Ancient Egypt is still very far from having revealed all its secrets, and the era of the pharaohs is full of mysteries that archaeologists (the real ones, not Gims), attempt to break through. This is the case of the Leyden-Turin expedition, led by doctors Lara Weiss and Christian Greco, which is conducting excavations in the Saqqara region, south-west of Cairo. Recently, several funeral chapels and a 3,200-year-old tomb were dug out of the desert sand by Italian-Dutch teams.
It is not the tomb of a prestigious king that the teams of Lara Weiss and Christian Greco have updated. However, these chapels and this tomb are nonetheless of a certain historical interest, in particular because their discovery makes it possible to better understand the history of the necropolis of Saqqara. It is indeed at this place that many inhabitants of the region of ancient Memphis were buried during the so-called ramesside period, a period of ancient Egypt during which many pharaohs bore the name of Ramses. . Incidentally, this discovery had repercussions as far as Amiens, in Hauts-de-France.
Youyou, manufacturer of gold leaf
One of the chapels in question has been identified by archaeologists as belonging to the family of a man named Youyou. And that’s when it hit the headlines of the teams at the Musée de Picardie, in Amiens. “Since 1927, the museum has kept doorposts decorated with hieroglyphics whose provenance we did not know,” explains to 20 minutes Agathe Jagerschmidt-Séguin, head of archaeological collections at the Musée de Picardie, in Amiens. “The only information given by the reading of these hieroglyphs was the name of the person, Youyou, and his profession, manufacturer of leaf gold”, she continues.
Part of the mystery is lifted since, from now on, the Picardy museum knows that its ancient pieces come from the necropolis of Saqqara, from a chapel which housed four generations of members of the Youyou family, contemporaries of the famous Ramses II.
A bequest from collector Albert Maignan
But how could the doorposts land in Amiens in 1927 even though the tomb was unearthed last March? “In fact, Youyou Chapel and the nearby tomb were discovered and looted initially in the 19th century. We had completely lost track of it afterwards, ”explains the curator.
It was through a legacy from the painter and collector Albert Maignan, at the very beginning of the 20th century, that the uprights of the door of the chapel of Youyou became part of the collections of the Musée de Picardie. “Albert Maignan had bought these pieces, and many others, from the Vendée Egyptologist Emile Amelineau who needed money. But what we still do not know is how he came into possession of the uprights of the Youyou funeral chapel, ”acknowledges Agathe Jagerschmidt-Séguin. The mystery of Youyou has not yet revealed all its secrets.