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JOURNAL

of the

American Research Center In Egypt

VOLUME XXXVIII

2 1

Published y

TH E MERIC N RESE RCH CENTER IN EGYPT

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The 19881 1989 Excavation of Petrie'sWorkmen's Barracks at Giza*

NICHOL S CON RD nd M RK LEHNER

Introduction

The Giza Plateau Mapping Project (GPMP)bega n with the aim of creatin g a high precisionmap of both the natural a nd cultural featuresof the Giza Plateau. The researchers on theproject have attempted to move away from ap-proaching the monuments of Giza as discreteobjects created by and for the elite. We try totake a more integrated and dynamic view of theplateau that considers the actions of all of themembers of Old Kingdom society in relationto their natural and social environment. In

T h e excavations reported here began as a collaborationbetween Zahi Hawass and Mark Lehner. We than k Dr. ZahiHawass, Undersecretary of State fo r Giza an d Saqqara for hiscollaboration and assistance with ou r research at Giza. Weare grateful to th e late Dr. Sayed Tewfik, Presid ent of theEgyptian Antiquities Organization d urin g our 1988-89 sea-son, an d to Dr. G. A. Gaballa, Secretary General of the Su-pre me Council of Antiquities. We also thank Mr. Ahmed al-Hagar, Director of Giza, Mr. Mahmoud al-Afifi, Chief Inspec-tor for Giza, and Mansour Bureik, Senior Inspector, fo r theirassistance. We are g rateful to o ur inspectors who workedlong hours in the field in 1988-1989: Mr. Mohammed Ala'ael-Din, Ms. Namet Hamed Mohammed, Mr. Maher Moussa,and Ms. Nagla Nabil.

David Koch an d Bruce Ludwig fund ed th e 1988-89 seasonof the Giza Plateau Mapping Project. This work would no thave been possible without their suppo rt that has been stead-fast over ten year s of our excavations at Giza. We also want tothank William Kelly Simpson and the Yale Endowment forEgyptology for additional financial sup port during our firstexcavation season. We are indebted to David Goodman fordonating his time, and procuring equipment, for o ur surveycontrol.

Members of th e team includ ed Dr. Wilma Wetterstrom,who served as archaeob otanist in the 1988-89 season andmade important contributions to the excavation and interpre-tation of the galleries of Area C. Others who donated th eirtime an d expertise to the Area C excavations include Dr. Frank

our studies we attempt to integrate geological,archaeological, art historical and textual data.This approach considers both the large monu-ments and the smaller scale building projectsof every day life that suppo rted the constructionand maintenance of the monumental during theOld Kingdom.

Any reconstruction of the social and eco-nomic history of the Giza Plateau must con-sider the tens of thousands of workers withoutwhose labor any monumental building wouldhave been impossible. One of the most glaringgaps in our understanding of the history of the

Hole, archaeo logist and scientific advisor, Dr. K. La1 Gauri,geologist, Dr. Herber t Haas, geochronologist, Mr. Hisham el-Hegazy, archaeologist, Dr. Howard Hecker and Dr. RichardRedding, faunal analysts. We are particularly indebted to Fiona

Baker, Nick Fairplay and Diane Kerns who were area supervi-sors for th e Area C excavation. Michael Chazan, Hisham He-gazy, Diane Kerns and Peggy Sanders all contributed to theillustrations included in this report. Ms. Caroline Hebronproduced the illustration of the roofing fragments (fig. 13 .We than k Peggy Sanders an d Archaeological Graphic Servicesfor computer g raphics of the Area C galleries. We thankMichael Chazan, Peter Lacovara, and An na Wodzinska for theirwork with the ceramics, and Co rdula Werschkun for organizingand curating materials in the GPMP storeroom at Giza.

We were able to prepa re this re por t thanks to a grant forConard from the Alexander von Humboldt Stiftung at theRomisch-Germanisches Zentralmuseum in Mainz, and thanksto support for the Giza Plateau Mapping Project from AnnLurie and the Ann an d Robert H. Lurie Foundation, David

Koch, Peter Norton, Brucc Ludwig, Robert Lowdermilk, GlenDash, Marjorie Fisher, Sandford a nd Betty Sigoloff, Victor an dNancy Moss, Fred and Suzanne Rheinstein, and our otherfaithful supp orters. A first draft of this paper was written inconnection with the symposium, Beyond the Elite: ld KingdomArchaeology and the Giza Plateau Mapping Project presented atthe 57th annual m eeting of the Society for American Archae-ology, April, 1992 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

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Fig 1 Ma p of the Giza Plateau with pyramid complexes of Khufu Khafre and Me nkaure reconstructed. Th e three principal areas of the Giza Plateau m appin gproject investig ation are labeled Area A Area B and Area C . Computer graphics by Peggy Sande rs Archaeological Gra phics Services.

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THE 198811989 EXCAVATION AT GIZA 2

Giza Plateau concerns how the Egyptians ofthat time organized an d provisioned the labor-ers. So far most of the reconstruction of thissocial organization has been based on texts-tomb titles, workers graffiti or co ntrol notes an dinferences about labor organization drawn fromlater documents. It is essential to complementtextual studies by locating the workforce on thearchaeological landscape of the plateau.

Although th e emphasis of nearly two centurie sof excavations on the Giza Plateau has certainlynot bee n toward recovering social an d economicstructures, there have been attempts to iden-tify areas of workers' housing an d workshops.During his work in 1880-82, Petrie identified aseries of comb-like galleries west of the KhafrePyramid as the Workmen's Barracks. He es-timated they could have accommodated 4,000

people. Elsewhere on the Giza Plateau, he rec-ognized tools, tool marks, and the workers' re-fuse dumps and made inferences about theirmethods a nd organization.' Between 1971 and1975 Kromer excavated a huge du mp of settle-ment debris on the Maadi Formation, about akilometer south of the Third Pyramid. Kromersuggested th e debri s was the remains of a settle-ment that the Egyptians razed to build a pyra-mid, probably Menkaure's, on its 10cation.~ lsoin th e early 1970's, Abd al-Aziz Saleh excavated asmall industrial settle ment south of the KhafrePyramid an d within the outer peribolus enclo-sure of the Menkaure Pyramid. This settlementconsisted of a broad open court and smallhouse-like structures built against a thick pre-cinct wall. Many large pieces of alabaster layabo ut the cou rt, and the re was evidence of cop-per work an d ot her industry.3 Much more ofsuch infrastructure surely existed at Giza forbuilding th e 4 th Dynasty pyramids.

Beginning in 1988-89 with the goal of find-ing workers' quarte rs, the Giza Plateau Mapping

W M. l Petrie, The Pyram ids an d Temples of Gizeh (Lon-don , 1883) , 101-3 fo r the so-called Workmen's Barracks,173-77 for tools and tool marks, 210-11 for labor organiza-tion, and 213 for masons' waste.

K Kromer, Siedlungsfunde aus dem Alien Reich in Giseh.Denkschnften, osterreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Phili-sophisch-historische Klasse 136 (1978) 1-130.

A. Saleh, Excavations Aroun d Mycerinus PyramidComplex, MD IK 30 (19 74), 131-54.

Project began excavations in two locations. Onearea is south of the gre at stone Wall of theCrow (Heit el-Ghurob, Area A ), 400 meters sout hof the Sp hinx at the southeast corner of theGiza Necropolis (fig. 1) . Th e oth er a rea is theso-called Workmen's Barracks west of the KhafrePyramid (Area C) 4

O ne aim of the 198811989 season a t Giza wasto confirm or refute Petrie's interpretation ofthe galleries west of the Khafre Pyramid. WhilePetrie's excavations of the site turned up manyfragm ents of statues an d stone with high trans-portation cost like diorite, alabaster, and gran-ite,5 the surface aro und t he galleries provides n oobvious signs of se ttleme nt debris. Th e galleriesattach to the west wall of a vast rectangul ar e n-closure, and measure 450 meters in the north-south a nd 80 meters in the east-west direction.

The barren bedrock shows along the east ofthe galleries within the enclosure and behindthe enclosure to the west. The surface is unen -cumbered with the kind of settlement debris-pottery, ash, bon e, and oth er refuse-we mightexpect if tho usands of men had bivouacked herefor a decade o r more.6

Area B was a third area for research. Area B is theelevated broad sandy bowl on the Maadi Formation duesouth of the G reat Pyramid. Kromer's excavations int o agreat dum p of settlement debris (see note above) werelocated in the N E corner of this bowl. Lehner, MD IK 41,133-34 suggested this bowl was an ideal place fo r a worker's

community. An inspection early in the 1988-89 seasonhinted that the re was little in th e way of settlem ent depos-its on the floor of t he bowl. Natural marl clay tafia) wasfou nd just u nd er a shallow sand cover in a few spots that weprobe d. We therefore decid ed to concentrate ou r efforts inArea A, which has proved a location rich in settlement re-mains. It is possible that the bowl was widened and d eep eneddurin g the Pyramid Age as a quarry for tafia, widely used inramps, embank ments, an d walls of o ther secondary struc-tures. It is also possible that there is some settlement debrisin the dumps that Kromer excavated derived from settle-ments cleared off the bowl. The deposits contained seal im-pressions of Khufu an d Khafre. Area B deserves moreinvestigation in the future.

Petrie, Pyramids and Temples of Gizeh, 102-3, also page 31where Petrie states that he fo und many fragments of earlystatues in diorite, alabaster, and quartzite.

M. Leh ner , A Contex tual Approach to the Giza Pyra-mids, Archiu fur Orientforschung 31 (1985), 136-58. It shouldbe noted that the modern asphalt road running north andwest of t he Khafre Pyramid curves right t hroug h th e longrectangular enclosure passing in fron t of th e east ends of thegalleries.

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4 JARCE XXXVIII (2001

Another im portan t question relates to the sizeof this installation. Most estimates of the num-ber of laborers needed to build the pyramidsexceed the number of people who could havebeen housed in the galleries.7 Thus even if itcould be demonstrated that the galleries servedas housing, additional accommodations for theworkers would have been needed. The largelyunexcavated area south of the Wall of the Crowseemed to provide a place close to the plateauwith enough space to have housed thousandsof workers and support facilities.' With thesepoints in mind, the members of the GPMP metin Cairo in December of 1988 for two months offieldwork.

