Atlantis and the Ten Plagues of Egypt: The Secret History Hidden in the Valley of the Kings

by Phillips, Graham

  There can be little doubt that Horemheb knew exactly were Tutankhamun's tomb was situated. The reliefs in his burial chamber show that Tutankhamun's burial was attended by all the important dignitaries. The east wall shows a dozen of the top courtiers pulling the coffin on a sledge to the tomb, including two who can be identified by their distinctive shaven heads as the chief ministers, Pentu and Usermont. The inscription over the figures actually identify the others as 'high officials of the palace'. It is inconceivable that as king's deputy, Horemheb would not have been among them. Even if he wasn't it seems most unlikely that a man of his resources would not have been able to exert pressure to get someone in the court to reveal the tomb's whereabouts.

  All this is irrelevant, however, as the location of Tutankhamun's tomb was a matter of public knowledge. Contrary to popular belief, the tomb was not completely intact when Carter found it. It had been robbed twice in antiquity, soon after it had been sealed. The first robbery was for small pieces of gold and precious jewellery, most of which the robbers got away with except for a few gold rings found still wrapped in a rag and stuffed into a box in the Annex. After the priests had resealed the tomb, it was broken into again, this time to steal the precious oils and unguents which had been stored in large alabaster jars. For such robberies to have occurred and repairs made, implies a guarded tomb of the old mastaba variety, rather than one with a concealed entrance. Moreover, if it had been buried deep underground, as it was when Carter found it, the robbers would have had to burrow down and consequently have made their way into the tomb by way of a small opening. Only this would need to have been resealed, and there would have been no point in re-exposing the entire stairwell. However, as the whole doorway had been resealed after the robbery, it means that when the theft was discovered the entrance must have been exposed.

  Incredibly, Horemheb not only refrained from desecrating Tutankhamun's tomb, he seems to have protected it. It was evidently on his orders that it was resealed for the second time. When it was finally closed, the seals used were those of the royal necropolis which bore no royal names. These were exactly the same seals that were used in the tomb of Tuthmosis IV when Horemheb ordered it to be restored after its violation by robbers. An inscription in the tomb of Tuthmosis IV reveals that the necropolis scribe Djehutymose had assisted in the restoration, and his name is also found scribbled on a jar-stand in Tutankhamun's tomb.

  All of this implies that there was something very special about Tutankhamun's tomb. Why did Horemheb make sure it remained intact when he had no love for Tutankhamun? The first thing that springs to mind whenever most people hear the name Tutankhamun is the so-called curse that surrounded the opening of his tomb. Is this the answer? Was Horemheb afraid to disturb the tomb because he believed it was cursed?

  The story of the curse of Tutankhamun's tomb began with the strange circumstances surrounding the death of Carter's patron Lord Carnarvon. On 28 February 1922, shortly after the tomb was opened, Carnarvon departed for Aswan for a few days' rest. About the same time he was bitten on the cheek by a mosquito. While shaving with his cut-throat razor, he inadvertently opened the bite which quickly became infected. A fever set in and, although he seemed to recover and two days later he was up and about and eager to revisit the tomb, he suffered a relapse and died. Soon after, the author Arthur Conan Doyle, who was fascinated by the supernatural, attributed Carnarvon's death to a curse left by Tutankhamun's priests to guard the tomb. The idea caught the imagination of the world's press. Reports included all manner of other preternatural events. Apparently, at the precise moment of Carnarvon's death the lights went out allover Cairo, while at the exact same time his dog back in England howled and dropped dead. It was also said that on the day the tomb was opened Carter's pet canary was swallowed by a cobra – the very creature depicted on pharaoh's brow. Evidently, the expedition had ignored the warning inscribed over the entrance to the tomb: 'Death shall come on swift wings to him that toucheth the tomb of the Pharaoh'. Other deaths were indeed to follow, and today they form an integral part of the curse legend.

  No one who was associated with the tomb or the investigation of the mummy was apparently safe. One of the X-ray specialists invited to examine the mummy died of a stroke while on his way to Egypt. Carnarvon's younger brother, Aubrey Herbert, died suddenly the year after the tomb was opened, and Carter's right-hand men, Arthur Mace and Richard Bethell, both died under mysterious circumstances before the tomb was cleared. Others died, seemingly as a consequence of merely visiting the tomb. The American railroad magnate Jay Gould died of pneumonia as a result of a cold he caught there, and the French Egyptologist Georges Benedte died from a fall after being shown round the tomb. A more violent demise was in store for the Egyptian official Ali Kernel Fahmy Bey, whose wife decided to shoot him soon after he had viewed the discovery.

