Egypt's Valley of the Kings, part 2

We spent several hours touring the Valley of the Kings, burial grounds for ancient Egypt's pharaohs. We approached it via our river boat - see pic below.

The walk to the location of the pharaoh's burial tombs was a dusty one, but pretty impressive.

There were active archaeological digs taking place - see the white tents where the supervisors are working - plus the local folks hired for the manual labor.

The tomb's interiors were fascinating. As expected, the detail was vivid and well preserved since it was underground away from the elements for century upon century. For a period of 500 years, beginning in the 16th century BC, tombs were dug along this valley for pharaohs and nobles. This is where Egyptologist Howard Carter discovered King Tutankhamen's sealed tomb in 1922. 

Above is Tut's mummified remains, while below is his innermost burial box they've left inside his rather small tomb. This is the only place where I recall seeing monkeys as part of the wall decoration in any of the tombs we toured.

In addition to Tut's tomb, we also visited the tombs of several other pharaohs, including Seti I, one of the best preserved tombs in the Valley of the Kings with limited access. Weren't we the lucky ones to tour it!

I noticed several things that were common to each of the burial chambers, including depictions of the mummification process.

There was the usual assortment of gods, hieroglyphics, scenes of life in ancient Egypt and bright paint that was applied several millennia ago.

As usual, most of the ceilings were highly decorated, too.

Some of the tombs still had large stone burial boxes in them that once contained the pharaoh's highly decorated sarcophagus and mummy.

As you can imagine, the passageways were often steep. I had to work up the nerve to enter one of the tombs where we had to crab walk down a steep incline, bent over at the waist, to gain access. I didn't get a pic of that. I was too busy trying not to hyperventilate. This was definitely not a tour for the claustrophobic. Unlike natural caves, there was no real circulation down there. You would think the temp would go down as you went under/into the mountain, but it didn't. It just got stuffy. I can't imagine doing this same tour in the summer months when Egypt's temps are Texas h-o-t. 

Two things I found interesting in the tombs, besides the obvious...

As soon as a pharaoh ascended the throne, workers were immediately assigned building his/her royal burial tomb. This obviously took a long time, but not all of the pharaohs reigned sufficiently long for the workers to finish their tombs. We were able to see one tomb where the pharaoh's name was left blank or possibly changed for a new "resident" - see the empty and/or defaced cartouche below.

Another thing I noticed was unfinished work in some of the tombs - see below. This is the second step in the process. It starts with a drawing, and then the carving/etching is done. This is followed by applications of paint and finally a sort of clear wax coat to seal the paint.

When a pharaoh died, it took several months to embalm them properly in anticipation of the after life. Then they were entombed, whether the decoration was finished or not. Because it was time to begin working on the new pharaoh's burial tomb. NEXT!