June 5, 2006 — Walking up the road into the Valley of the Kings for the first time, I was able to tell where KV 63 was right away. While tourists were steadily moving in and out of other tomb entrances, they stopped and strained to see down the narrow shaft into KV 63.
You can tell immediately that the tomb was unfinished. While some of the chamber is squared off, the far back right corner is incomplete. There is also quite a bit of limestone debris left in the room. It is definitely not like the other royal tombs in the valley, and some have suggested it is just an embalmer's cache.
Inside, Otto's team found 28 large ceramic pots and seven anthropoid [human-like] coffins. The pots are about 3 feet tall and sealed shut.
When I arrived, Salima Ikram was working to open the pots. They were mostly filled with stuff used in the embalming process, like natron [embalming salts], broken ceramics, some linen and even small pieces of dried flesh.
The team was really keen on finding inscriptions or writing on the ceramics. This would allow them to say exactly when the tomb was used, and possibly give some clues as to who may have used it.
Salima is an incredible archaeologist and wonderful to work with because she gets so excited. One of the most exhilarating moments was when she recovered the mud seals. One of the seals had the word "pa-aten" inscribed on it. This could be part of the former name of Tutankhamen's wife, Ankhesenamun. This raises the possibility that the embalming material inside KV 63 may have been used for the mummification of Ankhesenamun.
The coffins were in varying states of preservation. Many of the coffins had jars full of natron or linen stuffed inside them. Termites had worked on the wood over the centuries, eventually weakening some of the coffins to the point that they split because of the weight of the stuff inside.
Some of the coffins, however, are intact. The "youth" coffin is one of the best preserved. Before it was brought up and out of the tomb you could see some linen sticking out on the sides. It looked like it had escaped the termites for the most part. Of course, it was an incredible surprise when the small golden coffin was found inside.
The small golden coffin is an incredible find. It was probably made to hold a "ushabti" figurine that would be interred with the principal burial.
Archaeology is about reconstructing the story. Based on the available evidence, we try to figure out what happened. One of the most interesting things Dr. Otto told me was that maybe the pots and coffins were arranged as they were in order to discourage tomb robbers. The coffins were placed side by side, and one of them was even stacked on top.
This could mean that someone was trying to protect something in the tomb. It is possible that the coffin in the very back of the chamber, which still seems to be at least partially sealed, may hold a mummy. There are some inscriptions on the front of the coffin, but they are covered in black resin and dust, so they can’t be read until the coffin is actually brought out of the tomb.
At one point, as I was leaving the tomb, I looked back and simply took in the scene. That was one of the moments when it really hit me that these things were more than 3,000 years old. Even if KV 63 doesn’t have a mummy and is just an embalming cache, it is still incredible on a couple of levels.
First, it is significant for the simple fact that people thought that the valley had given up all of its secrets. Finally KV 63, whether tomb or cache, holds clues that will deepen our understanding of ancient Egypt.