Surface Survey of Petrie'sWorkmen's Barracks

In late 1988 while most of the research teambegan to excavate south of the Wall of the Crow,one of us (Cona rd) along with two area supervi-sors and about fifteen workmen, began work inPetrie's Workmen's Barracks. First we made asketch map of the roughly 78 E-W oriented gal-leries and about 15 N-S ori ented galleries visibleon the surface. petrie9 reports a total of 91 gal-leries, while Lehner reports 73 E-W orientedand 18 N S oriented galleries an d mentions thatoriginally as many as galleries might havebeen present in this enclosure about 450 m on

See M Lehner, The Complete Pyramids (London, 1997),224-25 for a purposefully low estimate of 4,000 haulers,masons and setters and a nother 1,212 men working the localquarries. While this total comes close to Petrie's estimatedpopulation of the barracks, many more people were neededfor support, such as carpenters, metal workers, potters, etc.The total labor force might have been in the 20,000 range.See Dieter Arnold, Estimates of the population of the workforce at Giza, (1982); and R. Stadelmann, Pyramiden-stadten, L 5 (1983) , 9-14.

Lehner, MDAIK 41, 135-36. S. Hassan, Excavations atGiza IV: 1932-1933 (1943), 42, stated he found mudbrickwalls and other settlement remains in test trenches from the

Wall of the Crow for hundreds of meters south. By the timeof our 1988-89 season, some of the walls and Old Kingdompottery were showing where men and boys from nearbyriding stables had stripped off the clean sand overburden.There were good indications of extensive buried settlementin this location.

Petrie, Pyramids a nd Temples of Gizeh 102.

its long axis and 80 m on its shorter axis.1Th e sketch map included the location a nd ori-entation of th e walls, wall tumble and the con-spicuous concentrations of materials includingalabaster, basalt, diorite, granite, flint artifactsan d ceramics. Despite many irregularities o n thesurface of Area C, the location of most of thegalleries could be determined on the basis ofthe placement of walls of limestone rubble. Asthe initial stages of t he excavation began, DavidGoodman of CALTRANS (the California De-partment of Transportation) and Conard sur-veyed the surface of Area C using a total stationto measure nearly 1000 points in three dimen-sions. The survey team plotted points along theestimated center of the gallery walls on thedefla ted surface. They discerned the positions ofthe walls as linear concentra tions of stones while

the area in between the walls showed as slightlylower, sandier strips.The map shown in fig. 2 is the result of this

survey. The lines mark the walls as doc umentedin December of 1988. The modern asphalt roadpasses throug h the enclosure and ust east of thegalleries on its route f rom the pyramids to SaharaCity. Where the road turns to the west it runsright across the southern end of the enclosure,and we were unable to discern the path of theenclosure wall here. Similarly, at the north endof the enclosure, where the asphalt road turnssouth, another modern road runs west to themode rn complex of buildings that includes thegovernment rest house , antiquities storage facili-ties (adapted from Reisner's Harvard Houseexcavation hea dquarters), an d the engineeringdepa rtment of the Giza antiquities Inspectorate.Together the two roads either wiped out or ob-scure the northern enclosure wall, and a shortstub of an ancient wall that connected the eastwall of the galleries enclosure to the unfinishedlarge stone wall north of the Khafre Pyramidand south of the Western cem etery .ll The east-

lo

Lehner, Archiv fur Orientforschung 32, 138-58; MDAIK41, 140 where, measuring off a 1:5,000 map L ehner gives 44086 m.

l Reisner noted and sketched this connection in his GizaDiary for October 14, 1913-1914 in the expedition recordshoused at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. I am grateful toRita Freed for the use of these records.

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THE 198811989 EXCAVATION AT GIZ

\ Gallery 74 75 /

G a l l e r y 48 1

Gallery 38 1

Gallery 28

/-

0 0Gallery 8

2 Area C. Ma p of wall lines surveyed by David Goodman an d Nicholas C onard with excalotion u ni ts C1 C11. Plotted by P eg a Sanders. C ontour values indicate height in m. abovenean sea level.

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2 6 JARCE XXXVIII 2001)

er n e nclosu re wall is still visible ru nn in g east ofand parallel to the mo dern road.

The fact that roughly 93 galleries are visibleon the surface of Area C attests to the stabilityof t he a rchitect ure as it has erode d away overthe centuries. I n general, th e walls of t he galler-

ies are better preserved, and stand to a greaterheight to the west, closer to the common westwall of the gallery set. Th e gallery walls, as pre -served in 1988, sloped down toward their o pen -ings on the east.

While we worked at Area C, the changingnature of the surface became clear to us. Dur-ing the weeks of fieldwork one could observeinnum erable small alterations and inte rruptio nsto the r egular pa tter n of the gallery walls. Someof these disturbances obviously resulted fro mpedestrians, camels, horses, and motor vehicles.Those in the tourist trade often redistributed thelimestone rubble on the surface by buildinghearths, 'camel pens' and stacking stones forot he r reasons. Additional disturbances, includingpits, must have resulted from previous archaeo-logical excavations as well as activities in antiquity.

O n the basis of ou r walking survey and sketchmap we numbered the galleries starting on thesouth of the main row of the E-W oriented gal-leries. Later, survey identified two more likelygalleries south of our number 1; and perhapsstill more galleries exist farther south underthe modern asphalt road and beyond. The two

galleries south of our numbe r were thereforedesignated as -1 and -2. Figure 3 representsthe original position of the complex of galler-ies on the basis of the features that we mappedfor individual excavation units. While we sur-veyed walls suggesting the presence of fifteen orsixteen galleries extending southward from thenorthern closure wall (fig. 2), there could bemore under the modern road which cuts acrossthe NE corner of the enclosure. Extrapolatingthe eastern wall of the enclosure to its cornerwith the north wall allows room for nineteengalleries in the no rthe rn set (fig. 3).

Metho ds of Excavation

Due to time constraints the team could onlyexcavate a small part of the total set of nearlyone hundred galleries stretching for some 450meters. We wanted to investigate the fr ont , mid-

dle, and back parts of the galleries through aseries of randomly selected small excavationunits. For this purpose we surveyed north-southlines that divided the galleries into three 10-mparts. We chose excavation units that sampledthe entrances, center parts and backs of the

galleries. A fourth row took in the sandy depos-its along th e west of the western enclos ure wallto which the galleries attach.

To decide which galleries to excavate we ini-tially drew numbers from a hat, which was lessthan random but got us started. Initially we di-rected ou r attention toward the randomly se-lected galleries but later decided to try to findgalleries that deviated from the typical pattern.We also directed ou r attention to the entrancesof the galleries, which turned out to containmore cultural debris than the middle and rearparts. Figures an d 2 show the location of theexcavation units C1-C11:

C lC2:C3:C4:

C5:C6:C7:C8:C9:

C10:

C l l :

Entran ce to E-W gallery 68.Middle section of an E-W gallery 36.Rear of an E-W gallery 58.Area beh ind th e main N-S wall an d

opposite C3.Entran ce to an E-W gallery 35.Middle section of an E-W gallery 10.Rear of an E-W gallery 35.Middle section of an E-W gallery 65.Middle section of N-S gallery 83.

Entrance and middle section of N-Sgallery 84.

Entrance to E-W gallery 6.

These units measured abo ut 5 x 5 to 5 10 man d excavation followed the stratigraphic systemadvo cated by ~ a r r i s . ' ~ xcavation supervisorsidentified natural deposits and archaeologicalfeatures as they encountered them. The galler-ies were mostly filled with windblown sand that

l E C. Harris, Principles ofArchaeologica1 Stratigraphy (New

York, 1979 . Any change to the cultural material from adiscrete depositional event is considered a feature (layers,walls, hearths, floors, pit lines, etc.). In our first season wedesignated feature numbers in a series starting with foreach excavation square. For all subsequent seasons we logfeature numbers out of a common Feature Log, so that fea-ture numbers never repeat across the site. The num bers arepurely for identification. The numbers do not themselvesindicate the sequ ence of deposition.

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workmen removed with hoes and baskets. Crewmembers screened all of the cultural depositsthrough 0.5-cm mesh, collected non-local stonematerials (e.g., alabaster, basalt, diorite andgranite), counted the pieces and measured theweights. We collected and counted flint arti-facts, ceramics, faunal remains, charcoal, c opp erfragments and all other cultural material. Areasupervisors sampled many of t he cultu ral de-posits for flotation an d took 14C samples whenthey encountered suitable material. The crewdocumented stratigraphic sections, plans andelevations of the units of excavation and the ar-chitecture they contained and also documentedthe more important finds in three dimensionsby taking horizontal coordinates and elevationsor spot heights.

Architecture

Despite the irregularities on the surface ofArea C, the excavations revealed a remarkablyconsistent pattern in the architecture of thegalleries. All of th e walls of the galleries have acore of limestone rubble or irregu lar field-stones (figs. 4, 7, 8, 9). In many areas, especiallythe lower parts of the walls, plaster is preserved(fig. 4). Alluvial mud comprises the thicker in-ner layer of plaster, and a thin outer layer ofmarl (Arabic tafia) covers the wall surfaces.

In the rear of the galleries, the main N-S wall

is preserved to a he igh t of between 3.0 and 3.6 m(fig. 4). The latter figure represents the mini-mum heig ht of the structures. Th e western en-closure wall, or main N-S wall, is the backboneof the comb-like galleries. It is a massive, solidconstruction with a thickness of 2.5 m at thebase, tapering at abut 78 degrees to a thick-ness of roughly 1.2 m at the top (fig. 4). Thesidewalls of t he galleries are strong , but less mas-sive than the main N-S wall. They are 1.5 m thickat the base and roughly 1.0 m thick at the h eightof t hre e meters at the back (west) where they arebetter preserved.