  Was it fear of such a curse that evidently persuaded Horemheb to leave the tomb alone? It seems most unlikely, as the curse of Tutankhamun's tomb is a complete myth. Apart from the fact that many aspects of the story cannot be verified, such as the canary, the dog and lights going out, there never was any inscription over the door, or anywhere else in the tomb, which threatened death to those who disturbed the pharaoh. Where the story came from, God only knows! There were what the Egyptians believed to have been magic defences in place to keep the mummy safe. These Carter himself described:

  Beside this traditional paraphernalia necessary to meet and vanquish the dark powers of the Nether World, there were magical figures placed in small recesses in the walls, facing north, south, east and west, covered with plaster, conforming with the ritual laid down in the Book of the Dead for the defence of the tomb and its owner. Associated with these magical figures are incantations to repel the enemy of Osiris [the deceased], in whatever form he may come. Magic, for once, seems to have prevailed. For of twentyseven monarchs of the Imperial Age of Egypt buried in this valley, who have suffered every type of depravation, Tutankhamun alone has lain unscathed.

  Perhaps such a statement had been misconstrued. As for the mysterious deaths: although true, they did take place before the clearance of the tomb, for the painstaking operation actually took seven years. Consequently, the deaths had not all occurred at once as the now-familiar story relates. Bethell, for instance, did not die until 1929. In fact, only Lord Carnarvon's death is in any way synchronic. Indeed, most of the chief culprits got away scot-free: Lord Carnarvon's daughter, Lady Evelyn, one of the first to enter the tomb, lived for another fifty-eight years; Douglas Derry, the doctor who actually performed the autopsy on the mummy, lived for another forty-seven years; even Howard Carter – the man responsible for the entire thing – did not die until 1939, at the age of sixty-four.

  We can tell from the strange condition and signs of hurried evacuation of Smenkhkare's tomb that the perpetrators of the desecration seemed to have feared some unseen menace in Tomb 55, but there is no such evidence in the case of Tutankhamun's tomb. The protective amulets in his tomb were no different from any tomb of the period, and such things never stopped other pharaohs from plundering the tomb of a former rival. After all, they considered themselves gods and could do whatever they wanted. There must therefore have been something most unusual at stake to restrain Horemheb. The reason appears to be linked in some way with Tomb 55, as Horemheb went to peculiar lengths to protect both of them.

  When Carter discovered Tutankhamun's tomb, its entrance was buried deep underground. Although the burial of many tombs occurred naturally over time, Tutankhamun's tomb had been deliberately buried a few years after its final sealing. Evidence for this was found in the tons of debris that Carter removed from the stairwell when he dug down to its entrance. Among the rubble were dozens of pieces of pottery and broken clay seals dating from the late eighteenth dynasty. For such remains to be present, the tomb must have been buried before the end of Horemheb's reign as he was the last eighteenth-dynasty king. Because the final sealing of the tomb seems to have occurred during Horemheb's reig
n, this means its burial must have occurred while he was pharaoh. Exactly the same seems to have happened to Tomb 55, as Ayrton also found contemporary artefacts in the rubble that covered its entrance.

  The fact that, of all the royal tombs of the period, only the tombs of these two brothers survived intact surely cannot be coincidence. (Indeed, of all the royal tombs of ancient Egypt – from Giza, Saqqara and the Valley of the Kings – only a handful have ever been found as they were left.) Rather it would suggests that the steps taken to hide them from future generations may have been unique. We can understand why such a procedure may have been considered necessary for Tomb 55, but why Tutankhamun? – unless his burial was somehow linked with the condition of Tomb 55. Yet from the perspective of Egyptian magic, there is nothing unusual about Tutankhamun's tomb. Indeed, it is the complete opposite of Tomb 55. Smenkhkare was left in a state of desecration, stripped of his belongings; Tutankhamun was left in state of splendour, surrounded by the most fabulous treasures. Is there perhaps some relevance here?

