BIA

AVRIL 2015
Last week, the team discovered the oldest
evidence of breast cancer yet found during the
examination of the skeleton of an aristocratic
lady excavated at the site. Studies of the
remains revealed extraordinary deterioration of
her skeleton, including damage caused by the
spread of breast cancer when it metastasizes
in the bones.
Tomb number 33
According to JIMÉNEZ, tomb number 33 was
filled with 200 skeletons and mummies of top
officials and members of the elite of
Elephantine Island. It was built during the 12 th
Dynasty but was later reused during the New
Kingdom, the Third Intermediate Period and the
Late Period.
The tomb, JIMÉNEZ said, has an intact burial
chamber in which three decorated wooden
sarcophagi were found. Analysis has shown that
the population suffered from poor health,
including members of the area’s elite and even
the governors themselves.
“They lived in precarious conditions on the
edge of survival,” said Miguel BOTELLA, an
anthropologist from Granada University. Average
life expectancy was 30, and people suffered
from malnutrition and acute gastrointestinal
disorders due to drinking contaminated water
from the Nile. “Analysis of the bones of
children has revealed that they died from acute
infectious diseases,” BOTELLA said.
He said that the first mention of the
Pygmies had been found in a scene engraved
on the walls of Governor Herjuf’s tomb dating
from 2200 BCE. “It shows three trips to central
Africa, one of which mentions a Pygmy, the
earliest mention of this ethnic group,” he said.
“The virulence of the disease stopped her
from carrying out any kind of labour, but she
was treated and taken care of during a long
period until her death,” BOTELLA said.
The discovery comes a year after the
discovery of metastatic cancer in the skeleton
of a young man who lived in ancient Egypt
over 3,000 years ago. The skeleton was
unearthed at the Amara Wet site in northern
Sudan.
“This is a very important discovery,” Minister
of Antiquities Mamdûh al-Damâtî told the
Weekly, adding that it contradicted views that
cancer is a modern disease resulting from
modern lifestyles. New evidence had shown that
cancer is a very old disease, he said, even if it
had not been detected as often in past
centuries as many people died in middle age
from infectious diseases or even earlier in
childhood. (Nevine El-Aref, “Tracking ancient
disease”, Al-Ahram Weekly, April 2, 2015).
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This week further controversy broke out
about the conservation of the funerary
collection of the ancient Egyptian boy pharaoh
Tutankhamun. This time the object of concern
was not the king’s golden funerary mask, the
beard of which was clumsily reattached two
months ago, but his gilded wooden chair.
Local newspapers reported that a gilded
wooden chair belonging to the boy king was
broken during its transportation from the
Egyptian Museum in Tahrîr Square to the
planned Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM)
overlooking the Gîza Plateau. The report
claimed that in addition to the chair three
other artefacts from Tutankhamun’s collection
were also damaged in transit.
The diseased skull
These objects were the top of a
sarcophagus, a round offering table and a
marble vessel. The report accused the Ministry
BIA LI — Janvier/Juin 2015 78