From fragment to scene: The reliefs from the funerary complex of Mentuhotep II

This article is from Ancient Egypt issue 145

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Nebhepetra Mentuhotep II (c.2055-2004 BC) was the founder of the Middle Kingdom, ruling from Thebes during the Eleventh Dynasty. His innovative funerary complex was the first to be built at Deir el-Bahri, and was the model for the later temples of Thutmose III and Hatshepsut. Sadly, as Geoffrey Lenox-Smith accurately pointed out in AE 136, Mentuhotep’s complex nowadays lies almost unnoticed. Nevertheless, this monument deserves attention, not least because its walls were once beautifully decorated with scenes carved in relief. Unfortunately, only fragments from these decorated walls are currently preserved. It is these fragments that form the dataset of my ongoing PhD research at Johns Hopkins University in the United States. I am using these pieces to study this king’s important artistic, political, societal, and religious innovations, all of which would become part of the ancient Egyptian canon for the next 2,000 years.

The temple complex

Mentuhotep’s complex can be divided architecturally into several parts, and seems to have undergone about four major phases of construction. One would have first entered a large courtyard, stretching out in front of the main building, which featured a garden with trees and seated statues of the king. This main building was on a platform and comprised multiple pillared halls, with two of them surrounding a solid square structure. The shape and function of this has not yet been conclusively explained. Several opinions have been put forward in the past 120 years, reconstructing it as either a pyramid or a mastaba. Other scholars, however, have argued that it perhaps featured a solar altar, flanked by either one or two obelisks, or even an earthen mound representing the mythological primeval mound.

The western part of the complex consisted of a court containing the shafts to the supposed royal tomb of Mentuhotep II, and to the tombs of a number of Hathor priestesses who lived during his reign. Last, another hall, featuring octagonal columns, contained a sanctuary seemingly dedicated to both the king Mentuhotep and the god Amun.

The excavations

The first known excavations of Mentuhotep’s complex were conducted by British diplomat Frederick Hamilton-Temple-Blackwood, First Marquis of Dufferin and Ava, in 1859-1860.

He decided to interrupt his travels on the Nile for about a month, hired a crew of workmen, and began working in the westernmost area of the complex. It is unclear why Lord Dufferin decided to start digging in this exact spot, but he was most likely enthralled by some spectacular tombs that were excavated in the Theban Necropolis at that time. These included the tomb of the New Kingdom queen Ahhotep, where Auguste Mariette’s team found her mummified body, gold and silver jewellery, and a ceremonial axe made of gold, copper, electrum, and wood. In Mentuhotep’s complex, Lord Dufferin’s team excavated the tomb of Queen Tem (often thought to be the mother of Mentuhotep’s successor Mentuhotep III), a statue of the god Amun (now in the August Kestner Museum in Hanover), and numerous decorated wall fragments. Selections of these fragments were shipped to Dufferin’s ancestral home in Northern Ireland. However, seemingly unwilling to invest further money in the venture, he concluded his excavations before the entire site was cleared of the debris that would continue to cover most of the complex until the beginning of the 20th century.

Excavations did not resume at the site until the winter of 1903, this time led by Édouard Naville, a Swiss Egyptologist working for the British Egypt Exploration Fund (EEF). Naville and his assistants would oversee four seasons of excavations, so that, by 1907, the entire site had been cleared of debris. Less than 20 years later, Herbert Winlock of the Metropolitan Museum in New York also worked at the complex, excavating its forecourt and northern and southern courts in greater depth. Finally, in the 1960s, Dieter Arnold (who then worked for the German Archaeological Institute) excavated several foundation deposits at the site, conducted an architectural study of Mentuhotep’s complex, and published the first study of a selection of decorated wall fragments.

