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Diary Transcription:

microfilm: begin page 274

Wednesday, March 4, 1925 (continued)

(2) Street G 7500
In pits:
G 7255 X: Clearing pit. Down 800. Chamber on south disturbed debris.
G 7523 B: Clearing chamber on north. Robbers' debris.

(3) Avenue G 2
Clearing debris away from the brick walls south of street G 7100.

(4) G 7000 X
During the morning the bones of the lower jaw of the ox in the shrine of offerings were removed and the mat fragments such as could be lifted likewise. All the debris in the room down to rock was sifted on the spot and resifted on the surface. There were found a great many fragments of charcoal, some of 4 - 5 cm length, scattered through all levels and most of the surface. Some of the largest came from the north near the doorblock and from the southwest corner. Also the fragment of a rim of pebble polished red [black // GAR] ware pot [ILLUSTRATION] and two other fragments of pottery. Near the center and low down was a second piece of basalt, of about the same size as the other. Portions of the mat were adhering to the lower surface of the jaws. It is clear that the portions of bull were alone wrapped in the mat although the limits of the mat extended some way beyond them to the north. Both pots were then leaning over it. Slight trace of blue powder in debris (? copper).

At noon the depth reached was 1880 cm, the slow progress being partly due to the great length of pull on the ropes while raising the blocks, and partly because of the ladder in the pit to enable work to be done in the shrine some ten meters above.

During the afternoon work continued as before and at 4:20 p.m. the depth reached was 1970 cm on the east. Here the rock sloped down sharply in a clean-cut angle which at first was thought to be the beginning of a passage to the west. But later clearing a little lower down showed that this slope ended in a vertical drop into very fine rock. Below the cleared level at west the rock is now of good hard limestone. On the south the belt of sandstone is being covered now completely by hard limestone, and the patch of bad rock on north is probably only temporary.

[ILLUSTRATION]

This vertical face on the east may be a first step in a staircase, or more probably a truly rectangular pit.

microfilm: end page 274

Details

  • Classification
    Documentation-Expedition diary pages
  • Department
    Harvard University-Boston Museum of Fine Arts Expedition
  • Credit Line
    Harvard University–Boston Museum of Fine Arts Expedition
  • Display Page Dates
    03/04/1925
  • Author
    Thomas Richard Duncan Greenlees, British, 1899–

Tombs and Monuments 7

People 1

Modern People

  • Thomas Richard Duncan Greenlees

    • Type Author
    • Nationality & Dates British, 1899–
    • Remarks Thomas Richard Duncan Greenlees, born South Africa, Sivaratri, March 10, 1899. British subject with a Scottish father and an English mother. For a brief period during 1925 he was a staff member of Harvard University--Boston Museum of Fine Arts Expedition, who later joined the Theosophist movement in India. Greenlees received his MA degree in 1922 from Oxford, where he studied Egyptian, Coptic and Arabic. April 2,1925, Greenlees appointed Assistant Curator of Egyptian Art at MFA.