  We shall return to the possible link between the two tombs later. Before we can proceed, however, we must examine the thinking behind the actions of these contemporary pharaohs. The entire mystery of Tomb 55 – and every subsequent mystery it leads on to – will ultimately remain a mystery unless we can get into the minds of those who lived during the Amarna period. We need to appreciate their reasoning, which seems almost exclusively driven by their reaction to Atenism – either pro or anti. The new god seems to have dominated the entire era. Exactly how, then, did this most unusual religion get started?

  SUMMARY

  • Events soon impelled Tutankhamun's regime to reinstate Amun-Re as the principle deity, albeit seemingly as a token gesture to appease opposition.

  • On the balance of evidence it would seem that Tutankhamun was the son of Amonhotep III and his chief wife Tiye. As Smenkhkare seems to have been Amonhotep's son by his secondary wife Mutnodjme, this would make Tutankhamun Smenkhkare's half-brother and full brother of Akhenaten.

  • We know from Tutankhamun's tomb that by the time of the young king's burial Ay had appointed himself heir apparent, and inscriptions from his own tomb suggest he reigned for four years. When Ay died the leading general Horemheb became pharaoh. Throughout the country images of the Aten were defaced, Amarna was ransacked, and the temple of the Aten in Karnak was taken apart brick by brick.

  • The Amarna kings became non-persons: the names of Akhenaten, Smenkhkare, Tutankhamun and Ay were struck off all monuments, save a few that were overlooked or isolated.

  • It has long remained a mystery how Tutankhamun's tomb managed to escape the destruction. It is, perhaps, understandable that Horemheb left Smenkhkare as he was, his remains desecrated and unnamed, but for Tutankhamun – a king whose statues he was toppling all over Egypt – also to have been left alone is bewildering. Incredibly, Horemheb not only refrained from desecrating Tutankhamun's tomb; he seems to have safeguarded it.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  The One God

  The most remarkable aspect of Akhenaten's revolution in religious thought is that it apparently springs into existence – seemingly from nowhere – the moment Akhenaten becomes king. Apart from passing allusions, there is only a handful of references predating Akhenaten's reign which seem to give the Aten any real significance:

  At the beginning of twelfth dynasty, around 2000 BC, the deceased pharaoh Amenemhet I is referred to as having flown to heaven to unite with the Aten; as is the eighteenth-dynasty pharaoh Amonhotep I.

  Tuthmosis I, around 1525 BC, chose as one of his tides, 'Horus-Re who comes from the Aten'.

  From the reign of Akhenaten's grandfather, Tuthmosis IV, around 1400 BC, a large commemorative scarab bears an inscription in which the peoples under the dominion of the pharaoh are described as, 'his subjects under the sway of the Aten'. (Scarabs such as this, sacred to the god Khepri, represent a dung beetle rolling the sun across the sky.)

  Akhenaten's father, Amonhotep III, named his state barge Radiance of the Aten.

  Although the Aten existed as a divinity before Akhenaten came to power, there was apparently no such thing as Atenism. No one, as far as we can tell, had ever considered worshipping it exclusively, or indeed giving it any importance in its own right: it was merely an aspect of Re-Herakhte. As solar deity, Re-Herakhte had many different roles and being the Aten – namely the sun disc itself – was just one of them. Consequently, Atenism is even stranger than it first appears: before Akhenaten's reign this new supreme deity was not really considered a god at all. In order to ascertain how this extraordinary situation came about, we must examine Akhenaten's earliest years as king, before his move to Amarna.

  It was once thought that outside Amarna no references to Akhenaten had survived, as no monuments had been found bearing is name. Eventually, however, it was realized that the pharaoh had not always been known by the name Akhenaten. He was actually born with his father's name, Amonhotep ('Amun is Pleased'), and began his reign as Amonhotep IV, taking the name Akhenaten ('Living spirit of the Aten') in his fifth regnal year. Under the name Amonhotep IV, references to Akhenaten do appear in a few Theban tombs that managed to escape desecration. But they are few and far between, and it was only thanks to a remarkable quirk of fate that we have any real knowledge of Akhenaten's early years in Thebes. When Horemheb attempted to destroy all evidence of Akhenaten's existence by dismantling his Aten temple at Karnak, stone by stone, he used the masonry to repair the nearby temple of Amun-Re. Here reliefs from Akhenaten's temple were preserved unscathed for over 3,000 years.