The archives

Each of the four teams that worked in Mentuhotep’s complex over the past 160 years created archival documents that shed light on different aspects of the excavations, as well as on the monument itself. For instance, photographs, notebooks, letters, plans, and drawings made by Naville and his assistants between 1903 and 1907 have made it possible to reconstruct partially the gradual progress of the EEF excavations. Apart from learning more about the (often very strained) interpersonal relations between the team members, their unfavourable opinions of Flinders Petrie, their blatantly racist behaviour towards the Egyptian workmen, and their everlasting struggle to raise more money to continue the excavations, the reconstruction has proved to be especially useful when studying the decorated wall fragments of the complex. These archival documents provide information about the approximate find-spot of a small number of decorated blocks, as well as of other objects. Knowing approximately where these blocks were excavated in Mentuhotep’s complex helps with attributing them to specific walls, since they seem to have remained in place after collapsing to the floor.

The fragments

Current estimates suggest that around 5,000 fragments of relief decoration, both in sandstone and in limestone, were found during the different excavations in Mentuhotep’s complex. About 1,000 of these blocks were taken out of Egypt at the time of Naville’s excavations and distributed among multiple collections around the world. To my knowledge, about 45 museum and private collections outside Egypt currently contain decorated fragments from Mentuhotep’s complex, with the majority located in the USA and UK. This division is an excellent example of the system known as ‘partage’, introduced by the colonial powers that controlled the Antiquities Service, whereby the excavators would receive a selection of the objects from the sites where they worked. The EEF, whose activities in Egypt were sponsored through a system of subscriptions, distributed the selection of wall fragments allotted to them to their many donors, often museums and universities, as a form of compensation, thus explaining the worldwide division of these blocks.

The scenes depicted on the decorated blocks cover a wide range of subjects, including a hunting scene in the desert, a procession of offering-bearers, war scenes, naval scenes, and a procession of women belonging to Mentuhotep’s court. However, many of the fragments are very small, and they often contain only a few carved lines or a single hieroglyph. Naturally, this makes it rather difficult to determine to what scene all these fragments would have originally belonged.

Reconstruction

My analysis of these blocks is still in a very preliminary stage, but the next two fragments will show how seemingly small bits and pieces can still be used to reconstruct – at least parts of – the original scenes.

The first example is currently preserved in the collection of the Bolton Museum (BOLMG:1907.90.13) and shows a bunch of papyrus stalks. At first, this fragment does not seem to provide much information about the larger scene to which it originally belonged, although it might seem to come from a scene depicting fowling and fishing in the marshes. In such a scene, the king would be seen either spearing hippopotami or fish in the water, or overseeing the catching of water fowl with a clap net. Based on other decorated wall fragments, it seems that these two scenes did indeed feature in the decoration of this complex. However, one tiny detail excludes the Bolton fragment from being part of such a fowling and fishing scene – namely a small piece of rope, still visible at the bottom edge of the fragment. The rope suggests that these stalks were tied together and taken out of their natural environment. Such a clear human interaction with the papyrus plants is reminiscent of another, larger decorated fragment from Mentuhotep’s complex in the collection of the Musée d’Art et d’Histoire in Geneva (004583). This depicts a male figure, sporting a short wig or cap, a short beard, and a loincloth. On his left shoulder, the man is carrying plant stems that are tied together by several ropes. Even though it is unclear what type of plant is depicted on the Geneva fragment, since the flower part at the top is missing, the way the bundle is tied together is very similar to the fragment in Bolton, thus suggesting that both fragments may have belonged to the same scene. However, if this is the case, it is currently impossible to state with certainty whether or not the Bolton fragment would fit directly on top of the Geneva fragment. Perhaps there is another block that fitted between the two fragments? It is also possible that the Bolton fragment was cut off at the bottom in modern times – an unfortunate practice that made the blocks lighter to facilitate transport. Or perhaps the Bolton fragment formed the top of a different but similar bundle of papyrus stalks? It is quite likely that the original scene would have contained multiple figures gathering and transporting papyrus stalks.

