Royal tomb of a palace official discovered

In a cemetery on the Giza Plateau, Egypt, archaeologists discovered a tomb of a female senior official in the royal palace. The site dates back 4300 years.

Wall paintings within the tomb (by Egypt Antiquities Ministry)

According to the officials, the tomb discovered by a team led by Mostafa Waziri contains very distinguished wall paintings, in a very good conservation condition, depicting  a woman named “Hetpet” – to which the tomb belonged to – standing in different hunting and fishing scenes or sitting before a large offering table receiving offerings from her children. Scenes of reaping fruits, melting metals and the fabrication of leather and papyri boats as well as musical and dancing performances are also shown on walls. The paintings also show two monkeys: in one scene, the monkey is gathering fruits and the other it is dancing in front of an orchestra. It was also stated that the tomb contains a shrine with a purification basin and places where incense and offerings could be held. One area inside the shrine may have held a statue of Hetpet, which is now missing, the archaeologists suspect. The archaeologists didn’t find a mummy inside the tomb, but it’s possible the mummy and statue were robbed in ancient times.

The tomb of Hetpet (by Egypt Antiquities Ministry)

(after Live Science & Egypt Antiquities Ministry)

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