Latest news with #SecondIntermediatePeriod
Yahoo
10-04-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Egyptian Tomb Discovery Sheds Light on Mysterious Royal Family
Archaeologists from the University of Pennsylvania were investigating Abydos, one of Egypt's most ancient cities, when they found a 3,600-year-old royal tomb. From its location near the Mount Anubis necropolis and the surviving inscriptions, Egyptologists know the tomb belonged to a little-known royal family, the Abydos pharaohs. The discovery sheds light on a lost dynasty whose very existence scholars have debated. It's difficult to imagine how long the Ancient Egyptian civilization persisted. In England, there have been seven different ruling dynasties since the Middle Ages. Egypt had roughly 33 dynasties. This makes it a little easier to understand how an entire ruling family could slip through the cracks of history. The existence of the Abydos dynasty was first proposed in the 1990s and only confirmed by the discovery of a tomb in 2014. This second tomb provides more evidence. Egyptologists believe the Abydos pharaohs ruled from 1700 to 1550 BCE. This Second Intermediate Period marked the chaotic transition between the Middle and New Kingdoms, a time of famine, warring dynasties, and rapid regime change. The last Middle Kingdom dynasty was when the Hyksos people swept into Egypt. They conquered the Nile Delta area known as Lower Egypt, becoming the 15th Dynasty. Upper Egypt, meanwhile, was split in two. The 16th dynasty ruled Thebes and its surrounding area. The area around Abydos was ruled by, you guessed it, the Abydos Dynasty. The area was fairly small, and the Abydos reign short. They left few monuments behind. The Turin King List, compiled by the famous 19th Dynasty King Ramesses II, only chronicles four Abydos rulers. The list detailed every pharaoh before Ramesses II. However, the list was discovered in fragments, with some sections lost, so a degree of guesswork is involved. Pharaoh Senebkay, whose tomb was discovered in 2014, is not one of the four Abydos rulers on the Turin King List. The new grave belonged to someone who was likely an ancestor of Senebkay, as they were buried in a similar style. Beyond that, Egyptologists can only guess. Looters stole the grave goods and the mummy and damaged the inscriptions. On either side of the tomb entrance, yellow bands once showed the pharaoh's name and images of the goddesses Isis and Nephthys. You can still make out the sister deities, but the name has vanished. The Pennsylvania team, led by Josef Wegner, believes the tomb could belong to either Senaiib or Paentjeni. Both have monuments in the area, and researchers have not found either of their tombs. The Abydos tomb is the second royal grave Egyptologists have unearthed this year. The first belonged to Thutmose II, husband of the famous female pharaoh Hatshepsut. Wegner and his team will continue excavations near Mount Anubis. More Abydos dynasty and Middle Period kings may be in the necropolis, Wegner believes. For the Ancient Egyptians, Abydos was the burial place of the god Osiris, ruler of the afterlife. This made it a sacred city and the burial site for many of the earliest pharaohs. The kings buried here are much older than Thutmose II or the famous Tutankhamun, and their lives are much more mysterious. The Mount Anubis excavations may unearth their long-buried history.
Yahoo
06-04-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Archaeologists uncover an ancient Egyptian tomb belonging to a mystery king
Sign up for CNN's Wonder Theory science newsletter. Explore the universe with news on fascinating discoveries, scientific advancements and more. A newly uncovered ancient Egyptian tomb is shedding light on royalty that once ruled the region over 3,600 years ago. Archaeologists discovered the massive limestone burial chamber, which has multiple rooms and a decorated entryway, in January in Abydos, Egypt. But the lavish tomb's intended occupant remains a mystery. Graverobbers had damaged the hieroglyphic text painted on bricks at the entryway, leaving the name unreadable, according to a news release issued March 27 by the Penn Museum at the University of Pennsylvania. The impressive tomb didn't contain skeletal remains that could help identify its owner. However, the researchers who made the discovery believe it is likely the resting place of a king who ruled upper Egypt during the Second Intermediate Period between 1640 and 1540 BC as part of the Abydos Dynasty, one of the least understood dynasties of ancient Egypt. The mystery king might be one of several who are notoriously missing from the traditional records of monarchs who once ruled the region. 'It's a very sort of mysterious, enigmatic dynasty that seems to have basically been sort of forgotten from the ancient records of Egypt, because it was in this period of political decay and fragmentation,' said Josef Wegner, an Egyptologist and professor of Egyptian archaeology at the University of Pennsylvania, who led the excavation. 