, but is not Akhenaten. If this man died only in his early 20s and was the enigmatic Smenkhkare, as many believe, then the chronology becomes rather more tricky, requiring marriages and children to have occurred pre-accession, co-regencies etc.

 Tutankhamun does appear likely to be the father of the foetuses from KV62, but the DNA data on them is incomplete. A more surprising suggestion is that mummy KV21A might be the mother of the foetuses, and thus, perhaps Ankhesenamun. It now becomes clear why the KV21 mummies were included in the Amarna Group, but seems uncannily fortuitous that they were ever included in the study at all!

 The apparently lucky circumstance of potentially discovering Ankhesenamun buried in a tomb one would have expected to have housed early-mid Eighteenth dynasty courtiers, has to be balanced against some rather surprising omissions from the mummies selected for testing. Firstly, it seems almost perverse to have examined both the Elder Lady and Younger Lady from Side Room C in KV35 but not to have tested the boy who was found there with them.¹⁵ Since the two females in this group have proved to be probably Tiye, and potentially a daughter she had borne of Amenhotep III, then the boy might be Prince Thutmose.¹⁶Also, the mummy of Amenhotep III was included in the study but no chance taken to rule out the possibility of ancient mix-ups between the two Nebmaatres, by also testing Ramesses VI. Further, since it was hoped to establish a lineage, why was Thutmose IV not included? Indeed, Thutmose IV’s father, Amenhotep II, would also have proved a useful check against the possibility that the trio from Side Room C in his tomb, KV35, were in fact, members of his family. It is strange that Thutmose II was not included in the rather limited Control Group, and whilst Ahmose Nefertari, who was included, is not likely to have been a particularly close relation of either Hatshepsut or Thutmose I, Thutmose II should have been so in both cases. Indeed, the further inclusion of Thutmose III would have allowed the potential construction of another lineage.¹⁷

The results of the tests that were made are not necessarily as clear cut as the JAMA report and subsequent press releases might suggest, however. In particular a study posted on the web by Kate Phizackerley draws attention to certain problems raised by the 5-generation pedigree in the JAMA report.¹⁸ Firstly, she notes that KV35YL is being put forward as a previously unknown sister/wife of Akhenaten: a rather curious state of affairs if she was a daughter of Amenhotep III and Tiye, and mother of the future king, Tutankhamun. Secondly she points out that if the mother of the foetuses found in Tutankhamun’s tomb (KV62) was, as seems likely, Akhenaten’s daughter, Ankhesenamun, then the KV55 mummy cannot be Akhenaten:

‘If the KV55 mummy is Akhenaten then as well as being the paternal grandfather of the foetuses (via Tutankhamun), then he must also be the maternal grandfather (via Ankhesenamun). However, this contradicts the genetic data.’¹⁹

In short, the JAMA pedigree requires that either the foetuses had different mothers, or that the mother of both was not a daughter of Akhenaten. Thus the above two points show that the current interpretation of the DNA evidence requires unknown wives for both Akhenaten and Tutankhamun.

The problem is most readily resolved by assuming that the KV55 mummy, rather than Akhenaten, is another son of Amenhotep III and Tiye. This mummy would be a younger brother of Akhenaten, and if he ruled briefly as Smenkhkare, would have been a valid father of the successor, Tutankhamun. This reinterpretation has the benefit of going some way toward removing the need for a high age at death for the KV55 mummy. At the same time it also emphasized that two key figures were missing from the DNA sequence, Akhenaten and Nefertiti; and it was quite possible that KV35YL had inherited her characteristics from these two, rather than from Amenhotep III and Tiye. Thus the parents of Tutankhamun could have been Smenkhkare and Meritaten.

Another problem with the interpretation of the DNA evidence in the JAMA report, noted by Kate Phizackerley, is that in some loci certain alleles (characteristics) appear to ‘jump’, skipping generations, from Thuya or Amenhotep III to the KV62 foetuses or the KV21A mummy.²⁰ Since these rare alleles are unlikely to have appeared spontaneously from the general population, this implies a secondary line of descent which might be explained if Nefertiti was a granddaughter of Thuya, perhaps via Ay.

There remains the troubling coincidence that the KV21 mummies seem to fit into the DNA of the Amarna royal family. Of course the DNA data on these two mummies is particularly incomplete, but they do seem to show some characteristics of Thuya and Amenhotep III. How might this be explained? Probably the most likely answer is that those two royal figures themselves share a common source. It has long been speculated that the royal family in the later Eighteenth dynasty intermarried with an Akhmim family with a rather characteristic set of names: Yey, Yuya, Ay, Thuya, Tiye, Tey etc.²¹ In this regard it is interesting that Amenhotep II’s wife Tiaa was the mother of Thutmose IV, whose wife, Mutemwia, the mother of Amenhotep III, was of obscure origins. Both of these women may have derived from the same Akhmim family, and it is perhaps not unlikely that wet-nurses in KV21 (and perhaps KV60) are from this same background. Indeed, Ay’s wife, Tey, is known to have been Nefertiti’s wet-nurse, and one wonders if the SCA hoped for a similar pairing from KV21 as they thought had been found with Sitre-In and Hatshepsut in KV60. Thus when two obscure females from KV21 were entered in the DNA study as ‘Putative Relatives of Tutankhamun’, the prize that was sought was Nefertiti herself!

