Though among the objects found there were many of the XXIInd Dynasty, or even of a later period, the larger portion were certainly of the original XIth Dynasty burial; which, judging from the scanty remains, must have been very fine in quality, and of some high state official, but there was no inscription to tell us who he was.
Site 5. A depression in the surface of the hill slope, which proved to be a rock-cut court with sepulchral chambers on both sides and at its northern end ([Pl. XV]).
Almost at the commencement of its excavation the men came across the small chamber on the east side, containing the coffin of an adult burial untouched since the time it was deposited there. The entrance to this chamber was walled in with stones mixed with bricks and pieces of pottery, and it was found intact with the exception of a small opening at the top accidentally made by the workmen before discovering its real nature.
Later on, at the opposite side of the court, another small chamber was disclosed, but it proved to be unfinished.
Lastly, at the end of the court, a large chamber containing burials of seven adults and one child was found to be untouched. The sealing of the entrance was in perfect condition and was constructed like the other with similar stones and bricks ([Pl. XIV]. 1 and 2). The chamber was about two-thirds full of rubble, upon which the coffins were deposited, the first two having a slight excavation made for them. The first two coffins were placed side by side with their heads towards the east: they were covered by a pink shawl and chain garlands of leaves; with, beside the first one, a bouquet of cornflowers. This was evidently the last tribute paid to the dead placed in this sepulchre (see [Pl. XVII]. 3). The rest of the coffins, seven in all, belonging to a previous interment, and of a different type, were lying north and south with their heads to south. They were crowded together as if to make room for the latter burials. Some of these latter coffins had pieces of mummy-cloth upon them; the last of all some fragments of a decayed garland.
The east side-chamber was quite clean, and the coffin in it was placed exactly east and west with its head to the west.
After the removal of the coffins the large chamber was carefully explored. At the far end the commencement of an uncompleted pit was found, and at the entrance the remains of the early brick wall that originally closed the doorway were uncovered.
From the style of this tomb, the brickwork that closed the doorway, together with the pottery and some cones found in the rubbish, it clearly belongs to the earlier epoch of this district, the roughness of form being mostly owing to the inferior rock in which it is hewn (a conglomerate of lime and flints striated with Tafle). The beginning of a chamber on the west side of the court had been abandoned on account of some large flint-boulders embedded in the conglomerate which had prevented further progress, and the chamber on the east side was made in its stead. Neither of these cuttings seem to belong to the original design; they were most probably made by the usurpers found within the tomb: the fact that the floor-level of the completed side-chamber was the same as that of the rubbish drifted into the courtyard and tomb before its usurpation, I think, corroborates the above conjecture.
The burials in detail are as follows:—
1. A. ([Pl. XVI]. 3). A coffin containing inner case and mummy of a man named