'This mystery tomb … opens a new kind of avenue of investigation (into the Abydos Dynasty).' The burial chamber is the largest to be discovered from any known ruler from the same dynasty, illuminating a previously misunderstood period of history that can only be revealed through material remains, experts say. Archaeologists found the tomb nearly 23 feet (about 7 meters) underground at the site of an ancient necropolis, or 'city of the dead.' The necropolis is situated at Abydos' Anubis Mountain, a natural pyramid-shaped formation that was considered sacred by the ancient Egyptians and served to conceal the tombs built beneath it. In historical records, Abydos was referred to as a sacred city that was the final resting place of Osiris — the god of the underworld — and the preferred resting place for the first pharaohs. The necropolis developed over the course of centuries as more dynasties built tombs and buried their kings within the royal cemetery. Over a decade ago, Wegner and his team came across the first tomb within this necropolis that confirmed the existence of the Abydos Dynasty, a ruling lineage that had been first hypothesized about in 1997 by Egyptologist Kim Ryholt. Ryholt believed the smaller dynasty would have ruled the region of Abydos during a time when ancient Egypt was broken into rival kingdoms. That first tomb's owner, King Seneb-Kay, was an entirely unknown pharaoh who was never mentioned in historical records. Of the eight tombs from the dynasty discovered thus far, Seneb-Kay's is the only one found with a name preserved in the burial chamber. The newly found tomb is similar in architecture and decoration but is much larger than Seneb-Kay's — the main compartment of the three-chambered crypt is about 1.9 meters (6.2 feet) wide by 6 meters (19.7 feet) long. Because the tomb was built in a section of the necropolis that the researchers believe was established earlier in time, they think that the wealthy king buried there was likely a predecessor to Seneb-Kay. The scientists suspect that the tomb might have belonged to King Senaiib or King Paentjeni, two monarchs represented in the sparse archaeological record of the dynasty that exists as part of a dedicated monument at Abydos. 'It is equally possible there could be some entirely unknown king,' said Wegner, who is also curator of the Penn Museum's Egyptian section. 'We don't think we have all of (the Abydos kings) names — evidence hasn't survived consistently for them.' While any markings that might help pinpoint the freshly unearthed burial chamber's former occupant didn't survive, the tomb does still have two painted images of the goddesses Isis and Nephthys, who were commonly depicted in funerary rites as if they were mourning the deceased. The researchers plan to investigate about 10,000 square meters (over 100,000 square feet) more of the area's desert terrain in an effort to uncover additional tombs, Wegner said. 'There could easily be 12 or 15 kings that compose this group of kings,' he said. In addition to further excavation, the researchers will scope out the area using ground penetrating radar, technology that uses sound waves to map structures below Earth's surface, as well as magnetometry, which creates maps of structures underground that have magnetic signatures. 'The discovery of another ruler of the Abydos dynasty is very exciting,' said Salima Ikram, a distinguished university professor of Egyptology at the American University in Cairo, in an email. 'It establishes that there was a significant royal … cemetery here of that time, provides us with more details about royal tomb architecture, (and) gives us a clue as to the members of this dynasty and the order in which they ruled.' Ikram was not involved with the burial chamber's discovery but said she is hopeful that future excavations will yield more tombs that will help to 'further our understanding of this once-obscure period of Egyptian history.' Abydos Dynasty kings such as Seneb-Kay are unique because they do not appear on the king lists that were once kept by the ancient Egyptians. 'The Egyptian kings liked to present their history as straightforward and linear and they recorded (king) names in order. These kings aren't on there. So if we look at this sort of strict historical record, we have no place for these kings,' said Laurel Bestock, an Egyptologist and associate professor of archaeology at Brown University in Rhode Island. Bestock was not involved with the new tomb discovery. 'When we find these monuments, it shows us how inadequate that strict, linear historical record is — it was really written, not to be accurate, but to support a particular point of view of later kings who went and reunified Egypt,' Bestock added. 'They wrote of themselves as great victors and as having won ethnic wars, and they just kind of ignored all the little players.' Discoveries such as this latest Abydos tomb are 'incredibly exciting' because they provide context for a richer history, regardless of whether this king's identity is revealed or not, Bestock noted. As of now, the king to whom the burial chamber belonged remains a mystery, but Wegner's goal is to one day identify the ruler to help anchor him within the historical timeline. 'With archaeology you hope for evidence,' Wegner said. 'The archaeological record, you know, it gives you surprises and twists and turns along the way, so you never know what you can find.'