The interior dimensions of the galleries arefairly consistent, with widths ranging from 2.5to 3.0 m at the floor, and an average width ofabout 2.7 meters. The narrower galleries tendto be in the nor ther n half of th e whole set, whilethe wider galleries are generally in the southernor central part of th e set. The entrances to the

galleries are slightly constr icted with widths rang-ing from 2.0 to 2.25 m. Th e length of the galler-ies is more difficult to appro ximate since only inone case did we excavate the front and back ofthe sam e gallery. Th e length of Gallery 35 con-taining units C5 and C7 is 28.5 m at floor level.Th e placement of two oth er entrances relativeto the location of the back wall indicates that thelengths of the galleries do not deviate muchfrom the above figure. These figures generallymatch th e dimensions that Petrie report ed withthe exception that he mentions that the galler-ies were only seven feet (2.13 m) high.13 Ou r ex-cavation of parts of seven galleries on the mainaxis and two on the lesser axis shows that whilesome minor variation exists in the dimensionsof the structure, they are all of nearly identicalform, and no obvious features distinguish the

galleries on t he grea ter an d lesser axes.Th e careful study of th e construc tion of th ewalls, plaster, sub-floors, and floors provides evi-dence for the sequence of building the installa-tion. First fissures in the limestone bedrock ofthe Mokattam Formation were filled with sandand limestone (fig. 9). Often the fissures containnaturally occurring rust-colored material. Thelimestone rubble filling the sub-floor of the gal-leries consists of irregular sizes ranging fromsmall chips to pieces as large as 65 40 30 cm.Much of this rubble is white Turah-quality lime-stone such as the 4th Dynasty builders used to

case their tombs, temples and pyramids. Thefragments have sharp edges indicating that thechips resulted from stone work no t long beforethe detritus was used as foundation fill for thegalleries. Above the fill of rubble an d san d fol-lows a layer of white powdery limestone a fewcentimeters thick. This layer creates a flat sur-face that follows the 3.5-degree slope of t he bed-rock downward from west to east. Everywherethat we exposed a sub-floor a similar patternwas observed. This and other observations men-tioned below suggest that the roughly 30 450meter surface on which the galleries were builtwas graded or flattened at roughly the same time.

Once the bedrock fissures had been filled,workers constructed the western en closure wall-

the main N-S wall that ru ns for mo re than 400m and forms the spine of the main axis of the

l Petrie, yramids and Temples 102

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WESTERNENCLOSURE

W LL

Fig. 4. C3-C4 elevation-section profile dr awing across western enclosure wall of the galleries feature 9 i n C3 feature 2 i n C4. On the C3 side the drawing is an ele-vatio n of the southern wall feature 8 of Gallery 58; the mud floor is feature 5. The northern stratigraphic section of excavation unit C4 has been flipped to completethe profile: feature 1, sand fill with short-term surface lines; feature 3, crushed limestone powder with bur nt lime stone pieces; feature 4 reddish sandy sediment with-limestone inclusions, from natu ral ferrous fill of Mokat tam Formation. Vertical scale indicate s height in m. above mean sea level. Origina l by Diane Kerns.

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30 JARCE XXXVIII (20 01)

ig 5. C3 section draw ing of sand fill, Gallery 5 8 back end. Feature 1: sand fill with temporary surface lines and mu dlines from deterioration of side walls of Gallery 58 ; feature 5 all uvi al mud floor of gallery; features and 8, south andnorth side walls of Gallery 58. Origina l by Diane Kerns.

galleries. All of the fieldstone walls are m ade pri-marily of limestone pieces of various sizes andlesser amounts of granite rubble held togetherwith alluvial mud mortar (figs, 4, 9). The irreg-ulariti es of th e ru bbl e walls were filled with al-luvial mud before a marl plaster was applied tothe wall s ea st an d west faces. The constr uctionof t he sidewalls followed the erectio n of the

Western Wall. The entrances were then com-pleted, and finally alluvial mud floors were laidinside and in fro nt of t he galleries.

Roofing

Near the e nd of this sequence the roofs wereadded to the galleries. The strongest evidence

that the galleries were roofed comes from whatappear to be roof fragments recovered fromexcavation units C8, C10 and C l l . These piecesof alluvial mud contai n the impressions of paral-lel running sticks or reeds over part of the sur-face while the rest of th e surface is irreg ular an dbroken. These fragments suggest that the galler-ies were covered with flat as oppo sed to vaulted

roofs. We found neither bricks nor fragmentstha t suggested th e springing of a vault.Figure 1 3 illustrates some of these roofing

fragments. Examples A-C rep rese nt the impres-sions of relatively wide reed or wood elements,with widths from 10 to 25 mm. The impressionscould be from sticks, reed, or palm frond

gereed) . Examples D-G show patterns of mats

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THE 198811989 EXCAVATION AT GIZA

Fig. 6 Photograph of C l : entrance to Gallery 68 View to the south southwest.

of woven or tied reed elements ranging from 4to 1 2 mm wide. Examples H M carry the im-pressions of narrow elements ranging from 4 to10 mm, but with widths or diameters generallyaround 7-8 mm. These elements were round oroval as indica ted by some of t he bette r pres ervedimpressions (fig. 13, I). Examples H, I, and Jeither have reed impressions on two sides of themud fragm ent, or o n most of the roughly semi-circular surface. These examples indicate thatthe reed was stuffed with mud b inder into seamso r oins between other elements.14

Examples of roofing fragmentsA

throughK

in fig. 13 all derive from the same deposit, fea-

l Perhaps somewhat like the reed luting suggested as asealant between hull planks and capped by batons in theKhufu bark; Owain Roberts, personal communication. SeeB Landstrom, Ships of the Pharaohs (New York, 197 0), 28-29,figs. 84, 86. (Th e verb lute is 'to smear over and close upjoints and crevasses').

tures 4 and 5 in excavation unit C l l . Featuresimply corresponds to a ba nd of g reater densityat the base of the deposit. Thus these fragmentsprobably all derive from the same roof. They,and the reeds that left the impressions, musthave provided the covering layer over a moresubstantial rigid framework of wood beams. Theunderside of the beams, an d the top side of thereed or geree layer, were probably covered withmud layers repre sented by the fra gmen ts we re-trieved.15 The rooms, 2.5 to 3.0 m wide, are alittle less than the maximum 3.5 meter width of

flat-roofed rooms at h na rn a. 16 We tentativelyreconstruct a flat roof composed of a first layerof cross beams that rested upo n the gallery walls.The seams between the beams were filled with

l B. J Kemp, Soil (Inclu ding mud-brick architecture) IIn P. T. Nicholson and Ian Shaw (eds.) , Ancient Egyptian Materials and Technology (Cambridge, 2000), 93-96, fig. 3.8.

l 6 Kemp, Soil, 93.

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JARCE XXXVIII 2001)

Fig 7. Photograph of C3: Gallery 58 back end. Sq uare pit at rear, rig ht of th e view is probe below the floor of the gallerysee igure 9 .

reed and alluvial mud. Above this luting musthave come a layer of wider reed elements, orreed matting, and a final smooth mud layer tofinish off the top. Example M from excavationunit C10 in o ne of the n ort her n galleries is ofgypsum and suggests a diffe rent kind of roof.The impressions of narrow round or oval reedsare found on a roughly V-shaped underside.Th e V-shape may result from fill between roun dcrossbeams. Th e smooth side of th e fragmentrepresents the top of the roof, which is formedof a slightly harder, grayer, gypsum layer from3 to 6 mm thick. Here, the use of gypsum may

have obviated the need for thick reed luting,matting, and mud layers. It is possible that gyp-sum fr agmen ts A, B and C in fig. 26, from C5,feature 2, may also derive from gypsum roofing.Othe r broad, flat fragments of gypsum fromC513 and C l l / 3 , 1 6 and 23 mm thick respectively,could also be from gypsum coating the roof,

although they lack the impressions of wood orreed elements.

Since all of th e galleries appea r to haveroughly the same form, on e might assume if amiddle C8) and an entrance C l l ) were cov-ered, that all of the galleries would be com-pletely or partially roofed. On the other hand,the fact tha t we foun d roofing fragments in onlyC8, C10 and C l l excavation squares may indi-cate that the galleries were only selectivelyroofed. One would assume that when the galler-ies were no longer used, the beams and otherwood in the ceilings would have been taken for

reuse elsewhere, leaving mud fragme nts with theimpressions of the covering and spannin g mate-rials. Why the peo ple who aba ndon ed the galler-ies would sweep out th e deb ris from th e removalof roofing material remains unanswered. Unfor-tunately the tops of th e gallery walls are no t pre-served well enough to determine what portion

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THE 198811989 EXCAVATION AT GIZA

Fig 8 Photograph of C4: west side of western enclosurewall Sandb ags were needed to retai n the sections excavate dthroug h the sand fill after they collapsed

of t he galleries were covered an d exactly whattechnique was used to span the galleries.

Internal Structure

Since the first thr ee galleries excavated showedthe same pattern of a single undifferentiated,straight room without interior walls, in choosingsubsequent galleries to excavate, we deliberatelychose galleries that appeared to have interiorwalls or tha t app eare d to deviate from the usualpattern. However, our excavations indicate thegalleries are of nearly identical form. Only ex-cavation units C6, C8 and C l l yielded interiorwalls or large interior features. In all of thesecases, however, the walls and disturbances to thelimestone rubble walls clearly post-dated theoriginal phase of building. Th e interior wall in-

side C6 is an ephemeral arc of crudely stackedlimestone pieces that rest up on windblown sand.The disturbances in C8 and C l l are pits duginto t he no rth ern walls of the galleries. Thesedisturbances, like the burial of mod ern (British

army?) supply canisters in C3, are the result ofrelatively rec ent activities. We rec overed littlematerial from the Old Kingdom while diggingthe fill of these pits.

While the architecture of each gallery issimple and undifferentiated, lacking windowsand interior walls, the entrances to the galler-ies were carefully constructed with larger lime-stone slabs. Excavation units Cl, C5 and C10document the structure of the entrances to thegalleries (fig. 10 . In each of these three casesone must step up 15 centimeters from the allu-vial mud floor outside the galleries into a well-constructed threshold of rectangular limestoneslabs (fig. 6). These limestone thresholds areslightly over two mete rs wide and e xte nd slightlyless than o ne me ter into the galleries.

There are small pits just inside the limestonethreshold in C l and C10. These pits may havea function related to regulating access to theinterior of the galleries, bu t they do not ap pearto be positioned correctly for do or sockets. Th elack of such a depression inside C5 suggests thatthese pits are not standa rd architectural featuresof the galleries. About 50 cm in front of the

threshold in C5, fou r disks of al abaster were setinto the level mud surface. These tiny alabasterpieces are too small and isolated to have beenpart of a pavement in front of t he galleries.

The excavation documented white gypsumplaster on the limestone threshold and on thefro nt ext erior walls of excavation units C l andC5. In C l , feature 5 we found pieces rangingfrom 8.2 10 cm to 2.7 2 cm. O n these pieces,a thin layer of white gypsum less than one milli-met er thick covers a layer of yellowish marl clayfrom 4 to 8 millimeters thick, which in turncovered the alluvial mud binding of the walls.

