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Nefertiti: Burial Site & Mummy Mysteries

oll_lewis

Gone But Not Forgotten
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(not nessersarily fortean news but as it has links to akhenaten etc it probably gets into this section by the skin of it's teath, if not please move it mods)

from Reuters 30/8/03
Link is dead. An alternative publication of the same Reuters story can be accessed at the Wayback Machine:
https://web.archive.org/web/20031005145848/http://www.abc.net.au:80/news/newsitems/s935712.htm

Doubt cast on Nefertiti discovery
By Opheera McDoom

CAIRO (Reuters) - The mummy a British Egyptologist says could be the ancient Egyptian Queen Nefertiti, renowned for her beauty, is much more likely to be a man, Egypt's antiquities chief Zahi Hawass says.

Nefertiti, wife and co-ruler with the pharaoh Akhenaten and stepmother of legendary boy King Tutankhamun, has long been considered one of the most powerful women of ancient Egypt.

Joann Fletcher, a mummification specialist from the University of York in England, said in June there was a "strong possibility" her team had unearthed Nefertiti from a tomb in Egypt's Valley of the Kings in Luxor. The Discovery Channel publicised the find in a television programme aired this month.

But Secretary-General of Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA), Hawass, expressed doubts about the find and said there were questions over the gender of the mummy.

"I'm sure that this mummy is not a female," Hawass told Reuters at his office in the Egyptian capital.

A report submitted to Egypt's SCA from the University of York expedition leader Don Brothwell said of the mummy: "There has been some confusion as to the sex of this individual."

However, the report concluded that the mummy was a female because of a lack of evidence of male genitalia.

Hawass said a double-piercing in the mummy's ear was common to both sexes, but in a different period to the Amarna era in which Nefertiti lived. He said it was even more common in men.

"All the queens used to wear earrings in their wigs, not in their ears," Hawass said, who has worked in the field for 35 years. He added that the male mummy found alongside the mummy said to be Nefertiti's also had pierced ears.

A sculpted bust of Nefertiti, whose name means "the beautiful woman has come", is exhibited in the Egyptian Museum in Berlin. Her husband Akhenaten, who ruled from 1379-1362 BC, is believed to have all but killed off the idea of pharaoh as god-king in trying to impose a form of monotheism.

"Nefertiti gave birth six times, so her hips should be very broad, but this mummy's hips are very narrow," said Hawass, who inspected the mummy on Friday.

Professor of Egyptology at the American University in Cairo Salima Ikram said x-rays of the mummy taken by the University of York's expedition would clarify whether it had given birth.

"The evidence does not at all support the finding of Nefertiti," Ikram said in a telephone interview. "It would be very obvious from any x-rays of the mummy whether it had given birth...there would be specific markings."

Hawass said Nefertiti was widely believed to be at least 35 years old when she died, but Brothwell's expedition report concluded an age range of 18-30 for the mummy.

Reuters obtained a copy of Brothwell's report from the SCA.

I'm no egyptologist but I do know a thing or 2 about paleoanthropology and it is extreamly easy to tell from an xray if you are dealing with a male of female... the width of hips dosen't come into it at all all you do is just look at the width of the birth canal, relative to the sise of the pelvis.

why this hasen't been looked at is anyones guess :rolleyes:
 
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You're naive.

Well, OK, that was a cheap shot.

The shape of the pelvis is the usual guide. The male pelvis is more triangular, as it doesn't have to allow the passage of a baby's head. The female pelvis is much more round.

If they can't tell the difference from that, then what good are they as archaeologists?
 
And isn't there usually a more pronounced brow ridge on a male skull?

As for the width of the pelvis, surely there must be some slienderly built women with narrow hips? The ancient Egyptians were as a race much slighter in build than 21st century people of European descent.

Carole
 
Females don't always have an extra rib, that's just a defect that occasionally crops up.
Didn't they do a facial reconstruction a while back and found that she actually did look like the famous bust? That's a pretty feminine-looking face for someone they think could be a guy. Now Akhenaten. There's a gender problem!
 
carole said:
As for the width of the pelvis, surely there must be some slienderly built women with narrow hips? The ancient Egyptians were as a race much slighter in build than 21st century people of European descent.
It's not the width, it's the shape.
(That's what they all say.)