Yahoo
05-04-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Archaeologists uncover an ancient Egyptian tomb belonging to a mystery king
Sign up for CNN's Wonder Theory science newsletter. Explore the universe with news on fascinating discoveries, scientific advancements and more. A newly uncovered ancient Egyptian tomb is shedding light on royalty that once ruled the region over 3,600 years ago. Archaeologists discovered the massive limestone burial chamber, which has multiple rooms and a decorated entryway, in January in Abydos, Egypt. But the lavish tomb's intended occupant remains a mystery. Graverobbers had damaged the hieroglyphic text painted on bricks at the entryway, leaving the name unreadable, according to a news release issued March 27 by the Penn Museum at the University of Pennsylvania. The impressive tomb didn't contain skeletal remains that could help identify its owner. However, the researchers who made the discovery believe it is likely the resting place of a king who ruled upper Egypt during the Second Intermediate Period between 1640 and 1540 BC as part of the Abydos Dynasty, one of the least understood dynasties of ancient Egypt. The mystery king might be one of several who are notoriously missing from the traditional records of monarchs who once ruled the region. 'It's a very sort of mysterious, enigmatic dynasty that seems to have basically been sort of forgotten from the ancient records of Egypt, because it was in this period of political decay and fragmentation,' said Josef Wegner, an Egyptologist and professor of Egyptian archaeology at the University of Pennsylvania, who led the excavation. 'This mystery tomb … opens a new kind of avenue of investigation (into the Abydos Dynasty).' The burial chamber is the largest to be discovered from any known ruler from the same dynasty, illuminating a previously misunderstood period of history that can only be revealed through material remains, experts say. Archaeologists found the tomb nearly 23 feet (about 7 meters) underground at the site of an ancient necropolis, or 'city of the dead.' The necropolis is situated at Abydos' Anubis Mountain, a natural pyramid-shaped formation that was considered sacred by the ancient Egyptians and served to conceal the tombs built beneath it. In historical records, Abydos was referred to as a sacred city that was the final resting place of Osiris — the god of the underworld — and the preferred resting place for the first pharaohs. The necropolis developed over the course of centuries as more dynasties built tombs and buried their kings within the royal cemetery. Over a decade ago, Wegner and his team came across the first tomb within this necropolis that confirmed the existence of the Abydos Dynasty, a ruling lineage that had been first hypothesized about in 1997 by Egyptologist Kim Ryholt. Ryholt believed the smaller dynasty would have ruled the region of Abydos during a time when ancient Egypt was broken into rival kingdoms. That first tomb's owner, King Seneb-Kay, was an entirely unknown pharaoh who was never mentioned in historical records. Of the eight tombs from the dynasty discovered thus far, Seneb-Kay's is the only one found with a name preserved in the burial chamber. The newly found tomb is similar in architecture and decoration but is much larger than Seneb-Kay's — the main compartment of the three-chambered crypt is about 1.9 meters (6.2 feet) wide by 6 meters (19.7 feet) long. Because the tomb was built in a section of the necropolis that the researchers believe was established earlier in time, they think that the wealthy king buried there was likely a predecessor to Seneb-Kay. The scientists suspect that the tomb might have belonged to King Senaiib or King Paentjeni, two monarchs represented in the sparse archaeological record of the dynasty that exists as part of a dedicated monument at Abydos. 'It is equally possible there could be some entirely unknown king,' said Wegner, who is also curator of the Penn Museum's Egyptian section. 'We don't think we have all of (the Abydos kings) names — evidence hasn't survived consistently for them.' While any markings that might help pinpoint the freshly unearthed burial chamber's former occupant didn't survive, the tomb does still have two painted images of the goddesses Isis and Nephthys, who were commonly depicted in funerary rites as if they were mourning the deceased. The researchers plan to investigate about 10,000 square meters (over 100,000 square feet) more of the area's desert terrain in an effort to uncover additional tombs, Wegner said. 'There could easily be 12 or 15 kings that compose this group of kings,' he said. In addition to further excavation, the researchers will scope out the area using ground penetrating radar, technology that uses sound waves to map structures below Earth's surface, as well as magnetometry, which creates maps of structures underground that have magnetic signatures. 'The discovery of another ruler of the Abydos dynasty is very exciting,' said Salima Ikram, a distinguished university professor of Egyptology at the American University in Cairo, in an email. 