There were traces of red plaster on the thresh-old an d exte rior wall of C5, although this couldbe the red pigment seen quite often in gypsumplaster a t ~ i za . l ' These fragments indicate that

l S e e G Bonani, H. Haas, Z Hawass, J. Nolan, S Nakhla,M Lehner, R Wenke, an d W. Wolfli, Dating the Pyramids,Archaeology (Sept.-Oct., 1999), 26-33.

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JARCE XXXVIII 2001 )

WESTERN ENCLOSURE W LL

Fig 9. C3, elevation dra wi ng of the western enclosure wall, east face, at back of Ga llery58. Feature 3 tin canisters Britisharmy ? filled with san d; feature 5, alluv ial mud floor; feature 6 reddish sand y soil w ith sma ll limestone pieces, na tur al fer-rous fill of Mo kattam Formation ?);featu res7 and 8 south a nd north side walls of Gallery 58 ; eature 9 western enclosurewall of fieldstones an d a lluv ial m ud , with marl ta fla ) plaster preserved at base; feature 10 crushed limestone as bed foralluvia l mu d floor. Original by Diane Kerns.

the f ronts of the galleries were carefully covered impressive whitened image compatible with thewith gypsum plaster. As noted above, at least pyramid casing.on e fragment of roofing material from C10, fea-ture 6 fig. 13, M indicates that some of the Finds Inside th e Galleriesroofs were covered with a layer of plaster. If t heentire set of galleries were plastered with gyp- Th e stratigraphy of the galleries shows a fairly

sum, it would have produced an extensive and consistent pattern. Immediately above the mud

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Fig lOa. C l C5 C1 0 entrances plans. Spot heights in meters above mean sea level. The preserved tops of the walls in C1 0were not cleared of sand. Original by Diane Kerns.

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Fig 10.b C l C5 C 1 0 entrances plan s. Spot heights in meters above mean sea level. The preserved tops of the wall s inC 1 0were not cleared of sand. Original by Diane Kerns.

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l l l l l l

0, f

50 1 4 m

Fig. 10.c C l C5 C1 0 entrances plans. Spot heights in meters above mean sea level. The preserved tops of the walls in C 10were not cleared of sand. Original by Diane Kerns.

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3 8 JARCE XXXVIII (20 01 )

floors, one often encounters thin gray culturaldeposits with alluvial mud matrices an d a paucityof artifacts. Most of this matrix probably derivesfrom the deterioration of the plaster and mudthat eroded from the walls. Near the entrances

of th e galleries we foun d thicker, ashy, alluvialmud deposits that were rich with cultural mate-rial. Above the alluvial mud features, limestonerubb le is visible in most of the stratigraphic sec-tions. As one would expect, this rubble is thick-est toward the entrances of the galleries wherethe walls of the galleries are not as well pre-served. Overlying the rubble from the collapsedwalls one invariably sees thick deposits of windblown sands (fig. 5) . These deposits often havethin bands of alluvial mud. The bands may becomposed in part of plaster that weathered fromthe walls as the galleries filled with sand. Thesand also shows thin fragile crusty surfaces, or

dry lines . In some areas it was possible to un-cover horizontal exposures of these fine, crusty,sand layers. These surfaces apparently mark ahi tus in the accumulation of wind-blown sand.Several roughly horizontal bands of limestonebits were also visible in the higher parts of thesections cut through the sand fill. Again thesemark temporary, short-term surfaces.

A very curious feature of this sand is the pres-ence of many small snail shells. These s nail shellswere ubiquitous throughout the clean sand fill.

For example, field notes from unit C3, at theback of Gallery 58, describe the retrieval of a

double hand ful [of snails], 100 plus specimensfrom the sand fill. The snail shells must indicatewetter conditions than at present across Area C,or a cycle of wetter periods, when the snailscould proliferate, and drier periods when thesnails died and their shells were trapped in theaccumulating san d. We plan to have our samplesof snail shells analyzed and to further explorethe implications of this feature of the sand fill.

After digging C1-C4, it became clear that therichest cultural deposits were near the entrancesto th e galleries, while the middle an d rear partsof the galleries contained far less material. UnitC4, behind the main N S wall ( th e western en-closure wall), produced very little cultural mate-rial (figs. 4, 8) . Th e most significant finds fromthe middle an d rear of the galleries can be sum-marized as follows. Small cop per f ragm ents were

scattered on the floors of C2, C3 (one 6-mmamorphous piece), C6 and C8. Two copperpieces from C2 were identified as nails or

pins measuring 15 x 5 mm and 20 x 30 mmrespectively. C2 also yielded a piece of feldspar,

two pieces of malachite, and a piece of potterywith slag or slag-like material attach ed. On esmall copper piece 5 mm long and a piece ofgypsum 6 mm long that appeared to be stainedby copper came from unit C6. Excavation unitC7 pro duc ed two small pieces of malachite a nd apile of several doze n large quartzite flakes mixedwith charcoal. Ten pieces of copper came fromC8 alone. They range from 2 mm to 7 mm inlengt h. A she rd in C8 was identified as a wasterfrom pottery firing, and from this unit we fou nda bead, 4 15 mm, and a stone ball, 1.4 cm indiameter. Other finds from C8 included a frag-ment of polished granite, two flint blades andtwo diorite pounders. It should be noted thaton e of the blades was on e of three sickle bladesretrieved from our excavations in Area c.Other evidence of stone working includes asandstone abra der and a worked piece of granitefrom C9.

In contrast to the remarkably empty middleand rear portions of the galleries, excavation ofdeposits near entrances yielded comparativelylarge amounts of ceramics, faunal remains, bo-tanical remains, lithic artifacts and most other

classes of artifacts.Four gallery entrances were excavated: Cl,C5, C10 (fig. 10) an d C l l , durin g the 198811989season. The latter gallery could only be exca-vated as far as its threshold before we had toconclude ou r season. Excavation unit C10 is onthe minor axis (northern galleries), while theother gallery entrances are on the main axis(western galleries). In all of the excavation unitsnear the entrances of the three galleries on themain axis we found layers of gray cultural de-posits ranging in thickness from 20 to 60 cmimmediately above the floor.

Diane Kerns, who supervised excavation unitCl, documented two patches of gray depositseparated by unencumbered floor, features 4(east) and 5 (west). Feature 4 was alluvial mud

N. Conar d, Flint Artifacts from the 198811989 Excava-tions a t Giza, MDAIK56 2000), 21-41, fig. 11 nos. 5 6 and 9.

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TH E 1 98811989 EXCAVATION AT GIZA

Fig. 11. C5 stratigraphic dr aw ing of western section of the excavation. Feature 1 sand fill with temporary surface lines;feature 2 gray ashy deposit with charcoal po ttery and other artifacts; feature 6 limestone rubble with alluvial mud andplaster collapsed from side walls of Ga llery 35 ; feature 7 alluvia l mud floor; features 8 and 9 south and north side wallsof Gallery 35. Original by Diane Kerns.

and gray ashy material (possibly ash deb ris)mixed with pottery, limestone chips, alabaster,flint, granite, charcoal and a few faunal re-mains. Th e alluvial mud flo or was gray (Mun-sell 10YR 413) an d ashy, or com posed of grayashy sedim ent with scattere d pieces of charcoaland many pieces of pottery.

In square C5 a similar gray deposit overlyingthe floor contained plaster fragments fallenfrom the gallery walls, and pottery, charcoal,diorite, quartzite, flint, and bone (fig. 11, feature2). Flotation samples (4 large bags) yielded car-bonized plant remains. The deposit was highestagainst the walls of the gallery an d slopeddown toward the ce nter of the floor. Upon fea-

ture 2, near the walls, small patches of yellowish-gray (Munsell 10 YR 814) material, p robablymarl, may mark a higher floor that was worn orero ded away in th e cen ter of the gallery. Nearthe southern patch there was a large concen-tration of wood charcoal. Small fragments ofred material-possibly pigment-lay beside th e

nor ther n patch of marl. On this spot we fou nd asmall figurine, the model of an architectonicstatue, pain ted re d a nd black (fig. 16, see below).Th e patches of marl, perhaps a secondary floor,were abou t 25 cm above the original floor of thisgallery. This stratigraphy is important for u nde r-standi ng use of the gallery, particularly becausejust here were found a number of fragments ofvery small human and animal figurines andot he r evidence of craft activity.

In C l l the gray deposit (feature 4) wasabout 40 cm thick above the floor. Once againthere were marl patches that could indicate thatthe top of this layer was a higher floor laid downafter the material of features 4 and 5 had accu-

mulate d. However, we think this is unlikely. Th emarl showed in the west section of C l l as twosuperimposed thin marl lines running from theno rth wall of the gallery (fig. 12 ). We designatedas feature 5 a more concentrated alluvial mudlayer about 10 cm thick just upo n the originalfloor of th e gallery. Diane Kerns, the supervisor,

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JARCE XXXVIII (2001)

C

Fig. 12. C l l stratigraphic drawin g of western section of the excavation. Feature 3 limestone rubble and sand fill with tem-porary surface lines; eature 4 gray ashy alluvial m ud deposit with pottery, bone, plaster and roofing ragments, statue rag-ments and other artifacts; feature 5 concentrated, dense mud, about 10 cm thick, with bone, limestone debris, roofingfragments, pottery and other artifacts; feature 6 alluv ial mud floor; features and 9 side walls of Gallery 6 a pit cut intothe norther n wall); features 10 and 11 marl taf la) lines, probably from deterioration of marl plaster from northern wallof the gallery. Original by Diane Kerns.

described fea ture 4 as very ashy, fine material,loosely packed and uniform throughout thesquar e in coarseness an d texture. Feature 4

was very rich in pottery an d faunal remains,an d yielded a great quantity of wood charcoal,an d a few pieces of marl plaster, evidently fallenfrom the gallery walls. Eight large fragments ofroofing material were uncovered in all areas ofthe square, including finds from both features4 an d 519 (fig. 13 ).

In contrast to C l l the gallery entrance ex-cavated in C10 yielded mainly lithic finds. Herewe found a thinner deposit above the floor.Noteworthy finds from C10 include two dioritepounders, a ceramic fragment with a slag-likematerial, a worked piece of alabaster, 11 cm,an d red st one pigment, two triangular flint scrap-

l It should be noted that a large intrusive hole, 2.451 10 meters penetrated the north gallery wall and part ofthe sand, rubble, an cient cultural fill and floor of the gallerywithin C l l This did not affect the provenience of the mat e-rial we now describe, but see following main text for its rele-vance to our finding of the fragments of larger statues in C l l

ers, several cores of desert flint cobbles, an d flintflakes. Several of these flakes could be refittedto the cores from which they were struck.