The Manchester Museum fragment 5283, which depicts a male figure’s torso and arms, is another example of fragmentary decoration which is by itself not very telling. At first sight, the larger scene to which it might have originally belonged is unclear. However, when compared with other fragments in the corpus of decorated wall fragments from Mentuhotep’s complex, it becomes clear that the figure depicted on this fragment was probably seated on a boat deck. For instance, the male figure on a fragment in the collection of the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto (910.34.150) is seated in the same position as in the Manchester fragment, with one knee up and the other down on the floor. This fragment clearly indicates that these people are seated on a boat, since the typical boat rigging is still preserved behind the Toronto figure.

Since both fragments originally belonged to a boat scene, this begs the question of what the boat itself would have actually looked like. There are some more completely preserved wall fragments depicting such boats, but perhaps a better illustration is a 3D example: a boat from the Tomb of Meketra, located not too far south of Mentuhotep’s complex in the Theban Necropolis. Certain figures on this wooden model are depicted in a seated pose very similar to that on the decorated fragments, suggesting a similar scene/boat might be depicted here. Incidentally, Meketra was also a high official in the administration of Mentuhotep II and features in the wall decoration of the king’s complex. These two fragments are only a small selection of the many featuring boats from Mentuhotep’s complex. Even though more analysis on all of them still needs to be carried out, they seem to have originally belonged to different scenes. For example, some fragments from Mentuhotep’s complex depict boats that are transporting goods, which could have belonged to a Middle Kingdom precursor of the Punt scene in Hatshepsut’s neighbouring complex, and a successor of the one shown in Sahura’s complex dated to the Fifth Dynasty.

Current state of preservation

During my fieldwork in Mentuhotep’s complex in December 2023, it immediately became clear that several areas of the monument need to be urgently stabilised to prevent further damage. Old restorations and protections are past their due date and need to be replaced as soon as possible. Areas that are specifically threatened are the northern court, which suffered damage caused by falling debris from the complex of Thutmose III, and the western part of Mentuhotep’s complex. The complex of Thutmose III is itself at risk of damage, because the unstable tafla (the natural bedrock of the Theban mountain), which forms the foundation of this complex as well as the north-western limit of the complex of Mentuhotep II, is collapsing. Additionally, falling debris from the cliff side is causing damage to the remaining architecture of the monument and the many decorated fragments preserved outside on the complex’s platform. The state of preservation of these blocks outside differs: while some are excellently preserved, most are heavily impacted by the weather conditions and falling debris, which has led to cracking and loss of most of the paint. The only solution to prevent further damage to the site is to remove all debris on the entire cliff side above Mentuhotep’s complex – work similar to what has already been done above the complex of Hatshepsut. The fragments preserved inside the royal shaft are generally in better condition, but they are unorganised and stacked in precarious ways. These blocks also suffer from damage caused by different types of animals, since some of them are covered with the remains of wasp and bird nests. Finally, the bedrock ceiling of the royal shaft has already collapsed in certain areas of the corridor and is very unstable in others, which could lead to the burial chamber becoming completely inaccessible. Some of the collapsed debris has also damaged a selection of the decorated fragments currently preserved in the shaft.

Legitimising power

In short, the decorated wall fragments from Mentuhotep II’s funerary complex at Deir el-Bahri offer exciting research avenues, not only to reconstruct the decoration itself, but also to take further our understanding of the royal propaganda embedded in it. For instance, many of the decoration themes such as the boat journeys (perhaps to Punt) seem borrowed from Old Kingdom royal monuments, suggesting Mentuhotep’s intention to hark back to the perceived glorious achievements of previous kings in an attempt to consolidate and legitimise his newly established reign over all of Egypt.

Maarten Praet is a PhD student in Egyptian Art and Archaeology at the Johns Hopkins University in the USA, and also holds MA degrees in ancient history, archaeology, and Egyptology from KU Leuven in Belgium. He has extensive archaeological fieldwork experience both in Egypt (Deir el-Bersha and the Mut temple precinct at Karnak) and in Belgium.