'It establishes that there was a significant royal … cemetery here of that time, provides us with more details about royal tomb architecture, (and) gives us a clue as to the members of this dynasty and the order in which they ruled.' Ikram was not involved with the burial chamber's discovery but said she is hopeful that future excavations will yield more tombs that will help to 'further our understanding of this once-obscure period of Egyptian history.' Abydos Dynasty kings such as Seneb-Kay are unique because they do not appear on the king lists that were once kept by the ancient Egyptians. 'The Egyptian kings liked to present their history as straightforward and linear and they recorded (king) names in order. These kings aren't on there. So if we look at this sort of strict historical record, we have no place for these kings,' said Laurel Bestock, an Egyptologist and associate professor of archaeology at Brown University in Rhode Island. Bestock was not involved with the new tomb discovery. 'When we find these monuments, it shows us how inadequate that strict, linear historical record is — it was really written, not to be accurate, but to support a particular point of view of later kings who went and reunified Egypt,' Bestock added. 'They wrote of themselves as great victors and as having won ethnic wars, and they just kind of ignored all the little players.' Discoveries such as this latest Abydos tomb are 'incredibly exciting' because they provide context for a richer history, regardless of whether this king's identity is revealed or not, Bestock noted. As of now, the king to whom the burial chamber belonged remains a mystery, but Wegner's goal is to one day identify the ruler to help anchor him within the historical timeline. 'With archaeology you hope for evidence,' Wegner said. 'The archaeological record, you know, it gives you surprises and twists and turns along the way, so you never know what you can find.'
CNN
05-04-2025
- Science
- CNN
Archaeologists uncover an ancient Egyptian tomb belonging to a ‘mystery king'
A newly uncovered ancient Egyptian tomb is shedding light on royalty that once ruled the region over 3,600 years ago. Archaeologists discovered the massive limestone burial chamber, which has multiple rooms and a decorated entryway, in January in Abydos, Egypt. But the lavish tomb's intended occupant remains a mystery. Graverobbers had damaged the hieroglyphic text painted on bricks at the entryway, leaving the name unreadable, according to a news release issued March 27 by the Penn Museum at the University of Pennsylvania. The impressive tomb didn't contain skeletal remains that could help identify its owner. However, the researchers who made the discovery believe it is likely the resting place of a king who ruled upper Egypt during the Second Intermediate Period between 1640 and 1540 BC as part of the Abydos Dynasty, one of the least understood dynasties of ancient Egypt. The mystery king might be one of several who are notoriously missing from the traditional records of monarchs who once ruled the region. 'It's a very sort of mysterious, enigmatic dynasty that seems to have basically been sort of forgotten from the ancient records of Egypt, because it was in this period of political decay and fragmentation,' said Josef Wegner, an Egyptologist and professor of Egyptian archaeology at the University of Pennsylvania, who led the excavation. 'This mystery tomb … opens a new kind of avenue of investigation (into the Abydos Dynasty).' The burial chamber is the largest to be discovered from any known ruler from the same dynasty, illuminating a previously misunderstood period of history that can only be revealed through material remains, experts say. Archaeologists found the tomb nearly 23 feet (about 7 meters) underground at the site of an ancient necropolis, or 'city of the dead.' The necropolis is situated at Abydos' Anubis Mountain, a natural pyramid-shaped formation that was considered sacred by the ancient Egyptians and served to conceal the tombs built beneath it. In historical records, Abydos was referred to as a sacred city that was the final resting place of Osiris — the god of the underworld — and the preferred resting place for the first pharaohs. The necropolis developed over the course of centuries as more dynasties built tombs and buried their kings within the royal cemetery. Over a decade ago, Wegner and his team came across the first tomb within this necropolis that confirmed the existence of the Abydos Dynasty, a ruling lineage that had been first hypothesized about in 1997 by Egyptologist Kim Ryholt. Ryholt believed the smaller dynasty would have ruled the region of Abydos during a time when ancient Egypt was broken into rival kingdoms. That first tomb's owner, King Seneb-Kay, was an entirely unknown pharaoh who was never mentioned in historical records. Of the eight tombs from the dynasty discovered thus far, Seneb-Kay's is the only one found with a name preserved in the burial chamber. The newly found tomb is similar in architecture and decoration but is much larger than Seneb-Kay's — the main compartment of the three-chambered crypt is about 1.9 meters (6.2 feet) wide by 6 meters (19.7 feet) long. Because the tomb was built in a section of the necropolis that the researchers believe was established earlier in time, they think that the wealthy king buried there was likely a predecessor to Seneb-Kay. The scientists suspect that the tomb might have belonged to King Senaiib or King Paentjeni, two monarchs represented in the sparse archaeological record of the dynasty that exists as part of a dedicated monument at Abydos. 