Vividly colored paintings on the ceiling depicted the tomb’s owner and his family members. After working for five months to clear 300 meters of rubble, a French-led team of archaeologists uncovered this particular tomb earlier this month. Located between the royal tombs in the Valley of the Queens and the Valley of the Kings, the El-Asasef necropolis was used to bury noblemen and women close to the pharaohs. Ancient Egypt’s 18th dynasty dates to the 13th century B.C., and included well-known pharaohs like Tutankhamun, Hatshepsut, Akhenaten and his queen, Nefertiti. “One sarcophagus was rishi-style, which dates back to the 17th dynasty, while the other sarcophagus was from the 18th dynasty,' Minister of Antiquities Khaled Al Anani said. The archaeologists identified the mummy inside the other sarcophagus as Thaw-Irkhet-if, a priest who is known to have supervised the embalming of several pharaohs at the Temple of Mut in Karnak. The tomb dates to Egypt’s middle kingdom, nearly 4,000 years ago. Ministry officials think the woman inside the sarcophagus may be named Thuya, though a spokeswoman said they were still working to definitively identify the mummy.