In the deposits above the original floors ofthe galleries, particularly in those units nearentrances, we found ample evidence that theoccupants were consuming, if n ot processing an dproducing, meat and plant food. Richard Red-ding exam ined 159 bones from Area C: 103 wereunidentifiable, 44 were from domestic cattle, 6from sheep-goat, 5 from pig, an d 1 from a canid.A large sample of the cattle are from C l l , feature4 and repres ent what could be the remains of asingle young animal. This feature alone yielded40 cattle fragments, 3 pig fragments, and 76 un-identified mammal fragments. 20

While a complete report on the faunal andfloral analysis will follow, we can s tate summarily

Richard Redding, personal communication. When Rich-ard took over th e faunal analysis in 1991, a list of prove-niences for some of the faun al samples that h e should haveinhe rite d from the 1988-89 season had been lost. Fortu-

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THE 98 8 989 EXCAVATION AT GIZ

Fig. 13. Roofing fragments from Area C galleries. Solid line i n profiles indicates surface with reed impressions, dashed lineindicates rough surface or break A through K all from C l l , eatures 4 and 5 Top row, A-C show imp ressions of wide reedor palm fron d ?) elements. Second row, D-G show impressions of bound or woven reed matting. Thi rd row, H-K showimpres sions of narro w reed elements. Diam eters of reeds indicated i n ragm ent I. M from ClO/feature 6 is gypsum withimpressions of narrow reed elements, a V-shaped bottom which may in dicate seam between cross beams, and a t hi n harder,grayish layer that may indicate top of roof. Drawings by Caroline Hebron.

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42 JARCE XXXVIII (20 01)

that 49.4% of the identifiable plant remainsfrom Area C flotation samples were chaff (barleyinternodes, em mer glume bases, emmer spikletforks, or cereal culm nodes), 8.0% were grainand 42.5% were weeds. From C l l , feature 4,alone, the results indicate 57% chaff, 4% grain,

29% wild weed seeds, 7 Trifoliacea (berseem)and 3% reeds and sedges. The high percentageof chaff contrasts with th e first ro und of samplesand analysis from Area A, which yielded only6.2% chaff, 7.2% grain, 72.4% wild weed seeds,12.3% Trifoliacea, a nd 1.7% reeds and sedgesz 1

What could the abundance of chaff in Area Cmean? Chaff results from cleaning grain. Itcan be burnt in dung fuel, which preserves itin carbonized form . Wilma Wetterstrom reports:

Chaff can be abundant in settlement sites. Itmight have been used directly as fuel or burnedin d ung fuel. Chaff ends u p in dung when it is1) added to dun g cakes as temper, an d 2) usedas fodder. 22

nately, the bags of b one from the richest intact ancient de-posits on the floors of two galleries near the en trance s, C512and C l l l 4 , were not among the group that lost a prove-nience. Unfortunately 12 out of 21 bags from Area C did losetheir provenience. The largest sample of bone material camefrom Cl114

Bone samples/rom ag Lists Redding AnalyzedSquare Feature Ba g No. Yes No

Cl 1 6Cl 4 10Cl 5 14Cl 9 18C2 2 6C2 3 17C2 10 38C3 1 6C4 1 5C5 1 3C5 2 9C6 4 12C6 5 17C8 1 4C8 5 21C8 3 25C8 6 31

C8 7 37C l l 4 6C l l 3 15Cl l 5 17

*Note: Bag and Features numbers started a new sequen cefor each square in our 1988-89 season.

2 Wilma Wetterstrom, personal communication.Wetterstrom, e-mail, October 27, 2000.

We recorded a total of 552 diagnostic sherdsfrom Area C. Crud e red ware jars (so-called beerjars, variations of Reisner's type A-IV) 23 whichseem to be the second most common type fromour Area A excavations, account for 20% ofth e total. Bread molds an d trays-generally the

most abundant type from our Area A excava-tions-account for 113 examples, abou t 20% ofthe assemblage. Th e highest percentage of AreaC sherds, 147 examples or 26.63% are from atype of carinated bowl that we have called CD7.This is generally a thicker, heavier bowl thanthe red burnished carinated bowl, the so-called

Meidum ware. CD7's are ca rina ted bowls withround bases, fabric of Nile A, Nile B, or Marl C,with a rim diam eter in th e 14 to 17, and 18-23ranges, a height of 8 to 11 centimeters, and awall thickness rang ing from 0.5 to 1 3 mm. Thisceramic form was made on a slow potter's wheel,well smoothed when the clay was wet, and thebottom was scraped before firing. A distinctivefeature is that after firing both inte rior an d exte-rior were covered with white or buff wash, per-haps of powdered limestone. A total of 113 CD7sherds came from the gray ashy layers, features 4and 5, in Cl l alone-accounting for 20% of alldiagnostic sherds (3 5% of 318 diagnostic sher dsfrom (21114-5) .24 From C l l , features 4 and 5 wealso recovered 55 sherds from bread molds orbread trays and 42 examples of ou r type, G2, ashallow bowl with an internal flange that may

have functioned as a lid for bread molds or forCD7's.In addition to the quantity of pottery and

animal bones, we were struck by the amount ofcopper from C l l , features 4-5. Excavationsretrieved eight pieces ranging from 2 mm 30mm, 2.6 mm in diameter and 8 15 mm, tosmall bits 3 mm a nd smaller (fig. 27).

This material in C5 and Cl 1 was mixed with anumber of diverse small pieces of art and craftwork that hint at something more than simplefood an d accommodations for unskilled labor.z5

3 G Reisner, History of th Giza Necropolis Vol. I1 (Cam-bridge, Massachusetts, 1955), 70, fig. 85.

24 Anna Wodzinska, personal communication.5 The relative abundance of material in C l 1 was in

spite of the fact that, between Janua ry 17 and 24, 1989 wewere unable t o finish the excavation of this unit by clearingthe gallery entran ce to the east before we had to close ourseason.

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THE 19881 1989 EXCAVATION AT GIZA

Table 1

Objects/rom C all from feature 2 except no 5

Limestone figurine of king wearing so uth crownGPMP No 49 (fig. 14)

Measuring 7.8 cm high, 2.5 cm in wide and 2 cm thick, the figure represents the king striding forth, wearingthe south crown and shendyt kilt. The eyes, eyebrows, and ears are painted black. The legs and right lower armare broken off. The left arm was sawn off or never formed. The left shoulder ends in a smooth straight cut,similar to sculptors trial pieces known from other contexts.26

Base of figurine wi th hum an feet

GPMP No 74 (fig. 15)The base measures 3 4.4 cm (where complete length preserved). The left foot is forward (length: 1.8 cm) ,and the toes of right foot, back, are preserved. Thickness of base is about 6 to 7 mm. The feet are unpainted.The base is painted black on top and edges. A n unpainted rough ridge, 2 mm high, runs between feet. Thebase was found in 6 pieces close to GPMP No. 175, but could be base for GPMP No. 149 (above) .

Model statue figurine

GPMP 75 (fig. 16)No. 175A, found in 3 pieces (fig. 16a ), represents head of king wearing the south crown, against a back pillarwith a roof projecting over top of crown. Two more pieces are from the same or similar object (figs. 16b, c) .All pieces were painted red with large black stipples. The right side of the face a nd crown was unpainted, be-cause of re-carving after painting, as evidenced by flat planes from carving and blocking out of the ea r. Theright side of crown an d ear shows more finished modeling. The face was broken or worn away and the headbroke away from the back pillar before we found it. The top of the pillar-roof has a black painted line mark-ing the back of the statue underneat h. The model statue measures 3.7 cm 3.8 cm, and 6 cm high. 175B(fig. 16b), which does not fit the othe r pieces, may be the bottom of 175A, although i t is 1 to 2 mm narrower.A narrow rectangle is painted in black o n the lower back part of 175B. 175C (fig. 16c), found in two piecesth at jo in , could also belong to the lower par t of 175A, although 175B is 4.6 cm wide, 9 mm wider than 175A.The fact that 175B and C do no t match the width of 175A may indicate that the former pieces belonged toother figurines similar to the model statue. 175A evidently represents an architectural royal statue with aback pillar and projecting roof, like the projecting of a colonnade roof into a courtyard. These pieces werefound next to re d pigment around a marl patch.

Limestone lion jigurine

GPMP 52 (fig. 17)The lion figurine is 5.3 cm long, 2 cm wide, and 3 cm high. The base is 8 mm thick. The lion is painted red;its mane is rendered in stylized relief. The paws are missing due to a break across the lower front. The breakis worn smooth on the right side.

Fragments of limestonefeline figurine: feature 10

GPMP 76 (fig. 18)The paw is painted black. The base is unpainted. The paw piece is 2.2 cm long, 1.5 crn wide and the baseis 5 mm thick. The paw alone is 9 mm wide, and 1.7 cm long. The paw includes the rear toe that indicatesthis is the left leg. The second leg piece is 2.7 cm long, 1 cm wide and the base is 6 mm thick. The legalone is 2 cm long, 7 mm wide, and 8 mm high . The leg has fou r facets, or flat planes. The third piece may

have flaked off the animal body of the figurine . It is flat, thou gh slightly saddle-shaped, 3 mm thick, and1.7 1.7 cm. It is faceted like the leg piece. Feature 10 was yellowish gray material dott ing the original mudfloor, probably marl plaster.

6 C. C. Edgar, Sculptors Studies and Unfinished Works. Cat. Gen. 31 , I (Cairo, 1906 ); G. Steind orf, Catalogue ofEgyptian Sculpturein the Walters Art Gallery (Baltimore, 1946), 7 where the au thor suggests the models were for traini ng apprentices. Tho se inthewalters-one of the most extensive and diversified collections-are all of the Late Period with unknown provenience. Seefor Old Kingdom, J. Capart, Documents pour seruir a l etude de l art @tien, I (Paris, 19 27) , PI. 2; E. D. Ross, The Art of EgyptThrough the Ages N.Y. and L ondon, 1931), 99; L. Borchardt, ASAE28 (1928) , 43-50.

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Table 1 continued

Faience tile fragment

P M P 177, fig. 21cThe piece is corruga ted, 2.1 1.6, 5 mm thick, dark gray ceramic-like layer between glaze and whiteouter layers.

Malachite fragment

PMP 162Th e fragme nt measures 3.2 0.8 cm.

