Secret Stairs To Tomb

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 45, 16 May 1927, Page 7

Secret Stairs To Tomb

Wonders of 5,000 Years Ago A striking archaeological discovery has to be added to the record of Mr. Cecil Firth, who is excavating at Bakkara, on behalf of the Antiquities Department of the Egyptian Government. It is understood that a 50-centuries-old Third Dynasty tomb has been unearthed which is unique in many features. The tomb, with rounded top, is on part of the great boundary wall surrounding the Step Pyramid which extends about one mile round. To the west of it is a great stairway leading down into the rock. Hidden in Tunnel It is not known yet to whom the tomb belongs. It may have been a temporary tomb in which the King Zoser lay pending completion of the Step Pyramid, or it may be the tomb of his queen. After descending the great stairway one goes down 100 steps leading to a doorway blocked with three enormous stones. This, however, is only a decoy. It took two months of careful work trying to discover the entrance and removing the filling which concealed the stairway. Thq true entrance lay through an obsciare tunnel in the rock, hidden by fallen debris. This tunnel branches in various directions, and descending from it is a stairway leading through a doorway into a series of underground rooms walled with white limestone, intended to represent the house of the “Ka” (soul) of the owner of the tomb. Three False Doors The two rooms were once finely decorated with blue tiles, similar to, but more elaborate than, the blue tiled rooms in the Step Pyramid. One of these tombs lias three false doors or niches each decorated with a portrait of King Zoser in different costumes and attitudes. This work is in very low relief and in the very finest style of the period. The figures stand out only about a millimetre, yet every muscle is distinctly shown. In one of the tunnels leading to the chamber the excavators found 12 magnificent alabaster wine jars averaging nearly three feet in height. It is certainly the most remarkable tomb of the Archaic or pre-Pyramid Age yet discovered, and is one of the earliest tombs discovered in Egypt—certainly the earliest containing limestone relief. The quality of the masonry in the underground chambers is even finer than the remarkable examples of Third Dynasty architecture discovered during the past two years at Bakkara.—Reuter.