'It is equally possible there could be some entirely unknown king,' said Wegner, who is also curator of the Penn Museum's Egyptian section. 'We don't think we have all of (the Abydos kings) names — evidence hasn't survived consistently for them.' While any markings that might help pinpoint the freshly unearthed burial chamber's former occupant didn't survive, the tomb does still have two painted images of the goddesses Isis and Nephthys, who were commonly depicted in funerary rites as if they were mourning the deceased. The researchers plan to investigate about 10,000 square meters (over 100,000 square feet) more of the area's desert terrain in an effort to uncover additional tombs, Wegner said. 'There could easily be 12 or 15 kings that compose this group of kings,' he said. In addition to further excavation, the researchers will scope out the area using ground penetrating radar, technology that uses sound waves to map structures below Earth's surface, as well as magnetometry, which creates maps of structures underground that have magnetic signatures. 'The discovery of another ruler of the Abydos dynasty is very exciting,' said Salima Ikram, a distinguished university professor of Egyptology at the American University in Cairo, in an email. 'It establishes that there was a significant royal … cemetery here of that time, provides us with more details about royal tomb architecture, (and) gives us a clue as to the members of this dynasty and the order in which they ruled.' Ikram was not involved with the burial chamber's discovery but said she is hopeful that future excavations will yield more tombs that will help to 'further our understanding of this once-obscure period of Egyptian history.' Abydos Dynasty kings such as Seneb-Kay are unique because they do not appear on the king lists that were once kept by the ancient Egyptians. 'The Egyptian kings liked to present their history as straightforward and linear and they recorded (king) names in order. These kings aren't on there. So if we look at this sort of strict historical record, we have no place for these kings,' said Laurel Bestock, an Egyptologist and associate professor of archaeology at Brown University in Rhode Island. Bestock was not involved with the new tomb discovery. 'When we find these monuments, it shows us how inadequate that strict, linear historical record is — it was really written, not to be accurate, but to support a particular point of view of later kings who went and reunified Egypt,' Bestock added. 'They wrote of themselves as great victors and as having won ethnic wars, and they just kind of ignored all the little players.' Discoveries such as this latest Abydos tomb are 'incredibly exciting' because they provide context for a richer history, regardless of whether this king's identity is revealed or not, Bestock noted. As of now, the king to whom the burial chamber belonged remains a mystery, but Wegner's goal is to one day identify the ruler to help anchor him within the historical timeline. 'With archaeology you hope for evidence,' Wegner said. 'The archaeological record, you know, it gives you surprises and twists and turns along the way, so you never know what you can find.'
CNN
05-04-2025
- Science
- CNN
Archaeologists uncover an ancient Egyptian tomb belonging to a ‘mystery king'
A newly uncovered ancient Egyptian tomb is shedding light on royalty that once ruled the region over 3,600 years ago. Archaeologists discovered the massive limestone burial chamber, which has multiple rooms and a decorated entryway, in January in Abydos, Egypt. But the lavish tomb's intended occupant remains a mystery. Graverobbers had damaged the hieroglyphic text painted on bricks at the entryway, leaving the name unreadable, according to a news release issued March 27 by the Penn Museum at the University of Pennsylvania. The impressive tomb didn't contain skeletal remains that could help identify its owner. However, the researchers who made the discovery believe it is likely the resting place of a king who ruled upper Egypt during the Second Intermediate Period between 1640 and 1540 BC as part of the Abydos Dynasty, one of the least understood dynasties of ancient Egypt. The mystery king might be one of several who are notoriously missing from the traditional records of monarchs who once ruled the region. 'It's a very sort of mysterious, enigmatic dynasty that seems to have basically been sort of forgotten from the ancient records of Egypt, because it was in this period of political decay and fragmentation,' said Josef Wegner, an Egyptologist and professor of Egyptian archaeology at the University of Pennsylvania, who led the excavation. 