The male pelvis is a nice, angular, triangle. Built to work hard, and carry a lot of weight.

The female pelvis is a more rounded triangular shape, particularly on the internal angles, where the baby comes through.

There are a lot of women with slim hips, and men with nice solid groins (if you're into that sort of thing), but the different shapes are the real indication.

I'm not discounting the possibility of anomalous bone structures, I just thought if the remains of the soft tissues were in dispute, the skeleton would be able to decide the matter.
 
BTW, there is a show on the Discovery Channel in the UK on Sunday, Sept 7 about Nefertiti.
I don't know anything about her at all so this is gonna be Nefertiti 101 for me.
 
Last night (Jan. 13), The CBC program 'Disclosure' did an investigation of the Nefertiti controversy. They were quite critical of Dr. Joann Fletcher and her claims.

They also released the results of DNA tests showing that the mummy of 'Nefertiti' is in fact male.

cbc.ca/disclosure/archives/040113_nef/main.html
(includes a pdf of the DNA report)
Originally posted link is dead. The MIA webpage (and at least some of the associated / linked pages) can be accessed via the Wayback Machine:
https://web.archive.org/web/2004011...c.ca/disclosure/archives/040113_nef/main.html
 
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Here's a brain shocker - suppose Nefrititi was always a guy?

Wasn't bisexuality more of a normal thing back then? And King Tut was the child of another bride - I don't know if he had any kids with Nefrititi, and if they did, maybe they adopted....
 
The Egyptian pharaoh queen Nefertiti could be buried in two newly-discovered rooms in King Tutankhamun's tomb, according to a British archaeologist.

Nicholas Reeves said on Egyptian TV that two extra rooms had been found hidden in the walls of the tomb.

Egyptian officials say they hope to give the go-ahead to use radar scans to test Mr Reeves' theory that Nefertiti's remains are hidden in one of them.

She was queen of Egypt during the 14th Century BC.

Mr Reeves believes the remains of Tutankhamun, who died 3,000 years ago aged 19, may have been rushed into an outer chamber of what was originally Nefertiti's tomb.

The remains of Tutankhamun, who may have been Nefertiti's son, were found in 1922.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-34410720
 
It's taken them all this time to find this?
 
Yes you'd think they would have gone over every inch of that pyramid by now.
 
What pyramid?

The Valley of the Kings is amazingly compact and over sixty tombs are known. You would expect it to have been surveyed to death. There are, however, tombs described in early accounts which are now lost!

It goes on giving and it will be a sad day when there is nothing left to discover! :)
 
Ahh, I though Tut's tomb was connected to one of the pyramids.
 
Tut's tomb was in a completely buried chamber away from the pyramids (under a mound of earth and rock). Which probably explains why it was missed by tomb robbers.
I suspect many of the remains of pharaohs and their family members were buried in these, as their mummies have not been found in the stone sarcophagi in the pyramids. Just my theory, but the pyramids may have been a monumental diversion to lure grave robbers away from the actual bodies.
 
Just my theory, but the pyramids may have been a monumental diversion to lure grave robbers away from the actual bodies.

Over 300 miles is quite a diversion! There are no massive pyramids on the Luxor Temple, Karnak or Valley of the Kings sites. You hardly get to see any camels either! :(
 
"Two newly-discovered rooms," (see report above) have become two doorways, "If I am right it is a continuation - corridor continuation - of the tomb, which will end in another burial chamber," (BBC report directly above).

Intriguing - but there is a dearth of good news stories from Egypt and this one does seem to lend itself to endless spinning. I'm not suggesting they take a mallet to that lovely fresco . . . a pneumatic drill would be faster! :banghead:
 
I'm not suggesting they take a mallet to that lovely fresco . . . a pneumatic drill would be faster! :banghead:

By coincidence, I was watching a docu about the Schliemann excavations of Troy earlier tonight. He used any means he could to dig down through the layers - including industrial mining equipment and dynamite. Bet that would find any hidden chambers.
 
I see that the Guardian version of the story has a lot of sceptical comments under the line. Many suggest that a keyhole camera (remember that pyramid gig?) might speed things up, if there was any will to! o_O
 
Egyptian authorities have finished their quest to discover a secret chamber in the tomb of Tutankhamun - concluding that it does not exist.