It must be noted that the DNA tables for the Control Group of mummies remain unpublished and so we are unable to comment as to whether any of those mummies appears to have a close link to the Amarna royal family or not. It would be rather embarrassing if the so-called Hatshepsut (KV60A) turned out to be as closely linked as the KV21 mummies, but nothing can be said without the publication of data.

The larger part of the JAMA report relates to the morphological findings as produced by CAT scans, showing that the Amarna males did not suffer from any condition that would have led to their features having feminine characteristics as seen on sculpture etc.; though it should be commented that overeating and lack of exercise may well have produced appropriately rounded thighs, and ‘man-boobs’! Unlike Figure 1 in the JAMA report (comparison of DNA profiles), Table 3 – Anomalies and Diseases in This Collection of 18^th-Dynasty Mummies, looks at both the Amarna and Control groups, and one has to say what a bunch of old crocks they were! It appears that club feet were the order of the day, and you were no-one without scoliosis…and that is just the malformations. Many of the conditions are perhaps not surprising in people of quite advanced age (as we now understand many of the royal mummies to be), but the prevalence of incisional hernia raises suspicions that some observed details may in fact be artifacts of the mummification process. Evidence of trauma in some mummies, e.g. KV35 Younger Lady, may indeed be related to tomb robbery and thus not ‘fatal’, as stated there. The discovery of malaria in a few of the mummies comes as a surprise so early in Egyptian history.

Tutankhamun wins the prize, however, with cleft palate, scoliosis, foot necrosis, club foot, a broken leg, and malaria. One is tempted to devise a scenario in which all of these played a part in his death…probably he drowned!

Overall then, the study is a start, and raises some interesting points for future discussion. Perhaps we now have some more certain identifications amongst the royal mummies, the most convincing of which is undoubtedly Queen Tiye.

NOTES

1. Some work of this kind was, however, conducted by an American team around 2000.

2. E. Thomas, The Royal Necropoleis of Thebes (Princeton 1966).

3. Dr. J. L. Thimes, ‘Readers’ Forum’, KMT: A Modern Journal of Ancient Egypt 19.3 (Fall 2008), 6-7. My point that matches made using x-rays or CAT scans are not strong evidence is borne out here.

4. The evidence for the KV60 mummies is discussed in Dylan Bickerstaffe, Identifying the Royal Mummies, Part 4 of Refugees for Eternity: The Royal Mummies of Thebes (Canopus Press 2009), 92-6. I point out in talks that if you knock out one of my teeth and throw it in a box named ‘Hitler’, that does not make me Hitler!

5. The methods by which identifications are made, and the relative strength of these in relation to each case, are discussed in detail in Identifying the Royal Mummies.

6. Estimates of age-at-death generally underestimate ages, however, and can never fully accommodate the wide inter-subject variability, see Identifying the Royal Mummies, 65-70.

7. See the discussion of the mummies from Side Room ‘C’ in KV35 in Identifying the Royal Mummies, 105-112.

8. Hawass et al., ‘Ancestry and Pathology in King Tutankhamun’s Family’, Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), Vol. 303, No. 7 (February 17, 2010), 638-647.

9. www.LiveScience.com Tue Feb 16, 12.10pm ET.

10. Specifically: Amenhotep III, KV55, and Tutankhamun. It seems that this mummy alone was used to show differences to the Amarna group!

11. Hawass et al.,JAMA 303.7, 641. Which results on which mummies is not stated.

12. Hawass et al., JAMA 303.7, 641.

13. Hawass et al., JAMA 303.7, 640. This figure was raised to 45-55 in press releases, apparently at the insistence of the CAT scan team. On the question of age-at-death see Identifying the Royal Mummies 65-71, & 98-99.

14. She is perhaps unlikely to be Sitamun, or Iset (C), who were married to Amenhotep III. Other daughters include Nebetiah, Henutaneb A, and Beketaten, see Aidan Dodson and Dyan Hilton, The Complete Families of Ancient Egypt (Cairo 2004), 146.

15. The KV35 boy is CCG 61071. I have been informed that Dr. Hawass informed the editor of Archaeology magazine (USA) that the boy has been tested. It is not known whether the testing was performed in response to criticisms on the web, or if a decision had been taken not to use results in the study obtained earlier. A mummy was present in a box in Side Room C of KV35 when I visited in March 2010, and I assume this to be the boy.