Gypsum and limestone shaped piecesP MP 182 (fig. 26)

From feature 2 Diane Kerns recovered 60 shaped pieces of gypsum or limestone , ranging from very small,thin bits to fragments as large as 5.8 4.5 2.3 cm. The largest is A in figure 26, a selection of t he larger,better shaped pieces. Some of these are certainly gypsum-soft, pinkish, and porous. It was hard to tell ifothers were very hard gypsum or limestone. Many are small flakes but a number in figure 26 have finishedfaces or facets and a variety of shapes. Fig. 26,A could be from the gypsum layer of a roof (like Fig. 13,M).If so, it might have been squeezed into a corne r seam so that the smoother surface would be the top of theroof, or, possibly, the underside or ceiling. Oth ers of t he flat fragments (fig. 26B-C) could also be roofing,but most of the rest have trapezoidal, conical, or rectil inear shapes that prec lude them as roofing. Somemay have been parts of molds (e.g., fig. 26,E).

Objects from C l l

Limestone statue fragment of king in shendyt kilt: feature 1.PM P 150, (fig. 19b)

The chest, abdomen, left shoulder a nd arm, and back pillar a re preserved. The piece is 35.5 cm long, 15.5 cmthick, and 2.5 cm wide including the back pillar.

Limestone statue fragment of king in shendyt kilt: feature 1PM P 95, (fig. 19a)

Only the kilt, forward left leg, and parts of lower arms are preserved. The piece is 16 cm long. It is very friable.

Limestone statue fragments shoulder: feature 4

PM P 179, (fig. 19c)The piece is 18.5 cm high, 3.8 wide, and 3.5 cm thick. The piece includes the left shoulder and, below a

break, the lower arm. The statue may have been unfinished; t he fron t of the upper arm was left as flat plane.Below the break the lower arm seems to have a curious angle. There is a slight ridge on the chest, just at thebreak. A bridge to a divine beard seems unlikely because this is not the cente r of the chest. At the back of thelower arm 5 mm remains of a back pillar. This object was found in two pieces.

Limestone statue fragments leg: feature 4

P M P 180, (fig. 19d)The object includes a bit of the bottom of the kilt, the knee, shin and calf. Found in three pieces (includinga flake off ca lf ). Fine modeling of the knee, shin a nd calf muscles. There is a trace of the plane connec tingto the back pillar on the right side of the piece. This piece is possibly from the same statue as No. 179.

Limestone statue fragments featurePMP 151

The e ntry is for two large pieces of a small statue of soft brecciated white limestone. The only part of thefigure preserved is the shin, about 5 cm long at joi n to back pillar, and 2.5 cm at front of shin. The heavy backpillar makes up the bulk of the piece, 8.5 cm wide, 11 cm from shin to back of pillar, 13 cm total height. Legis statue's right, since that side of back pillar is preserved. A second piece of a back pillar of same quality oflimestone, probably from same statue , is 6.5 8.2 4.2 cm.

6 Limestone pendant or loom weight: feature 4

PM P 102, (fig. 20)This object measures 6.3 4.5 cm. A sign is inscribed on one side. The sign might be a crude writing of t( Asiatic ) or t wr ( port ), the name of on e of five Old Kingdom phyles into which temple service and laborwere organized. Th e reading, with the two options, is problematic.27

7 See A. Roth, Egyptian Phyles in the Old Kingdom, SAOC 48 (Ch icago, 1991), 20 30.

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Table continued

7 Polished alabaster bar: features 3- 4PMP 71a-b fig. 22a)

In cross section one corner of this piece is curved, the othe r has a right angle. It measures 17.5 5.5 6 cm.

8 Limestone bar: feature 4PMP 181 fig. 22b)

The piece is broken at both ends, roughly square in cross-section, 10.1 3.7 4 cm. A black line is paintedacross one smoothed face and, spaced 3.6 cm, there is a short red line extending from on e edge. The exca-vator include d about 20 oth er limestone fragments and 2 of gypsum with 181. Two of the limestone pieceshave finished corne rs reminiscent of the shap ed limestone and gypsum pieces from C512 see above, C5no. 8). On e of these is illusmated in fig. 22c.

9 . Sandstone abraide r or polishing stone: feature 3

PMP 99Oval with o ne flat face, 7.2 4 cm.

10 . Faience ti1e piece: feature 4PMP 90 fig. 21a)

The glazed surface has a black spot. Th e piece measures 4.2 3.5 cm, 4 mm thick

11 . Faience piece7 feature 4PMP 96 fig. 21b)

This small piece measures 2.5 2.0 cm

12 . Sherd with incised crossed lines7 eature 2

PMP 167 fig. 25a)

13 . Faience tubular bead7 eature 4PMP 164

Length: mm

14 . Faience disk bead: feature 4PMP I fig. 25b)

Diameter 10 mm, 3 mm thick

15 . Two faience tubular beads, feature 4

PMP 141 fig. 25b)3 mm diameter 8 mm length and 3 mm length

16 . Copper needle, feature 4PMP 24 fig. 27)

3 cm long, 2 mm dia meter

17. Copperflagmen& of small, thin7 lat piece7 feature 4PMP 27 fig. 27)

18. Stone jar stopper, feature 5

PMP 976.8 x 3.8 cm

19. Stone bow lflacp ent7eature 4

PMP 872.6 x 2.5 cm

20 . Ceramic wasters7 eatures 3? 5PMP 91 126

Erom pottery sorting in storeroom

21 . Painted sherds, feature 4PMP 124 one), 129 three)

Erom pottery sorting in storeroom

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JARCE XXXVIII 200 1)

Fig 14. Ro yal pri ne from C5, feature2 photographs and drawings (GPM P 149 ):a. righ t side; b. fro nt; c. left side; d. back

a

0 5 m

GPMP 7 LC5 2

Fig 15. Base o f j p r i n e rom C5, feature 2 (GPMF 174):a. drawing scale 1: l; b. photograph, scale 2 1 ,

Functional Interpretationof the Galleries

On e major problem in interpreting the findsfrom Area C is determining which material cor-responds to the primary use of t he galleries. Thefact that we found the middle and back partsof the galleries to be practically empty suggeststhat the contents of the galleries were clearedprior to the abandonment of the structure, ortha t they were never fully used. If th e gallerieswere emptied it is possible that wood from theroofing was also removed. We found roofingfragments and plaster fragments from the sidewalls intermingled with the pottery, animalbone, plant remains, and craft objects in theintact ancient deposits near the entrances oftwo galleries in squares C5 a nd C l l . I n C l l , th eroofing fragments originated from both feature4, the intact ancient deposit, and feature 5, the

more concentrated mud deposit on the floorfig. 12 ). We must co nclud e th at these features

were deposited, along with the artifacts andother materials they contained, as, or after, theroof was deconstructed and the walls had par-tially deteriorated. One must therefore be cau-tious in assuming that the finds on the floors

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THE 19881 1989 EXCAVATION AT GIZA

PMP I7c 5 2

b.s i d e O l

o t t o m

Fig 16 Three pieces of one or more model s ta t u e j p n h e s ): a. front, sides, top and back photo) of head piece; b. back, bottom,an d side views of base; c. wider base or back piece, bottom and side view draw ing).

of the galleries correspond directly to the prin-ciple activities that took place he re during theirmain perio d of use. good deal of diverse mate-rial could have been piled up ne ar the e ntrancesas the roofs were dismantled and the galleriesvacated. This cau tion bein g state d, we must stillrely to some extent on the concrete finds fromthe galleries in putting forward interpretationsof Petrie's Workmen's Barracks.

In support of Petrie's hypothesis, the intactancient deposits in our units near th e entrances

do have a settlement quality to them. The ashycomponent suggests there were hearths nearby,an d they contain carbonized plant remains, ani-mal bones and pottery. C l l feature 4 containedpig bone-a small amo unt, bu t pig might beexpected in the context of a small settlement.Th e flint artifacts include three sickle blades, a

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JARCE XXXVIII (2001)

2 crn

Fig. 17 Lion gu~ne rom C5 feature 2, scale 1 : l GPMP 152).

form characteristic of settlement contexts (seenote 16 ). In t he floral samples, the high pro-portion chaff could suggest a village if we hadanalyzed the sample ignoring the obvious pre-planned, state-like character of the Area Cgalleries. The re is in the samples of plant mate-rial from Area C evidence of tamarisk wood

Tamerix sp. , probably used as fuel. This is con-sidered a cheaper fuel than Acacia, commonly

found on village sites.Acacia

is also amply at-tested in the samples from Area A (Rainer andGerisch personal communication). While thechaff could be the result of du ng fuel, the wastesfrom all stages of ce real processing cou ld havebeen bu rnt as fuel. Chaff might be expected in agrain storage facility. In this co ntext the resem-blance of th e galleries to New Kingdom templestorage facilities might be noted, as is discussedbelow. However, where burnt storage facilitieshave been found at Abydos, for example, thereis almost n o chaff a t all.28

As for the pottery, the high number of bread

molds an d trays in C l l , features 4 and 5, alsolend the impression of food production o r con-sumption, giving the deposit a domestic cast.Th e high percen tage of a particular type of bowl,

Mary Anne Murray, person al communication (2000).

our type CD7, on the other hand, suggests arather specialized function. So does the overallpattern of the galleries which, the settlement-like material notwithstanding, is about as unlikea village as one might imagine. The eleven ex-cavation units produced no obvious hearths, in-ternal walls, or other installations (ovens, potstands, etc.) that one would expect from domi-ciles, even those of a barracks character.

