Travel Guide Valley Of Kings

It can now only be reached by road. The view from up here is exceptional. The valley served as a royal necropolis from the beginning of the 18th dynasty (the first pharaoh to be buried here was Thutmes I) until the end of the 20th dynasty.The Valley of the Kings is the latest evolution of royal tomb styles in ancient Egypt, some one thousand years after the pyramids. Its name in hieroglyphs means "great and majestic necropolis of the millions of years of the pharaohs". Over four centuries of hard work, workers from all walks of life hauled, cleared, dug and polished thousands of tonnes of stone and rubble, with the sole aim of providing the kings with a burial place befitting their power. The sheer scale of the task - especially given the technical resources available at the time (tools, lighting) and the working conditions (heat, dust) - is beyond our comprehension. The discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb by Howard Carter in 1922 allowed the world to marvel at the funerary furnishings. Originally, every royal tomb was equipped with one.The characteristic feature of the Theban royal tomb, compared to its Memphite counterpart, remains the radical separation of the tomb and its chapel. What's more, all you'll find here are endless rituals in hieroglyphic script, scenes involving demons and obscure characters from funerary mythology.The structure of the tomb remains the same overall, with the exception of those of the first "generation" (Thutmes I, Thutmes III...), with almost right-angles, the desired shape being a straight line. Once through the doorway, a generally steep staircase leads down three successive corridors, some lined with niches, to one or more rooms, the last of which houses the sarcophagus. A well designed to trap would-be looters sometimes separates the corridors from the rooms.The texts, engraved or painted, grouped together under the title Book of the Dead, are supposed to provide the deceased with the keys to the afterlife. Some of these incantations, such as the litanies of the sun, allow the king to identify with Ra, thanks to their detailed description, and provide him with descriptions of the world of the dead(Book of the Gates). In addition to funerary texts, the rooms housing the sarcophagus usually feature representations of the deceased in the company of Osiris or other gods, as well as astronomical scenes on the ceilings.Of the sixty-two tombs in the necropolis, only around ten are of real interest. Take your pick, but beware of the unexpected closures that often occur.