16. Forbes, End Paper, KMT 2.2 (1991), 72; proposed that the trio might have comprised Tiye, Sitamun, and Prince Thutmose – all three deriving from Amenhotep III’s tomb, WV22.

17. The mummies of ‘Thutmose I’ and Thutmose II may, in fact, be reversed. See Identifying the Royal Mummies, 91-92. A line of descent possibly from the so-called Thutmose I (CCG 61065), through Thutmose II, Thutmose III, Amenhotep II, Thutmose IV, and Amenhotep III could be tested.

18. See Kate Phizackerley, ‘DNA Shows that KV55 Mummy Probably Not Akhenaten’, www.kv64.info. All of the data referred to here is from this source, though she has discussed her conclusions with me at length.

19. See Kate Phizackerley, www.kv64.info.The evidence in locus D7S820 shows Foetus 1 with alleles 10 & 13, and Foetus 2 with 6 & 15. Since Tutankhamun had 10 & 15, the mother must have provided 6 & 13. As the mother, Ankhesenamun would thus have inherited either 6 or 13 from Akhenaten, but the KV55 mummy has 15 & 15 in D7S820, and so cannot be the maternal grandfather.

20. Thus in locus D7S820 allele 13 jumps from Thuya to Foetus 1, and allele 6 jumps from Amenhotep III to Foetus 2 (although 6 appears in KV35YL she did not pass this to Tutankhamun and so this must have come from the mother); in D21S11 allele 35 appears to jump from Thuya to the KV21A mummy; and allele 16 jumps from Amenhotep III to KV21A in the D13S317 locus.

21. A theory first advanced by Cyril Aldred. Other characteristic names seem to be Nefertiti and Nefertari.

‘IDENTIFYING THE ROYAL MUMMIES’ – NOW AVAILABLE
The big question related to the Royal Mummies of Ancient Egypt is how certain we are of their identities. Several otherwise anonymous mummies have recently been claimed as famous rulers – such as Hatshepsut, Nefertiti, and Ramesses I; whilst theories abound as to the identity of the ‘Screaming Man’ royal mummy, (Unknown Man E).
I have studied this subject in considerable depth for many years, and my thorough review of the evidence is now available in Identifying the Royal Mummies (Part Four of Refugees for Eternity: The Royal Mummies of Thebes). Here you can see how how strong or otherwise the identifications of all the royal mummies are, including a great deal more depth on the ‘Screaming Man’ mummy (Unknown Man E) than appeared on recent TV programmes. Identifying the Royal Mummies may be purchased by worldwide customers here(see PUBLICATIONS). UK customers may also purchase the book through Amazon.co.uk; Museum Books, Oxbow Books, and the EES.

The Royal Mummies of Thebes: Their Journeys and Resting Places.

This is a very large work commenced in 1997 which examines the history of royal burials in Ancient Egypt; their robbery; the creation of cache tombs; the discovery of royal tombs and caches in the modern era; the study and identification of royal mummies. It has been broken into four parts, each of which will be issued on completion.

Sections:

Part One. Finding the Pharaohs. Nearing completion, due late 2010. The discovery of royal tombs and mummies in the modern era, with particular emphasis on the royal cache tombs.

Part Two. The Rise and Fall of the Theban Royal House and Necropolis. In Progess. From the obscure tombs of heroes, to the grand sepulchres of a decling empire, to the pillaging and ‘recycling’ and creation of caches in a fallen age.

Part Three. Clues from the Caches. In Progess. How and why the caches were created at the end of the New Kingdom.

Part Four. Identifying the Royal Mummies. Now available. Buy here. A thorough evaluation of the methods used to identify Royal Mummies and how good they are. Assessment of the evidence for each individual royal mummy. Detailed contents of mummies, coffins and identifying dockets for TT320 and KV35 royal caches.

This American publication has appeared quarterly since Spring 1990 and has featured contributions from many eminent Egyptologists. Articles are fully referenced.

My contibutions are listed below:

ARTICLES
‘Hidden in Plain Sight: The facts Surrounding the Burial of Unknown Man E’, KMT 10.1 (Spring 1999), 68-76. This remains the most comprehensive coverage of the reports on the strange, contorted mummy Elliot Smith listed as Unknown Man ‘E’.

‘The Discovery of Hatshepsut’s ‘Throne”, KMT 13.1 (Spring 2002), 71-77. Discussing the possible provenance of the enigmatic artefact (actually a funerary bed) and the objects associated with it.

‘The Mummy in the Nile’, KMT 13.2 (Summer 2002), 74-79. Amelia Edwards said that her travelling companions, the ‘MBs’ threw the mummy they had purchased into the Nile. Was it a pharaoh from the royal cache? If not, then who was it?

