The work of the La Plata researchers in the tomb began in 2019 / amenmose project
A group of researchers from the National University of La Plata led and completed the discovery of the original entrance to the tomb of Amenmose, an Egyptian nobleman, located on the west bank of the current city of Luxor, ancient Thebes, in Egypt.
The academic team in charge of the Amenmose Project also had the participation of specialists from Conicet and the universities of Córdoba, Tucumán and Buenos Aires.
“The third campaign of the Amenmose Project has ended. We achieved the goal of finding the original entrance to Amenmose’s tomb, and we have nothing but words of gratitude”, they communicated from the Project.
They also expressed their gratitude to “Al Rais Ali Fahrouk and Omar Fahrouk, Inspector Mahmoud Soliman, the workers, and all the people who with their generosity and support made this month of excavation in Egypt possible.”
Tomb
As described by Dr. Andrea Zingarelli, project director and professor at the UNLP Faculty of Humanities, “this tomb is more than 3,500 years old and its paintings and reliefs until our first campaign in 2020 were never restored or studied in depth.”
Zingarelli explained: “The project that we have been developing since 2019 has focused on the conservation of the monument, its paintings and reliefs. In this way, the Argentine project contributes to the conservation of a site of world heritage value, in accordance with the UNESCO convention of 1979, which includes Thebes and its necropolis among the sites declared heritage of humanity”.
The tomb chapel of the “worker of the necropolis of Amun” Amenmose consists of two rooms and is T-shaped.
Currently the entrance to the tomb is through a tunnel and a 50 by 37 centimeter hole from a neighboring tomb. Due to this, it was necessary to find the original entrance to carry out the conservation work.
The eight walls of Amenmose’s tomb are painted with figurative motifs, while the jambs and lintel at the entrance to the passage and the south wall of the latter are carved in low relief.
Although the research work began in 2019 and continued in 2022 after the pandemic and complementing different stages of restoration work, for this year the project proposed “excavating and finding the original entrance that is under about five meters of sediment and debris since the 19th century”. “The main entrance to the tomb must be opened so that we can easily enter a series of machines and accessories for the restoration works due to the difficulty of completing the work through the current entrance through the small shaft,” he said.
“Before the excavation work began to monitor the stability of the tomb, plaster tests were carried out to monitor possible movements of the fracture present in the ceiling, yielding positive results. Since no cracks were found in the tests, after two years, it is concluded that there were no movements that could be dangerous for the stability of the tomb”, he explained.
The expert had pointed out regarding the importance of this enormous advance that “the restoration work could not be completed if the main entrance to the tomb is not opened, because organic solvents require an environment with ventilation and adequate temperature and humidity relative, that provides security to the work team by creating a safe work environment.