Previously, officials said they were "90% sure" of a hidden room behind the wall of the boy king's famous 3,000-year-old tomb.

One theory suggested it could have been the tomb of Queen Nefertiti - who some think was Tutankhamun's mother.

New research, however, has concluded the chamber simply is not there.

After Mr Reeves' sensational paper, a series of radar scans seemed to support his theory, leading Egyptian authorities to declare it was "90% sure" that a further chamber existed.

A second scan also seemed to support the theory, which would have been the most significant discovery of Egyptian antiquities in decades.

However, Italian specialists from the University of Turin used new penetrating radar scans to reach their conclusion, saying they were confident in the results.


http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-44026087

(I suspect that some people will not be satisfied with these results)
 
Egyptian authorities have finished their quest to discover a secret chamber in the tomb of Tutankhamun - concluding that it does not exist. ...

Not so fast ...

New scanning results suggest the existence of additional buried spaces not detected in the earlier surveys, and the hunt for Nefertiti's tomb may be starting up again ...
Is this Nefertiti’s tomb? Radar clues reignite debate over hidden chambers

A new survey hints at a previously unknown space beyond Tutankhamun’s burial chamber.

A radar survey around the tomb of Tutankhamun in Egypt’s Valley of the Kings has revealed possible evidence of further hidden chambers behind its walls.

The findings — in an unpublished report, details of which have been seen by Nature — resurrect a controversial theory that the young king’s burial place hides the existence of a larger tomb, which could contain the mysterious Egyptian queen Nefertiti.

Researchers led by archaeologist Mamdouh Eldamaty, a former Egyptian minister of antiquities, used ground-penetrating radar (GPR) to scan the area immediately around Tutankhamun’s tomb. They report that they have identified a previously unknown corridor-like space a few metres from the burial chamber (see ‘Chamber of secrets’). Their finding was presented to Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA) earlier this month.


Rare mummified lions add to Egyptology buzz
The data are “tremendously exciting”, says Ray Johnson, an Egyptologist at the University of Chicago’s Oriental Institute in Luxor, Egypt, who wasn’t involved in the research. “Clearly there is something on the other side of the north wall of the burial chamber.”

The possibility of extra chambers beyond Tutankhamun’s tomb has previously been investigated by several teams, often working with private companies. But they produced conflicting results, and many researchers have dismissed the idea. For example, Francesco Porcelli, a physicist at the Polytechnic University of Turin in Italy who led a GPR survey inside the tomb in 2017, insists that his data rule out the existence of hidden rooms connected with the tomb. ...
FULL STORY:
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00465-y

See Also:
https://www.sciencealert.com/egypto...cret-chamber-where-queen-nefertiti-was-buried
 
Here's the latest round in the recurrent attempts to link Tut's tomb to Nefertiti ...
Secret Clues in Tutankhamun's Tomb Reignite The Idea That Nefertiti Is Hidden Nearby

A renowned British Egyptologist and former British Museum curator claims to have found evidence that the tomb's royal murals and hieroglyphics might have been a hasty cover-up.

Nicholas Reeves has argued for years now that the painting of Tutankhamun on his tomb's wall is not actually of the pharaoh himself. The lines around the corner of his mouth are often seen in paintings of his predecessor, Nefertiti.

Reeves, therefore, thinks that before the images on the walls depicted a 19-year-old male's burial, they might have shown Tutankhamun burying his step-mother, Nefertiti, whose mummy has never been found.

According to a new interview with Reeves, the oval-framed hieroglyphs above these depictions, known as cartouches, appear to have been written over, changing the identity of those involved in the burial ceremony.

Historically, researchers thought the mural of the 'opening of the mouth' ceremony (below), depicted Tutankhamun's body being prepared for burial by his successor, Ay. ...

But Reeves says Ay's features, including his chubby chin and snub nose, are more reminiscent of a young Tutankhamun.

"Close inspection of Ay's cartouches reveals clear, underlying traces of an earlier name – that of Tutankhamun," Reeves told The Guardian. ...
FULL STORY: https://www.sciencealert.com/secret...nite-the-idea-that-nefertiti-is-hidden-nearby
 
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