‘Examining the Mystery of the Niagara Falls Mummy. Was he from the Royal Mummies Cache? And is he Ramesses I?‘, KMT 17.4 (Winter 2006-07), 26-34. The mummy returned to Egypt as Ramesses I cannot have come from the royal cache and cannot be that pharaoh, but who is he, and why are his arms crossed like a king?

‘Embalming Caches in the Valley of the Kings’, KMT 18.2 (Summer 2007), 46-53. The recently discovered ‘tomb’ in the Valley of the Kings is in fact an embalming cache. The role of these caches is discussed as are the clues they may offer to the location of associated tombs.

‘Death in the Nile. The Birth of Egypt’s Last God’, KMT 19.2 (Summer 2008). The visit of the Roman emperor Hadrian to Egypt was crowned with tragedy when his favourite, Antinous, drowned in the Nile. Hadrian is said to have been devastated by the loss, but the death was suspicious. Antinous died at just the right place and time to become a new god.

‘The Fury of Amen. The Cursed Play in the Valley of the Queens’, KMT 19.3 (Fall 2008). In 1909 a play was to be staged in the Valley of the Queens in which the heretic pharaoh, Akhenaten, would receive the pardon of the gods. However, the participants were beset with a series of disasters and ailments. Was it the curse of the god Amen?

‘The King is Dead. How Long Lived the King?’, KMT 21.2 (Summer 2010), 38-44. Did everyone really die young in the past? How accurate are estimates of the age attained at death by ancient Egyptian kings and queens through examination of their mummies likely to be, when skilled observers get the ages of British Victorian bodies so badly wrong?

 ‘The Enigma of Kings Valley Tomb 58,’ KMT 21.3 (Fall 2010), 35-44. How did Kings Valley tomb 58 come to contain gold foil naming Tutankhamun, and Ay as both a private individual and as king? Who is represented by the calcite shabti figure found on the tomb floor? This tomb has much to tell us about events in the Post Amarna period.

LETTERS
KMT 11.2 (Summer 2000), 3-4. Concerning Unknown Man E. KMT 13.2 (Summer 2002), 6-7. Concerning Hatshepsut’s ‘Throne’. KMT 13.4 (Winter 2003/4), 3-4.Concerning Unknown Man E. KMT 14.3 (Fall 2007), 4-5. Refuting Fletcher’s identification of the ‘Younger Woman’ as Nefertiti. KMT 18.2 (Summer 2007), 6. Amarna head in Birmingham UK identified as a fake. KMT 18.3 (Fall 2007), 6-7. Refuting Lacovara’s reassertion that the Niagara mummy is Ramesses I.
Note also that the article in KMT 13.1, and the letter in KMT 13.2, concerning Hatshepsut’s Throne are cited in Catherine H. Roehrig (ed.) Hatshepsut From Queen to Pharaoh The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (2005), 257-9.

This is a new English/Arabic publication with an Egyptian editor.

 ‘The Burial of Hatshepsut’, The Heritage of Egypt 1 (January 2008), 2-12. This article reviews all the evidence for the burial of Hatshepsut, including the recent claims for identification of the one of the mummies from tomb KV60 as the famous female pharaoh. Recent CAT scan evidence provides grounds for speculating that Hatshepsut might have had Thutmose II murdered.  

‘Pharaoh Faseekh’, The Heritage of Egypt 3 (September 2008), 12-14. This relates tales of mummies (one of them a king) passed by customs as dried fish.

 ‘The Tomb of Akhenaten and the Golden Ring of Nefertiti’, The Heritage of Egypt 6. Who was buried in the royal tomb at Amarna, and was anyone buried in the other tombs nearby? Was the desecrated mummy of Akhenaten found outside the royal tomb? What is the significance of jewellery, including a gold ring of Nefertiti, found nearby?

See also Forthcoming Publications.

This was the publication of ISIS, an organisation devoted to the reconstruction of ancient chronologies. Owing to my knowledge of the TT320 Royal Cache tomb I was persuaded by David Rohl to write an overview of the discovery of the tomb and update such conclusions as could be drawn from the published data in the light of the recent re-clearance. This was the final issue of JACF as ISIS folded in 2006. My photographs here remain amongst the most useful published to date. ‘The Royal Cache Revisited’, Journal of the Ancient Chronology Forum 10 (2005), 9-25.

This society exists to study the literature and culture of our Anglo-Saxon ancestors. ‘Saxon Brigands Destroyed’, Widowinde: the Periodical of the English Companions. No. 115 (Autumn 1998). The Roman author, Ammianus Marcellinus, is cited to show that Saxons were in regular conflict with the Roman army on the continent in the 4th Century A.D.