Page 98 - HISTORY ANGKOR

D I S C O V E R I E S

was

The

Queen’s

Chamber

UPON OPENING the tomb of
Hetepheres in January 1926, 1
1
archaeologists were struck by
the golden funerary furniture
they found. Gilded chairs, a
bed, and a canopy that could 3
3
be disassembled had been se-
verely damaged by water fil-
5
tering into the tomb, but they 5
were not beyond repair. Me- 4
4
ticulous restoration allowed
many of the pieces to be re-
2
turned to their royal splendor. 2
MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS, BOSTON/SCALA, FLORENCE

1The canopy consists 2One of several 3This armchair is 4The queen’s gilded 5A silver and
of 25 different pieces and gold chests, this box gilded with gold leaf. bed is masterfully gold headrest,
was found disassembled. may have contained Papyrus flower motifs carved. Each bedpost commonly found
The supports feature the curtains that form the armrests, is shaped like a lion’s in Old Kingdom
carved reliefs of the would once have with feet in the form leg complete with burials, was inside
falcon-headed god Horus. covered the canopy. of lion claws. paws and claws. a gold chest.

damaged by water and in 4th dynasty and builder she was buried in the small
such poor condition of the Great Pyramid. Her pyramid G1a, at the foot of
that he feared it would tomb had lain hidden in the the Great Pyramid.
crumble. The delicate shadow of that monument Following the excavation,
work to retrieve the for over four millennia. the armchair was restored
fragments of wood and and is now displayed at the
inlay was painstaking. Missing Body Egyptian Museum in Cai-
In addition to a Hetepheres’s alabaster sar- ro. After Reisner’s death
canopy and bed, cophagus was opened in in 1942, renewed inter-

an armchair and March 1927, but it contained est in the retrieved frag-
an elaborate car- no human remains. Histori- ments from Tomb G7000X
rying chair were ans still debate what might spurred the mammoth task
recovered. The have happened to them. of reconstructing the elab-
tomb’s owner was Reisner suggested Heteph- orate carrying chair, in all
inscribed on the carry- eres was originally buried its golden splendor. It is
ing chair, and it confirmed near her husband, Snefru, at housed today at the Harvard
Reisner’s notion that the Dahshur; Khufu then creat- Museum of the Ancient
HETEPHERES’S CARRYING CHAIR, MADE tomb belonged to a wom- ed the new burial site at Gi- Near East in Cambridge,
OF GILDED WOOD WITH INLAID FAIENCE.
DECORATIONS INCLUDE FALCONS PERCHED ON an: “Hetepet-heres,” who za, but the remains of his Massachusetts.
PAPYRUS COLUMNS. HARVARD MUSEUM OF was the mother of Khu- mother were never trans-
THE ANCIENT NEAR EAST, CAMBRIDGE, MA
ALAMY/ACI fu, the second king of the ferred there. Others propose —Irene Cordon

96 MARCH/APRIL 2022