It is reasonable to ask what other ancientEgyptian buildings resemble this great set ofgalleries; to comp are form an d what we know offunction while being cautious of possible multi-ple uses, and changes over the coursc of cen-turies. The Area C galleries resemble, at leastsuperficially, galleries identified as granariesarou nd New Kingdom temples, o r at the %rig'sHouse at Amarna. Kemp pointed out, citingtomb scenes, that these long comb-like corridorscould have stored a wide variety of commodi-ties.29 Th e galleries with staircases are t hou gh tto be granaries because the stairs would have

allowed the compartments to be filled throughroof apertures.30 Kemp stated it is likely tha t inany [New Kingdom] large magazine block most

29 B J Kemp, Ancient Egypt, Anatomy o a Civilization(London, 1989), 191-95, fig. 69.

3 Kemp, Ancient Egypt, 192, fig. 68.

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TH E 1988119 89 EXCAVATION AT GIZA

of the capacity was used to store cereal grain, asa t th e R a m e s s e ~ m . ~ ~ n architectural grounds,one might feel most comfortable interpreting thegalleries a t Giza as an e nor mo us storage facility.As in the case of the New Kingdom storage gal-

leries, it would seem that the most likely com-modity that required a total length of roughly2.5 km of galleries with an interior volume ofabout (3 m x 3 m x 25 m x 100 galleries) 22,500m3 would be cereal grain . Unlike t he New King-dom grain storage magazines, excavation hasyielded no evidence for stairways in the area Cgalleries. However, we wonde r if th e very emptyan d clean condition of the back ends is becausethis was dark, dead storage space, left cleanwhen the commodities were removed. In con-trast, those on guard and craft duty may haveleft their trash just inside the entrances, which

provided light and shelter. Again, one couldconsider whether the high proportion of chaffin the plant remains might be due to grain stor-age. Grain (emm er and barley) stored while stillin spikelet has the advantage of greater protec-tion from moisture. Artistic evidence indicatesthat, after winnowing and sieving, the cerealswere recorded by scribes and put directly intostorage, evidently still in spikelet form, since nofurther processing, such as the pounding stage,is associated with this sequence. 32

In addition to grain storage, the ancient

Egyptians of the New Kingdom organized otherfunctions in long rows of narrow modular units.In g round plan th e Area C enclosure and galler-ies resemble superficially the Dynasty 18 Tem-ple Magazines sout h of th e Great Temple of theAten at Amarna, in that both layouts includecomb-like modular units an d broad o pen spaceswithin rectangular enclosures. The Amarna tem-ple magazines, however, are groupe d in three setsof galleries-two long an d one shorter, altogethermeasuring abou t 187 80 m.33 Th e modular unitsare shorter than the Area galleries, an d severalof those t hat were excavated had in tern al fea-

tures incl uding ovens, bins, an d stairways. On t he

Kemp, Ancient Egypt 194, fig. 69.3 M A. Murray, Cereal Produ ction and Processing, in

P. T. Nicholson and I. Shaw (eds.), Ancient Egyptian Materiakand Technoloa (Cambridge, 2000), 527-28.

33 J. D S. Pendlehury, The CiQ of Akhe naten Part 4 Vol. 2:plates (London, 1951), PI. XII.

P M P 7 6C5 2

Fig. 18. Fr ap en ts of l ion j iguene from C5 feature 2G P M 1 76 .

basis of huge quantities of bread molds in thevicinity, in particular in a large dump outsidean d to the east of th e complex, Kemp identifiedthe Temple Magazines as the temple bakeries.34He compares the compartments on the groundwith depictions of compartmentalized baking inrelief carved blocks.35 Thes e de pictions suggestvaulted roofs for the magazines. Kemp calls thebakeries a rare example of large-scale factoryproduction though characteristically arranged inthe form of repeated cellular units.

It is worth noting that while the bread p roduc-tion function of the Am arna temple magazines

34 B J Kemp, Preliminary Report o n the El-'AmarnaSurvey 19 78 , m 65 (19791, 7-12.

35 B J Kemp, Ancient Egypt Anatomy of a Civilization(Lon-don , 1989) , 289-91, fig. 96.

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JARCE XXXVIII 2001)

GPMP 95

C1111

doe

FRONT SI E

~ -

PMP 179 GPMP 18

C1114 C1114

Fig. 19. Royal statue fragments: a. front of midd le part of small statue GPM P 95 );b. large statue fragment, front and sideviews GPM P 15 0) ; c. shoulder and arm piece GP MP 1759, front an d side; d. Leg piece, GPM P 18 0) ront and side.

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THE 198811989 EXCAVATION AT GIZA

crn

Fig 20 Pendant loom weight?) GPMP 102 .

is indisputable, craft activities, similar to thosesuggested by ou r evidence f or Area C, may havealso been carried o ut in this complex. While fail-ing to recognize the evidence for bread produc-tion, Pendlebury noted a list of small objectsfrom the magazines an d from the approach onthe west. His list includes fragm ents of faience in-

lay, a faience fish, a sculptors trial piece of aclenched hand, bronze nails, a lid and roundelof alaba ster, a faien ce figurine, the lower faceof a sandstone statue, a bronze dish an d rings,a stone mould for metal amulets, and an in-scribed ston e weight.36 To th e e xte nt th at theseitems reflect the use of this installation, or theuse of the magazines, they suggest a variety ofcraft work activities in addit ion to baking.

Although the Area C galleries seem to havebeen largely emptied, the materials we foundoverwhelmingly suggest craft activity of a kindand quality no t expected for barracks that

36 J. D S. Pendlebury, The City o Akhenaten, Part 111 Vol. :Text (London, 1951), 31. Fairman thought the hieratic dock-ets naming the store house, n c K3 n nh Rc referred to thetemple magazines directly south of the Great temple of theAten because this was the only institutional name on docketsfrom the area. H. W Fairman, The City o Akhenaten, Part 111(London, l 95 l) , 211.

sheltered unskilled labor. Petrie already foundthis kind of evidence in the form of many frag-ments of early statues in diorite, alabaster, andquartzite. 37 Th e figurines an d oth er items likethe curious shaped limestone and gypsum ob-jects (fig. 26 suggest that sculpture and fine artwere conceptualized and experimented with in

this place. To reify, to first render a concept ormotif in material, may be the very purpose of th efigurines as a genre, which are paradoxically sodiminutive compared to the immensity of thegalleries in which they were found. The tinymode l of an arch itectu ral statue (fig. 16) must bea conceptual piece in which a back pillar andprojecting colonnade roof are being worked ou tin com bination with the king wearing the southcrown. Certainly the actual sculpture being con-ceived would have been finished in its templelocation. However, the large pieces (fig. 19) sug-gest tha t large r sculpture-still much less tha nlife size-and ot he r crafted prod ucts wereworked within the Area galleries enclo sure. Wealso foun d a granite artifact 41 cm tall, 1 7 cmwide and 14 cm thick on th e surface in the no rth -east corner of the galleries enclosure (fig. 24).

Petrie, Pyramids and Temples o Gizeh, 31, 102-3.

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JARCE XXXVIII 200 1)

GPMP 9C1114

GPMP 9C1114

GPMP 77C5 2

G P M P 1 7 7C 5 2

Fig. 21. Faience pieces 1 : l ) : a. GPMP 90 from C l l , eature 4; b. GPMP 96 from C l l , eature 4; c. GPMP 1 7 7 rom C5,feature 2

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TH E 988 989 EXCAVATION AT GIZA

b l a c k l i n e r e d l i n e

GPMP 8C 11 4

PMP 7C1113 4

Fig. 22. Alabaster and limeston e bars: a. Alabaster bar from C l l eatures 3 4 photo; b. GPM P 71 ; c. Lime-stone bar GPMP 181 from C l l eature 4 with black a nd red painted lines; c. shaped limesto ne piece.

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JARCE XXXVIII 2001)

Fig 23. Ha mm er stones: a dolerite poun der from C5,feature 2 GPM P 79), strike end shows traces o white, 8.2 x 7.9 crn; b. dol-eritepounder rom C l , eature 5 GPMP 47) ; c. end ofpolished diorite hammer GP MP81) rom C8 eature 3 11.4 x 11.6 cm.

This piece might be an unfinished offering Given the relative emptiness of the galleriesstand. It must be an example of the granite in most of our excavation units, we would notblocks of pillowy form tha t Petrie ment ions immediately suggest tha t oth er kinds of materi-findin g in th e area of t he galleries.38

38 Unaccountable blocks of granite were often found, show any wear, an d so could hardly be corn rubbers; an d yetlying loose in the sand; they are smoothed all over, about 3 0 they were too smooth and not flat enough to be intendedlbs. weight, with ro und ed faces an d slight edges. They never for a building. Petrie, Pyramids and Temples of Gizeh 103

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THE 198811989 EXCAVATION AT GIZA 5 5

GPMP 14surface

Fig. 24. Granite object, unfinishe d offering stan d? GPM P14 , rom surface i n northeast corner of Area C galleries. 14~ 1 7 x 4 1 m.

crnI

Fig 25. a. Sherd with incised cross lines from C l l , eature 2 GPMP 167 ; b. Beads: left, tubular bead from C l l , eature4 GPMP 141 ; right, disk bead from C l l , eature 4 GPMP 111 .

als were being processed or produced in thiscomplex. However, the number of copper bitsrecovered here and there close to, or embed-ded i n, floors leads us to ask if copper objectswere produced in, or in front of, the galleries.Other small bits of material also direct our at-tention to the question of copper productionor processing in this gallery complex. These in-

clude the pieces of malachite-a cop per or emineral-that were fou nd in C7 in C2, feature

(along with a bit of f elds par ), an d in C5 fea-ture 2. In C10 excavators fou nd a potte ry sherdwith slag adh erin g to it an d identifie d twopottery sherds as wasters from Cl l , featuresan d 5, an d ano ther waster from C8, feature 2.Thus on e could ask whether po ttery an d faience

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JARCE XXXVIII

PMP 82 ~ 5 1 . 75 m

Fig. 26. Hard gypsu m a nd limestone objects from C5, feature 2: A-D are definitely gypsu m, possibly roofing ragments seefig 13M) .E through N are very hard gypsum or limestone.

objects, such as the tiles (fig. 21) were also pro-duced i n ~ r e a .

It seems unlikely that wasters or sherds withslag would be introduce d in to the galleries if

the activity that usually produced such itemsdid not take place nearby. But we lack othertangible evidence of cop per work like cruci-bles, tuybes moulds, waste, slag, and oth er metalworking tools such as that fou nd on o the r siteswhere copper work has been a~ cer tai ned .~ ' tis possible that copper work was carried out inthe galleries with portable tools like clay cruci-bles, and blowpipes40 that were removed whenthe galleries were abandoned. Evidence from

39 J Ogden, Metals, in P. T. Nicholson and I. Shaw(eds.), Ancien t Egyptian Materials and Technology (Cambridge,2000), 155.

4 Ogden, Metals, 151.

Abydos indicates that early faience productioncould have left nothing more sophisticated thansimple bowl-shaped pits, in one case lined withfire-re dden ed mud bricks.41 Again it is possibletha t ou r excavation units simply missed this kindof evidence, and th at we missed the kind of mor epermanently built features or large ash-filledpits a nd trenches such as we foun d in the Area Agalleries in 1998 associated with roasting andcop per work.42 Th ere the back of the gallerieswere probably unroofed. In tight spaces whereproduction involved burning and roasting, thefloors are covered in ash and charcoal. One

4 P. T. Nicho lson, Egyp tian Faience, in P. T. Nicholsonand I. Shaw (eds.), Ancient Egyptian Materials and Technology(Cambridge, 2000), 180-81.

