A grave discovery: Mummified remains of ancient Egyptian royals found in burial site that was torched by tomb raiders

A tomb containing the remains of up to 50 royal Egyptians has been found



It is located in the Valley of the Kings - 310 miles (500km) south of Cairo



The mummified remains are believed to originate from the 14th century BC

The tomb may also have been used again in the 9th century BC



But the tomb has signs of fire that suggest it was raided numerous times



The charred remains of least 50 mummified Egyptians have been found in a plundered tomb in Cairo.



It is thought most of the bodies were members of the ancient Egyptian elite, and inscriptions suggest the tomb contains a prince and princess, related to two pharaohs who ruled during the 14th century BC.

But excavation wasn’t easy because the tomb is covered in soot - from a fire started by grave robbers in the late 19th century.

A tomb containing up to 50 mummified remains has been found in the Egyptian Valley of the Kings. Pictured can be seen fragments of coffins, cloth and pottery within tomb KV 40. The tomb was used twice, once in the 18th dynasty (14th century BC) and again in the 22nd dynasty (9th century BC)

The find was made during excavations by Egyptologists from the University of Basel Kings' Valley Project close to the royal tombs in the Valley of the Kings, about 310 miles (500 kilometres) south of Cairo.

A BRIEF HISTORY OF EGYPT

Prehistoric Egypt pre–3100 BC Ancient Egypt Early Dynastic Period 3100–2686 BC Old Kingdom 2686–2181 BC 1st Intermediate Period 2181–2055 BC Middle Kingdom 2055–1650 BC 2nd Intermediate Period 1650–1550 BC New Kingdom* 1550–1069 BC 3rd Intermediate Period 1069–664 BC Late Period 664–332 BC Classical Antiquity Achaemenid Egypt 525–332 BC Ptolemaic Egypt 332–30 BC Roman & Byzantine Egypt 30 BC–641 AD Sassanid Egypt 621–629 Middle Ages Arab Egypt 641–969 Fatimid Egypt 969–1171 Ayyubid Egypt 1171–1250 Mamluk Egypt 1250–1517 Early Modern Ottoman Egypt 1517–1867 French occupation 1798–1801 Egypt under Muhammad Ali 1805–1882 Khedivate of Egypt 1867–1914 Modern Egypt British occupation 1882–1953 Sultanate of Egypt 1914–1922 Kingdom of Egypt 1922–1953 Republic 1953–present *Time period from which tomb KV 40 is believed to originate.



Experts identified the burial place of several children as well as other family members of two pharaohs.

The team have been working on tomb KV 40 - where the find was made - close to the city of Luxor for three years.

From the outside, only a depression in the ground indicated the presence of a subterranean tomb.



Up to now, nothing was known about the layout of tomb KV 40, nor for whom it was built and who was buried there.

The Egyptologists assumed it was a non-royal tomb dating back to the 18th dynasty (1543–1292 BC).



They first cleared the 20ft (six metre) deep shaft which gives access to five subterranean chambers before recovering the countless remains and fragments of funerary equipment.



The scientists discovered mummified remains of at least 50 people in the centre chamber and in three side chambers.

Based on inscriptions on storage jars, Egyptologists were able to identify and name over 30 people.



Titles such as 'Prince' and 'Princess' distinguish the buried as members of the families of the two pharaohs Thutmosis IV and Amenhotep III who are also buried in the Valley of Kings.



Both pharaohs belonged to the 18th dynasty and ruled in the 14th century BC.

The analysis of the hieratic inscriptions, related to hieroglyphics, revealed that tomb KV 40 contains the mummified remains of at least eight hitherto unknown royal daughters, four princes and several foreign ladies.



While most of them were adults, mummified children were also found.

'We discovered a remarkable number of carefully mummified newborns and infants that would have normally been buried much simpler,' explains Egyptologist Professor Susanne Bickel.



'We believe that the family members of the royal court were buried in this tomb for a period of several decades.'



The identification of people buried in the proximity of the royal tombs gave the team of researchers important insight into who had the privilege to spend eternal life close to the pharaoh.



'Roughly two thirds of the tombs in the Kings' Valley are non-royal,' continued Bickel.



'Because the tombs do not have inscriptions and have been heavily plundered we so far have only been able to speculate on who lies buried in them.'

The tomb was found in the Valley of the Kings, a valley in egypt where pharoahs and nobles from the 18th, 19th and 20th dynasties (known as the 'New Kingdom') in Ancient Egypt were buried from the 16th to 11th century BC

Tomb KV 40 containing the newly discovered remains was found about 20ft (six metres) underground with a corridor, a central room and three side rooms. Most of the walls and ceilings are black from heavy fire, believed to have been caused by regular plunderers in ancient times but also as recently as the 19th century

This is a panorama view over the area in the Valley of Kings investigated by the University of Basel Kings' Valley Project. Tomb KV 40 is located directly next to tomb KV 64 and was first discovered by the Basel Egyptologists in 2012, but it has only recently been excavated and studied

Even though the tomb was looted in ancient times as well as at the end of the 19th century, the researchers found countless fragments of burial equipment, such as fragments of coffins and textiles.



'The remains and the walls have been heavily affected by a fire that was most likely ignited by the torches of the tomb raiders,' suspects Bickel.



The fragments of various wooden and cartonnage, layers of linen or papyrus covered with plaster, coffins indicate that tomb KV 40 was used a second time as a burial ground by members of priestly families in the 9th century BC.