The Shadow King Read Online Free PDF Page B
Author: Jo Marchant
bandages and broken open in a fruitless search for jewelry.
Carter was incensed. He set about tracking the culprits with all the cunning and determination of Sherlock Holmes (he later noted that if he hadn’t become an archaeologist, he might have made a competent detective5). He took plaster casts of footprints by the tomb door, identified the instrument used to break open the lock, and traced both to none other than the Abd el-Rassuls. When searched, their white house was found to be full of stolen artifacts from other tombs. Mohammed Abd el-Rassul was put on trial, but the court wasn’t persuaded by Carter’s evidence, and the accused went free.
In 1904, Maspero transferred Carter into the job of chief inspector of the antiquities of Lower Egypt, a prestigious posting that included responsibility for the Great Pyramids, near Cairo. He didn’t last long. A few weeks later, a party of drunken French tourists tried to force their way onto a site and attacked one of the Egyptian guards. Carter told his men to defend themselves, and the situation descended into a rowdy fight with sticks and chairs, with men on both sides left beaten and unconscious.
It caused a minor diplomatic storm that Carter should have encouraged mere Egyptians to strike Frenchmen, regardless of the provocation. Maspero and then the mighty Cromer asked him to apologize, but to Carter—principled, stubborn, with a general distrust of authority—the idea was unthinkable. He refused, and was later transferred to the remote northern town of Tanta.
Carter hated it there and, despite Maspero’s efforts to convince him otherwise, he resigned—the end of a promising career with the service. He eventually moved back to Luxor, where he scraped a living as an artist, as well as by selling an antiquity or two.
He dreamed of excavating in the Valley of the Kings, convinced there was still an intact—un-looted—royal tomb hidden there, and that he could track it down where everyone else had failed. But he could only stand by and watch as others made a series of impressive finds. The antiquities service was increasingly strapped for cash, so Maspero started working with rich amateurs who funded excavations in return for a share of the antiquities they unearthed. The process was organized by concession, meaning that only one person could dig in each area at a time. Once you had the concession for a particular area, it was yours until you decided to give it up.
The man who won the coveted concession for the Valley of the Kings was Theodore M. Davis, a retired lawyer from New York. He was short, aggressive, very rich, and had no patience for any kind of scientific procedure—the polar opposite of a careful archaeologist like Carter. He was in this game for the treasure.
In February 1905, he found it: the most intact tomb yet in the Valley. It belonged to an elderly couple called Yuya and Tjuiu. They weren’t royal (the Valley of the Kings hosted the tombs of various high-status nobles and courtiers as well as the pharaohs themselves), but their daughter Tiye had been a queen—wife of the powerful Eighteenth-Dynasty King Amenhotep III. The tomb had suffered some thefts in antiquity but hadn’t been touched since, and was still packed full. Davis entered with the elderly Maspero and a British archaeologist called Arthur Weigall, who had taken over Carter’s old job as inspector general at Thebes.
“The chamber was dark as dark could be and extremely hot,” wrote Davis afterward. “We held up our candles but they gave so little light and so dazzled our eyes that we could see nothing except the glint of gold.”6
Once their eyes adjusted, they saw that although the tomb was small and undecorated, its contents were gorgeous, including two gold-covered carved armchairs complete with cushions, two beds fitted with springy string mattresses, a wicker trunk, some lovely alabaster vases, and a chariot. Weigall later compared the stuffy, stiff feeling of the
Carter was incensed. He set about tracking the culprits with all the cunning and determination of Sherlock Holmes (he later noted that if he hadn’t become an archaeologist, he might have made a competent detective5). He took plaster casts of footprints by the tomb door, identified the instrument used to break open the lock, and traced both to none other than the Abd el-Rassuls. When searched, their white house was found to be full of stolen artifacts from other tombs. Mohammed Abd el-Rassul was put on trial, but the court wasn’t persuaded by Carter’s evidence, and the accused went free.
In 1904, Maspero transferred Carter into the job of chief inspector of the antiquities of Lower Egypt, a prestigious posting that included responsibility for the Great Pyramids, near Cairo. He didn’t last long. A few weeks later, a party of drunken French tourists tried to force their way onto a site and attacked one of the Egyptian guards. Carter told his men to defend themselves, and the situation descended into a rowdy fight with sticks and chairs, with men on both sides left beaten and unconscious.
It caused a minor diplomatic storm that Carter should have encouraged mere Egyptians to strike Frenchmen, regardless of the provocation. Maspero and then the mighty Cromer asked him to apologize, but to Carter—principled, stubborn, with a general distrust of authority—the idea was unthinkable. He refused, and was later transferred to the remote northern town of Tanta.
Carter hated it there and, despite Maspero’s efforts to convince him otherwise, he resigned—the end of a promising career with the service. He eventually moved back to Luxor, where he scraped a living as an artist, as well as by selling an antiquity or two.
He dreamed of excavating in the Valley of the Kings, convinced there was still an intact—un-looted—royal tomb hidden there, and that he could track it down where everyone else had failed. But he could only stand by and watch as others made a series of impressive finds. The antiquities service was increasingly strapped for cash, so Maspero started working with rich amateurs who funded excavations in return for a share of the antiquities they unearthed. The process was organized by concession, meaning that only one person could dig in each area at a time. Once you had the concession for a particular area, it was yours until you decided to give it up.
The man who won the coveted concession for the Valley of the Kings was Theodore M. Davis, a retired lawyer from New York. He was short, aggressive, very rich, and had no patience for any kind of scientific procedure—the polar opposite of a careful archaeologist like Carter. He was in this game for the treasure.
In February 1905, he found it: the most intact tomb yet in the Valley. It belonged to an elderly couple called Yuya and Tjuiu. They weren’t royal (the Valley of the Kings hosted the tombs of various high-status nobles and courtiers as well as the pharaohs themselves), but their daughter Tiye had been a queen—wife of the powerful Eighteenth-Dynasty King Amenhotep III. The tomb had suffered some thefts in antiquity but hadn’t been touched since, and was still packed full. Davis entered with the elderly Maspero and a British archaeologist called Arthur Weigall, who had taken over Carter’s old job as inspector general at Thebes.
“The chamber was dark as dark could be and extremely hot,” wrote Davis afterward. “We held up our candles but they gave so little light and so dazzled our eyes that we could see nothing except the glint of gold.”6
Once their eyes adjusted, they saw that although the tomb was small and undecorated, its contents were gorgeous, including two gold-covered carved armchairs complete with cushions, two beds fitted with springy string mattresses, a wicker trunk, some lovely alabaster vases, and a chariot. Weigall later compared the stuffy, stiff feeling of the