4 M Lehner, Giza, The Oriental Institute 1998-1999AnnualReport 70-71, fig. 5 .

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TH E 198 811 989 EXCAVATION AT GIZA

G P M P 1 9

C 1 3 b

G P M P 2 0

C 2 8

G P M P 2 L

C l l L

G P M P 2 7

C 1 1 L

Fig 2 7. Selection of copper pieces from Area C galleries. GPMP 1 9 rom C l , eature 3b; GP MP 20 rom C2, fea-ture 8 allu via l mud floor i n front of entrance to Gallery 68 . GPMP 24 and 27 from C 11 feature 4. GPMP27 is a selection from 2 1 small pieces, most of which appear to be very small bits broken from a th in flat strip.Scale 1:1

could imagine that such activity took place inthe 80-meter-broad area along the eastern partof t he rectangular enclos ure in which the Area Cgalleries are located. Without the protection ofthe densely spaced gallery walls, smaller struc-tures and loose material could have simply beeneroded away in the years after the gallery com-plex west of th e Khafre Pyramid was aba ndo ned .

The wide distribution of c opper bits through-out our excavation units is noticeable. We foundcoppe r in un it C3, a back e nd of a gallery, in C2,C6, and C8, toward the middle of galleries, andin Cl 1, near the entrance of a gallery (fig. 3). Ifnot manufactured here, one could still ask ifcoppe r, including tools, might have been storedwithin th e galleries.

More excavation and analysis of the copperan d oth er materials such as the wasters and

slag are needed to ascertain th e range of ac-tivities carried out in the Area C gallery com-plex. So far, the evidence certainly points awayfrom a simple barracks-like she lter for unskilled

rial remains from within the galleries, one mustnote the conspicuous presence of evidence forcraft activities and particularly stone working atArea C. Models and dep ictions of Old, Middleand New Kingdom workshops of various kindsindicate th at craft work and oth er kinds of pro-duction were con ducted inside highly compart-mentalized structures which were ope n at least inpart to sunlight.43 Sliwa noted that for woodwork-ing the workshop-or place set aside for crafts-men-had an adjoin ing store for raw materials(beams, boards, a nd wooden sticks for furthe r

4 H. Junker, Die gesellschaftliche Stellung der igyptischenKiinstler im Alten Retch, ~stmeichische Akademie der Wissen-schaften, Phii-Hist. Klasse. Sitzungsberichte 233 Band 1 (Vienna,1959), 35-36, fig ; J. E Quibell, Excavations at Saqqara(1906-1907) (Cairo, 190 8), PI. 17:4 fo r workshop in tom bof Karenen; J. H. Breasted, Egyptian Servant Statues (NewYork, 1948), 50; H. E Winlock, Models of Daily Life in AncientEgypt (Cambr idge, Massachusetts, 1955), pis. 28, 29, 68;N. Davies, The Tomb of Neferhotep at Thebes (New York, 192 3,pi. 11; N. Davies, The Tombs ofMenkhepmasonb, Amenmose, andAnother (London, 1933)) , pi. 11; N Davies, The Tomb of Two

workmen. If one looks primarily to the mate- Sculptors at Thebes ( ~ e w o r k , 925), pi. 11.

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58 JARCE XXXVIII (200 1)

treatment and production); this separate roommust have also served as a store for completeproducts. 44 Area C conforms to this pattern in-sofar as the large area in front of the galleriesmight have provided an outdoor working spacefor the craft people who must have manufac-tured statues and oth er goods to meet the needsof th e royal necropolis. If the are a in front of thegalleries served as a work place for skilled arti-sans, the galleries may have been used in part tostore the goods manufactured here. Additionalgoods or food stuffs may also have been storedin Area C. We could thus see the Area C en-closure as a typical ancient Egyptian workshopenlarged an order of magnitude and then re-peated a hun dred fold inside the 450 80 meterenclosure.

The problem here is that our sample exca-vation units suggest that most of the galleries

were emptied thoroughly, or else were neverused before the structure was left to collapseand eventually fill with drifting sand. This housecleaning may make a definitive answer to thisquestion impossible, although further excava-tion may indeed shed more light on the ques-tion of function.

Finally, we must consider the possibility thatth e role of t he galleries was not entirely utilitar-ian. The position of the structure in a promi-nent spot in the Giza necropolis suggests thatthe design of the galleries might not have beeninspired by strictly practical considerations. This

possibility forks in two directions. On the onehand the immense design, laid down accordingto a preconce ived scheme by state or royalhouse planners, may never have bee n very prac-tical for those who carried out whatever activityactually took place within its boundaries. In thiscase the galleries may not have been fully use-able or used beyond craftsmen ensconced justinside the entrances of some of th e units, whileleaving the long corridors behind them largelyempty. On the other hand the Area C galleriesmay have been a huge symbolic provisionaryfacility, as much for the king's afterlife as forservicing the royal structu res of this world. If thiswas the motivation for creating this vast com-

J. Sliwa, Studies in Ancient Egyptian Handicraft: Woodwork-in (Warsaw, l975), 43.

plex-perhaps no t entirely divorced from thefirst considera tion of impracticality-the Area Cgalleries would be similar in function to theequally immense s ubte rrane an system of maga-zines west of the Djoser Step Pyramid complex.45

DatePetrie cites three reasons for dating t he galler-

ies no later than the reign of Khafre; 1 thegalleries are a rrang ed square to the Second Pyra-mid; 2 the placement of the galleries would beou t of th e way for later work on th e plateau; 3)the walls are of t he same style as the oth er largefieldstone an d clay walls (Petrie's peribolu swalls ) west an d nor th of the Khafre pyramid.46

The galleries are arrayed west of the KhafrePyramid square with the terrace on which it isfoun ded a nd with th e base of the pyramid itself.

They are a neat western ex tension of t he enclo -sure for me d by the secondary peribolus wallsof field stones on the west and south, and theunfinished wall of large limestone blocks on thenorth. This pattern gives us the strong impres-sion that the galleries belong to the scheme ofthe Khafre Pyramid complex.

Th e relationship of the enclosure containingthe galleries with the Menkaure complex is un-clear. It would be useful to clear the corner be-tween the western enc losu re wall of th e galleriesan d the nor the rn fieldstone peribolus wall ofthe Thi rd Pyramid, if it has not been obliterated

by the modern asphalt road and the gravel tour-ist road leadin g to the fron t of the Th ird Pyra-mid (fig. 3) . In Petrie's day the spot must havebeen less disturbed. His map shows the longrectangula r enclosure of the galleries closed onthe sou th en d by the n ort h fieldstone wall of th eM e n k a u r e e n c l o ~ u r e . ~ ~ lthough it forms thesouthern side of the enclosure aroun d the AreaC galleries, Petrie noted more than once that

5 J. P. Lauer, La Pyramide Degris (Cairo, 1939), 39,pi. 22 central corridor and two parallel corridors extendover 365 meters north to south and connect 400 roomsarranged like teeth on a comb. In the north side, west end,of the Djoser enclo sure, below dummy granaries, a set ofmagazines, 68 meters long, were found to co ntain figs, Juni-per berries, an d long loaves of bread; Lauer, La PyramideDegris I (Cairo, 1936), 184-85.

6 Petrie, Pyramids and Temples of Gizeh 102.7 Petrie, Pyramids and Temples of Gizeh pis. 4-5.

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TH E 198 811 989 EXCAVATION AT GIZA 59

this wall was probably bui lt as par t of th e sec-ondary enclosure ( peribolus ) of the MenkaurePyramid. Toward the east, this northern wall ofMenkaure's secondary enclo sure joins what Pet-rie saw as the e arlier so uth ern wall of th e Khafresecondary enclosure. Since the two walls are n otquite aligned, they were joi ned by an elbow.48The importance of this for dating the use of th egalleries is that if the s out her n wall of the e n-closure aro und th e Area C galleries was built (o rrebuilt, replacing an earlier wall) in the reign ofMenkaure, the galleries would have been acces-sible from the south during the building of theThird Pyramid. Petrie, furthermore, noted thatthe west side of the Third Pyramid is nearlyaligned with the western enclosure wall of thegalleries and that the north peribolus wall ofthe Third Pyramid (which is the south wall of

the enclosure around the galleries), divides thespace between the Third Pyramid and the lastof the galleries on the south in half. It thusseems likely that the galleries were accessibledurin g the reign of M enkaure, an d that his pyra-mid was positioned in a meaningful, measured,relationship to them.49

On th e other hand , the small model of anarchitectural statue (fig. 16) from excavationunit C5, feature 2 provides the impression thatthe galleries an d their con tents date to the reignof Khafre. The little piece depicts a royal statuein granite against a granite back pillar toppedby a projecting roof that would have to havebeen from a colonnade around an open court.According to reconstructions of the finishedform of the Giza pyramid temples allowed byevidence o n the ground, there were no granitecourt statues with back pillars in the mortuarytemples of Khufu a nd ~ e n k a u r e . ~ ~ nly the Mor-

8 Petrie, Pyramids and Temples of Gizeh,101, 114.9 According to Petrie's map, once the secondary field-

stone walls were built on the nor th a nd west of t he Men-kaure Pyramid, an opening was left to the west by the factthat th e western enclosure wall of the galleries did no t touchthe no rthe rn peribolus wall of the Menkaure Pyramid.There is another op ening into the empty rectangular enclo-sure west of the Menkaure Pyramid, so that on e could haveexited the Area C galleries at the southw est cor ner of theenclosure by turning west, then entered the Menkaure west-ern enclosure by turni ng south.

5 J P Lauer, Le temple funeraire de Khkops i la grandepyramide de Guizeh, Anna les d u Service des Ant iqui tis de l@gypte

tuary Temple of Khafre an d the Sphinx Temple,which was probably also built for Khafre, had ex-actly this configuration w ith royal grani te statuesaround an open court, just in fron t of pillars,and un der the projecting roof of a colonnade.However, the most recent reconstruction of thesetemples would have seated statues of the kingwearing the n m s headdress, rather than strid-ing granite statues of the king wearing the southcrown,51 which is what our craftsman from Area Cseems to have had in mind.

Conclusio