  Between the wars, two of the pylons (pyramid-shaped gate towers) at the Temple of Karnak were dismantled for structural repairs by the Egyptian Antiquities Service. Inside, the two directors, Maurice Pillet and Henri Chevriery, discovered over 40,000 sculptured blocks which Horemheb had used for filling when he erected the pylons shortly after his accession. Now called the Karnak Talatat, nearly all of them came from the Aten temple and many are sculptured in sunk relief showing scenes from Akhenaten's early years as king. Reconstruction of this gargantuan jigsaw puzzle seemed almost impossible, however, until 1965, when Ray Wingfield Smith, a retired US foreign service officer and amateur art historian, initiated the so-called Akhenaten Temple Project to undertake the task. The project took years: it even ran out of money and had to be taken over by a Canadian team in 1975, under the directorship of Professor Donald Redford of Toronto University. Aided by modern computer technology, Redford was eventually able to reassemble many of the ancient scenes.

  From the Karnak Talatat, together with the reliefs from early tombs that managed to escape desecration, we learn that Akhenaten had seemingly proclaimed the Aten supreme deity the moment he became pharaoh, and immediately ordered a temple to be erected to his god. Called the Gempaaten ('The Aten is Found in the Estate of the Aten'), it was built to the same unique plan as those that were to follow in Amarna, with its special feature – 'The Window of Appearance' – like a papal balcony were the pharaoh could appear before his followers.

  From the very beginning Akhenaten sees himself as a prophet. His father's epithet, like all the preceding eighteenth-dynasty pharaohs, had been 'Ruler of Thebes', but Akhenaten described himself as 'Divine Ruler of Thebes'. To have himself depicted as an androgynous being was also his intention from early in his reign. In 1925, while digging a drainage ditch at the Temple of Karnak, workmen uncovered a row of fallen statues bearing the name Amonhotep IV. The huge colossi, of which fragments of twenty-five were eventually found, were of a startling, almost grotesque character, unlike any statues previously found in Egypt. Now reassembled in the Cairo Museum, they are extraordinary, three-dimensional representations of Akhenaten, showing the same exaggerated physiology as depicted in the Amarna reliefs. These, however, date from before the move to Amarna, and had originally adorned the Gempaaten temple.

  Although the Aten is supreme god and Akhenaten is its only prophet from the outset of the reign, there appears to
have been no suppression of the old religion for the first four or five years. In fact, the high priest of Amun was still active in the year 4, overseeing the cutting of stone for a royal statue. However, by the year 5 Akhenaten proscribed the cult of Amun-Re, closed the god's temples, and made a complete break from the past by founding his new city on a virgin site not previously sacred to any god.

  Throughout the first half of his reign, Akhenaten seems to have been struggling to find a conventional Egyptian context with which to convey his new religious concept. In the Old Kingdom the Aten had been seen as the visible manifestation of Re, and when Re became assimilated with Horus as Re-Herakhte by the Middle Kingdom, the Aten became an aspect of this composite deity. It was, in fact, as Re-Herakhte that the Aten was first represented at Thebes: a falcon-headed man wearing a solar disc, the uraeus and the Atef crown (the crown of Osiris). The full title by which Akhenaten refers to his god in his early regnal years is: 'Re-Herakhte, who rejoices in the horizon in his aspect of the light which is in the sun-disc'.

  However, Akhenaten clearly does not see his god as Re-Herakhte, but something which had previously been considered an aspect of Re-Herakhte. Namely, 'the light which is in the sun-disc' – in other words, sunlight. In an attempt to distinguish his deity from any previous god, however, Akhenaten had its name contained in a double cartouche. All the same, it appears that his subjects still found it difficult to grasp the idea that the Aten was something other than Re-Herakhte. On the Boundary Stelae proclamations of the year 5 at Amarna, we find Akhenaten desperately, and garrulously, attempting to explain his god to his people:

  May the good god live who delights in truth, lord of heaven and lord of earth, the Aten, the living, the great, illuminating the two lands. May the father live, divine and royal, Re-Herakhte, rejoicing in the horizon in his aspect of the light which is in the sun-disc, who lives for ever and ever, the Aten, the great, who is jubilee within the temple of the Aten in Akhetaten.