Sennefer (Deir el-Medineh)

Sennefer was an Ancient Egyptian official with the title Servant in the Place of Truth at the end of the 18th Dynasty. He is mainly known due to his unlooted burial found in 1928 by excavations under Bernard Bruyère at Deir el-Medina.[1] The burial chamber of Sennefer was found within the tomb of the servant at the place of truth Hormes (tomb no. 1159a). The small chamber contained the inscribed coffins of Sennefer[2] and his wife Nefertiti. Both were found wrapped in linen. Sennefer was also adorned with a mummy mask. He had a heart scarab and was adorned with a pectoral.[3] On his coffin was placed a painted piece of cloth, showing Sennefer before an offering table.[4] Furthermore, the burial contained different types of furniture, including a bed, a box, a head rest and several pottery as well as stone vessels. The burial of a child in an undecorated box was found, too.[5] Two shabti figures are datable by style to the end of the 18th Dynasty.[6]

Sarcophagus of Nefertiti

Life
T22 n nfrf
r
and
nfrM18it
D54
[7]
Sennefer and Nefertiti
in hieroglyphs
Era: New Kingdom
(1550–1069 BC)

Little is known about Sennefer. He was titled servant in the Place of Truth which indicates that he worked on the cutting and decorating of royal tombs in the Valley of the Kings. He lived during the late 18th Dynasty; his burial is usually assigned to the reign of Tutankhamun based on the style of his coffins and funerary goods.[8] Analysis of his skeletonised mummy indicates he was about 162–168 centimetres (5 ft 4 in – 5 ft 6 in) tall and died between 35 and 45 years of age. He had healed fractures to his wrist and a rib and a dent across the top of his head from an old injury, and many of his vertebrae have signs of osteoarthritis. His right arm is 1 centimetre (0.39 in) longer than his left.[9]

Sennefer was buried with a woman named Nefertiti (also transcribed Neferiyt[7]) who is thought to be his wife. Examination of her body estimated she died between the ages of 18 and 20. The infant interred with them is assumed to be their child; the baby died at approximately 9 months old.[10]

Tomb

The intact tomb of Sennefer was discovered 1928 in excavations conducted by the Institut Français d'Archéologie Orientale (IFAO) and led by the French Egyptologist Bernard Bruyère. It is located in Deir el-Medina's western cemetery, inside the tomb of Harmose (TT1159).[11] The entrance to Sennefer's burial chamber, numbered TT1159A, is cut into the floor against the western wall of Harmose's burial chamber. It consists of a descending staircase 1.70 metres (5.6 ft) deep that leads to an arched doorway 1.25 metres (4.1 ft) tall that opens to the west onto a roughly-cut rock chamber 1.9 metres (6.2 ft) high. The single room is almost square, with the walls measuring between 2.35 metres (7.7 ft) and 3 metres (9.8 ft) long.[12]

Sennefer's tomb was discovered on 1 February 1928 by workmen supervised by George Nagel. They were clearing the second (southernmost) of two shafts sunk into the floor of Harmose's burial chamber; the first (northern) shaft was found to be unfinished, comprising only of a shaft measuring 1.25 metres (4.1 ft) deep, and a partially cut doorway. As the door at the base of the southern shaft was uncovered, it was found to be entirely blocked with stacked bricks. The reis (foreman) Hassan Khalifa and his deputy Taher Hassane partly dismantled the blocking and reported to Nagel that they had found an undisturbed burial chamber. The opening was then enlarged and Nagel quickly recorded the contents before the blocking was resealed and the shaft refilled to await an official opening; the tomb was guarded by the reis and 5 of his men. The tomb was officially opened on the morning of 7 February 1928 in the presence of Egyptologists including Pierre Lacau, director of the Antiquites Service and members of the IFAO teams. After confirming that the tomb had not been disturbed since its initial discovery, those present entered and viewed the burial chamber. The contents were then photographed, planned, and recorded before being transported to TT217 for storage; that afternoon the contents were inventoried and the mummy of Sennefer was unwrapped.[13]

References
  1. Bernard Bruyère, Rapport sur les fouilles de Deir El Médineh (1928), Cairo 1929, p. 42. online
  2. The coffin of Sennefer is today in the Louvre E 14026, compareː Lisa Sartini: The black coffins with yellow decoration: a typological and chronological study, in Egitto e Vicino Oriente, XXXVIII (2015), p. 63, no. 33
  3. Bruyère, Rapport sur les fouilles de Deir El Médineh (1928), 58-60, pls. V, VII.
  4. Bruyère, Rapport sur les fouilles de Deir El Médineh (1928), 47-48, pl. III.
  5. Bruyère, Rapport sur les fouilles de Deir El Médineh (1928), pl. X
  6. Bruyère, Rapport sur les fouilles de Deir El Médineh (1928), 69-71, pls. IX-XII.
  7. Porter & Moss 1964, p. 687.
  8. Tomsová & Schierová 2016, pp. 52–53.
  9. Tomsová & Schierová 2016, pp. 55–56.
  10. Tomsová & Schierová 2016, pp. 57–59.
  11. Tomsová & Schierová 2016, p. 52.
  12. Bruyère 1929, p. 40.
  13. Bruyère 1929, pp. 40–42.

Bibliography
  • Bruyère, Bernard (1929). "Rapport sur les fouilles de Deir El Médineh (1928)". Fouilles de l'Institut français d'archéologie orientale du Caire. Institut Français d'Archéologie Orientale. 6. Retrieved 20 September 2023.
  • Porter, Bertha; Moss, Rosalind L. B. (1964). Topographical Bibliography of Ancient Egyptian Hieroglyphic Texts, Reliefs, and Paintings I: The Theban Necropolis; Part 2. Royal Tombs and Smaller Cemeteries (PDF) (Second ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. 685–688. Retrieved 27 September 2023.
  • Tomsová, Julie; Schierová, Zuzana (2016). "Skeletal Material From Deir El-Medina in The Egyptological Collection of the Hrdlička Museum Of Man in Prague". Annals of The Náprstek Museum. 37 (1): 51–59.
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