Tenth International Congress of Egyptologists Abstracts of Papers

XICE – Abstract of Papers
Locating the cemetery of the residential elite of the Thirteenth Dynasty at
Dahshur
Robert Schiestl
For the Old and New Kingdoms much information on the top echelons of society, on
the administration of the country and the elite’s relationship to the king can be
gleaned from the decorated tombs of the high officials in the orbit of the royal court,
the residential elite. In stark contrast, our understanding of the social and
administrative structure of the Middle Kingdom is primarily based on other sources
(e.g. seals and sealings, Abydene stelae), as our knowledge of tombs of the Middle
Kingdom residential elite is very patchy and for the period of the Thirteenth Dynasty
not a single such cemetery is known. In 2006 a survey was conducted in the region of
Dahshur in two new areas. One of the goals of the survey was precisely the location
and documentation of Thirteenth Dynasty elite necropoleis, whose location in this
central area of royal Thirteenth Dynasty activity could be assumed with high
probability. This was followed in 2007 by a trial excavation of one of the newly
discovered funerary monuments in Dahshur South. The results of these two seasons
will be presented in this paper.
In 2006, in continuation of the work done by the German Archaeological Institute
and the Free University Berlin, 138 a survey was undertaken in the area of Saqqara-
South/Dahshur-North, around the two Thirteenth Dynasty pyramids (Khendjer and
anonymous unfinished pyramid), and in the very south of Dahshur, in the region
between the pyramid of Ameny-Qemau and the pyramids of Mazghuna. 139 Both areas
revealed extensive new Thirteenth Dynasty features. While the area in the north had
been previously investigated by G. JÉQUIER 140 , his publication focussed exclusively on
the two relatively well preserved royal monuments of the Thirteenth Dynasty. Traces
of two further pyramidal structures could be documented: Saqqara South 3 represents
a large sand filled substructure of a an unfinished monument to the north of the
pyramid of Khendjer, Saqqara South 7 the more substantial remains of an unfinished
pyramid —only mentioned in passing by JÉQUIER— south of the large anonymous
pyramid. Its dimensions (base length today 54-57 m, originally probably 52.5 m x
52.5 m) equal those of the pyramid of Khendjer.
Between the royal monuments large pits surrounded by accumulations of
limestone and quartzite chips mark the location of destroyed elite funerary
monuments of this dynasty, presumably originally mastabas. An elite cemetery of this
period could be also identified about 150 m to the west and southwest (Saqqara South
8). Most tombs are only represented by pits marking the tops of robbed shafts, in one
case, however, the lower levels of a limestone encased mastaba still remains (Saqqara
South 8/9). The dating to the Thirteenth Dynasty is confirmed by pottery found on the
surface.The region south of the pyramid of Ameny-Qemau had previously never been
archeologically surveyed. Here traces of a remarkable type of 13 th Dynasty funerary
monument could be documented. On the narrow ridges of hills reaching the edge of
the cultivated land shafts had been erected (Dahshur South 49, 50/1-7, 51, 52). No
superstructures remain; however, substantial amounts of mud brick and limestone
138
D. ARNOLD, R. STADELMANN, in: MDAIK 31 (1975), 174, Abb.3; R. STADELMANN, N. ALEXANIAN,
in: MDAIK 54 (1998), 293-317.
139
For a preliminary report see R. SCHIESTL, in: SOKAR 13 (2006), 45-52; a full report on the 2006
survey is due to appear in MDAIK 64 (2008).
140
G. JEQUIER, Deux pyramides du Moyen Empire (Kairo, 1933).
226