'This mystery tomb … opens a new kind of avenue of investigation (into the Abydos Dynasty).' The burial chamber is the largest to be discovered from any known ruler from the same dynasty, illuminating a previously misunderstood period of history that can only be revealed through material remains, experts say. Archaeologists found the tomb nearly 23 feet (about 7 meters) underground at the site of an ancient necropolis, or 'city of the dead.' The necropolis is situated at Abydos' Anubis Mountain, a natural pyramid-shaped formation that was considered sacred by the ancient Egyptians and served to conceal the tombs built beneath it. In historical records, Abydos was referred to as a sacred city that was the final resting place of Osiris — the god of the underworld — and the preferred resting place for the first pharaohs. The necropolis developed over the course of centuries as more dynasties built tombs and buried their kings within the royal cemetery. Over a decade ago, Wegner and his team came across the first tomb within this necropolis that confirmed the existence of the Abydos Dynasty, a ruling lineage that had been first hypothesized about in 1997 by Egyptologist Kim Ryholt. Ryholt believed the smaller dynasty would have ruled the region of Abydos during a time when ancient Egypt was broken into rival kingdoms. That first tomb's owner, King Seneb-Kay, was an entirely unknown pharaoh who was never mentioned in historical records. Of the eight tombs from the dynasty discovered thus far, Seneb-Kay's is the only one found with a name preserved in the burial chamber. The newly found tomb is similar in architecture and decoration but is much larger than Seneb-Kay's — the main compartment of the three-chambered crypt is about 1.9 meters (6.2 feet) wide by 6 meters (19.7 feet) long. Because the tomb was built in a section of the necropolis that the researchers believe was established earlier in time, they think that the wealthy king buried there was likely a predecessor to Seneb-Kay. The scientists suspect that the tomb might have belonged to King Senaiib or King Paentjeni, two monarchs represented in the sparse archaeological record of the dynasty that exists as part of a dedicated monument at Abydos. 'It is equally possible there could be some entirely unknown king,' said Wegner, who is also curator of the Penn Museum's Egyptian section. 'We don't think we have all of (the Abydos kings) names — evidence hasn't survived consistently for them.' While any markings that might help pinpoint the freshly unearthed burial chamber's former occupant didn't survive, the tomb does still have two painted images of the goddesses Isis and Nephthys, who were commonly depicted in funerary rites as if they were mourning the deceased. The researchers plan to investigate about 10,000 square meters (over 100,000 square feet) more of the area's desert terrain in an effort to uncover additional tombs, Wegner said. 'There could easily be 12 or 15 kings that compose this group of kings,' he said. In addition to further excavation, the researchers will scope out the area using ground penetrating radar, technology that uses sound waves to map structures below Earth's surface, as well as magnetometry, which creates maps of structures underground that have magnetic signatures. 'The discovery of another ruler of the Abydos dynasty is very exciting,' said Salima Ikram, a distinguished university professor of Egyptology at the American University in Cairo, in an email. 'It establishes that there was a significant royal … cemetery here of that time, provides us with more details about royal tomb architecture, (and) gives us a clue as to the members of this dynasty and the order in which they ruled.' Ikram was not involved with the burial chamber's discovery but said she is hopeful that future excavations will yield more tombs that will help to 'further our understanding of this once-obscure period of Egyptian history.' Abydos Dynasty kings such as Seneb-Kay are unique because they do not appear on the king lists that were once kept by the ancient Egyptians. 'The Egyptian kings liked to present their history as straightforward and linear and they recorded (king) names in order. These kings aren't on there. So if we look at this sort of strict historical record, we have no place for these kings,' said Laurel Bestock, an Egyptologist and associate professor of archaeology at Brown University in Rhode Island. Bestock was not involved with the new tomb discovery. 'When we find these monuments, it shows us how inadequate that strict, linear historical record is — it was really written, not to be accurate, but to support a particular point of view of later kings who went and reunified Egypt,' Bestock added. 'They wrote of themselves as great victors and as having won ethnic wars, and they just kind of ignored all the little players.' Discoveries such as this latest Abydos tomb are 'incredibly exciting' because they provide context for a richer history, regardless of whether this king's identity is revealed or not, Bestock noted. As of now, the king to whom the burial chamber belonged remains a mystery, but Wegner's goal is to one day identify the ruler to help anchor him within the historical timeline. 'With archaeology you hope for evidence,' Wegner said. 'The archaeological record, you know, it gives you surprises and twists and turns along the way, so you never know what you can find.'
