Restoration reveals stunning Egyptian servants tombs
Posted On: Sep 6th, 2016 at 12:20
Egypt
A restoration project, started in 2012 in Luxor’s west bank, has been completed and reveals some of the most stunning tombs ever found. But the tombs did not belong to kings – they belonged to servants.
Royal servants were highly regarded by the pharaohs of Egypt, and one of these tombs belonged to a servant of queen Hatshepsut (the other three to servants of Ramses II). Since several paintings show queen Hatshepsut as a woman, this categorically puts to bed any doubt about her identity. Although it may seem obvious to some, those who know the archaeological history behind Egyptology would know there has been much debate as to whether queen Hatshepsut was actually a man, since many Egyptologists were previously convinced that no woman ever ruled Egypt. That may seem a little sexist today, but since Hatshepsut was the second confirmed female ruler of Egypt (1478 – 1458 BC) and her identity was never certain, it was once thought she may have been her stepson Thutmose III but used a different name. Further confusion ensued when she donned the dress of a man and changed her name to the male version, so it’s not surprising earlier Egyptologists were not convinced of her identity. It turned out later that Hatshepsut and Thutmose III co-ruled and that Thutmose III was just a young boy at the time, meaning that Hatshepsut was the sole ruler of Egypt. Since the revelation was revealed that Hatshepsut was a woman – and it was a revelation at the time – Egyptologists then took a closer look and found that there were other female rulers, some even long before Hatshepsut. It is now uncertain how many of the ancient rulers were female due to the ambiguity of their names, but there were many. The first known female ruler actually dates back to 5,000 years ago – Merneith (2970 BC).
Anyway, the tombs… it’s worth reading the article here, but generally I only occasionally use Daily Mail posts because they produce god quality pictures. The Daily Mail is not know for any accuracy and there are several mistakes in this article, but it’s okay for a brief overview.
