No. 231 contained three pots of Old Kingdom types ([XII], 23, 54, 31), with fragments of a large majūr ([XX], 5), and one sherd of a thin ware, black inside, and decorated outside with rows of pricked marks. This cannot be distinguished from certain fragments obtained in the Neolithic cemetery at Ballas.
No. 280, a well north of the wall, sunk below water-level, but in the filling were found the regular group of coarse pots ([XII], 31, 36, 35, 33).
In 197 the coarse pottery occurred with chips of malachite, and in 233 with a vertical alabaster vase and fragments of a large vase identical with a large late Neolithic shape.
11. We next turn to the other large class of tombs, those entered by stairways. These may all have been mastabas. The characteristic massive brick walls remain in several cases, in one, at least, retaining the recessed panel work and niches. But it may be that these stairway tombs are rather older than those mastabas which have square wells, and it seems best not to group them together. The appearance of these tombs may be seen in Miss Murray’s black and white reproduction of two sketches by Miss Pirie (Pl. [IX]).
The first view shows the stairway, as seen from below, looking northward; in the other view one is supposed to be looking southward at the vertical end of the shaft, the tomb entrance and the stone door.
All these tombs were robbed, excepting, possibly, one. This (St. 2) was the smallest tomb of the kind that I have seen. The stair was reduced to a couple of roughly cut steps; the total depth was only 1 m., and though a large stone slab had been placed as a door to the burial chamber, a robber had only to pierce 20 cm. of soil to get into the chamber through the roof. The chamber, which was about a metre square, was filled with a thick damp clay. The bones had decayed so much that only a few parts could be identified but distinctive fragments of the skull, the hip ends of the two femurs, a tibia, a radius and ulna, enabled one to see that the body had lain on the left side with the head to the north. Before the face was an ivory cup (shape [X], 44). Below the body was a little red dust with spots of white in it, probably the remains of a wooden coffin painted white.
In and below the white paste, which was all that was left of the bones of the hand, were two nuggets of gold (one 18 dwts. = 28 grammes) and a handful of barrel-shaped carnelian beads mixed with very small beads of gold. By scraping away the earth very gently, one could see that the gold beads had been strung together to form bands 5 or 6 mm. broad, alternating with bands of carnelian. A gold bar, 2 cm. long, pierced with five holes, had clearly served to hold the strings on which the beads were threaded. There was also a bracelet of a single thick gold wire. The total weight of gold was about 4 oz. (125 grammes). In the N.W. corner of the tomb, behind the head, were five vessels of ivory, two very coarse vertical jars (14 and 19 cm.), two bowls (23 and 26 cm. diameter), one with a spout ([X], 26), and a bowl of the speading shape of Ka-mena’s bronze ([XII], 51); there was also a small double vase of limestone ([X], 15). A little steatite plaque with the inscription Neb.ra was stated by the workmen to have come from this tomb, and there is no reason to doubt them; but I did not actually see it in place. The name Neb.ra is one of the three Ka names on the shoulder of the famous archaic statue No. I at Ghizeh, and the name on the plaque may perhaps be the same, though it is not written in the square Ka frame.
In the side of the tomb were two small balls of limestone and one of carnelian, in shape and size like playing marbles, and some fragments of malachite. By the door were some chips of diorite bowls. The marbles were clearly part of a set for a game (cf. Naqada, Pl. VII), and the fact that the set was incomplete, and that the stone bowls were broken, makes it probable, in spite of the presence of the gold nuggets, that the tomb had been partially plundered. The early robbers may easily have passed over the gold, for the moist and tough clay hides small objects only too well; it was only the weight of two small lumps of clay that betrayed to me the presence of the nuggets inside.
The quantity of gold remaining in so small a tomb shows how rich the large interments may have been, and how strong was the temptation to rob them.