For many years, taking pH๏τographs inside the tombs in Egypt was either not allowed or required a separate pH๏τography permit. Although up to three times more than the price of the site ticket itself, the individual pH๏τo permits were not excessively expensive – in the region of £12-£15 per site, depending on the exchange rate at the time – but the total cost could become excessive, and it was necessary to choose subjects carefully when planning a trip. This all changed in July 2022, when the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities (MOTA) unexpectedly announced that ‘Taking pH๏τographs using all kinds of traditional cameras, digital cameras, and video cameras will be permitted free of charge. No permit needs to be obtained beforehand.’ Thankfully, this included taking pH๏τographs inside the tombs. During the past ten years, there have been a few non-royal tombs of the Theban elite (often referred to as the ‘Tombs of the Nobles’) opened to the public for the first time, so I felt that the time was right for me to make a dedicated visit to Luxor’s West Bank to pH๏τograph as many as I could. In November 2023, I checked into the historic Marsam H๏τel, which, just a few hundred metres to the west of the Colossi of Memnon, meant that I could very easily visit the Tombs of the Nobles.

I spent the whole of my first day visiting two sets of recently opened tombs in an area of the Theban necropolis known as Dra‘ Abu el-Naga. I purchased tickets from the West Bank ticket office, which is conveniently located a five-minute walk from the H๏τel. Dra‘ Abu el-Naga itself is located near the roundabout by the Carter House, and can easily be reached from the ticket office on foot, bicycle, or by local microbus. Taking the local microbus is great fun. Make sure that you are standing on the correct side of the road for the direction that you are intending to take, hold out your hand when a bus approaches, hop in and find a seat, pᴀss a few LE1 coins or a small LE note to the driver via your fellow pᴀssengers, and any change will be pᴀssed back the same way. Hold on тιԍнт, as the sliding side door is often open! Call out when you want to get off.

Northern Dra‘ Abu el-Naga

The first set of tombs I visited are in the northern part of Dra‘ Abu el-Naga and are marked as ‘Roy and Shiroy’ on both the ticket office price list and on the ticket. There have been three tombs to view there for several years, but they have very recently been joined by another two (TT11 and TT12). Most non-royal elite tombs in Luxor have the abbreviation TT (for Theban Tomb) prefixed before a number – a classification system originally devised for early publications by Arthur Weigall and Alan Gardiner – and it helps to know the numbers when visiting the sweeping hillside on which the tombs are located. The tombs are all locked, and at some of the lesser-visited sites you need to find the guardian to bring the key. Some of the guardians know the tombs by the name of the deceased, while others refer to them by their number. At Dra‘ Abu el-Naga, TT13 Shuroy, TT148 Amenemopet, and TT255 Roy have all been open for some time, and they form a neat grouping at the very northern end of the necropolis. TT11 Djehuty and TT12 Hery officially opened to the public on 9 February 2023, following 20 years of dedicated conservation work by the Spanish National Research Council’s ‘Proyecto Djehuty’ mission, in cooperation with MOTA.

During their excavations, Proyecto Djehuty discovered some early tombs from the Eleventh Dynasty, a grid-based funerary garden from the Twelfth Dynasty, and burial shafts and mud-brick offering chapels from the Seventeenth Dynasty. They lie close to the two rock-cut tomb-chapels TT11 and TT12, which have been known for some time. In February 2020, an exact facsimile of the funerary garden was created by the Factum Foundation and installed on a reinforced platform to cover and protect the original garden.

Djehuty was ‘Overseer of the Treasury and of Works (metals and semi-precious stones)’ and ‘Overseer of the Cattle of Amun’ during the reign of Hatshepsut. His tomb (TT11) is dated to c.1460 BC. Hery was ‘Overseer of the Double Granary of the King’s Mother and Royal Wife AhH๏τep’ (wife of the Seventeenth Dynasty ruler Seqenenra Taa). He probably lived during the reigns of Ahmose I and AmenH๏τep I. His tomb (TT12) is dated to c.1510 BC, although there is evidence that it was a reused earlier tomb that was extended and redecorated for his burial. In the 2nd century BC, both tombs were used as part of a complex catacomb for bird mummies, mostly ibis and falcons, and priests added demotic graffiti in red ink to the walls at that time. The two tombs are located next to each other, to the south of the three open tombs already mentioned. Durable weatherproof signage has been installed outside each one, written in Arabic and English, with a QR code added to each for more information. Both have been lit with an innovative use of discreetly placed solar panels to power energy-efficient LED lighting. The lights create raked illumination from above, and avoid the usual mᴀss of wires on the floor.

TT11 Djehuty

TT11 (Djehuty) has an inverted T-shaped plan with an inner corridor 18.5 metres long, and an outer courtyard covered with translucent roof panels. This protects it, but also gives the illusion of being outside. Metal grids have been attached to the ceiling to allow visitors to view what is left of the decoration without any risk of falling stone. The rock floor has been left in its original state and remains uncovered, unlike many of the tombs in Luxor. Much thought has gone into the cleaning, consolidation, and restoration work to give the tomb visitor an exceptional experience. Many sections of the courtyard and corridor are decorated in relief, finely carved directly into the limestone walls, and I was particularly impressed by a delicate depiction of a harpist. At some time after his death, Djehuty and his family fell out of favour, and their names and images were defaced. Unusually, the burial chamber is highly decorated with cursive hieratic Book of the ᴅᴇᴀᴅ texts, and an illustration of the sky goddess Nut painted on to lime plaster. It is not possible to visit the burial chamber, but there is a pH๏τographic panel showing its decoration displayed in the courtyard area.

TT12 Hery

TT12 (Hery) is a relatively simple rock-cut tomb, with a narrow corridor leading to a broad inner room with a central pillar. The walls of the corridor are decorated with carved relief scenes of the voyage to Abydos, hunting both in the marshes and in the desert, offering bearers, a funerary procession with muu dancers, and a banquet. Although fragmentary, with many missing sections that have been hacked out by thieves, it is still one of the most decorated tombs from this era.

By using effective backlighting to reveal areas that have been ‘knocked through’, and by retaining the internal staircases that were added later, Proyecto Djehuty have been able to show the visitor how the various rock- cut tombs were joined together to form the later catacomb complex.

Dra‘ Abu el-Naga South

The second set of tombs I visited are in the southern part of Dra‘ Abu el-Naga and are shown as ‘Abo Naga Arm’ on the ticket office price list and ‘Dra Abu el-Naga South’ on the ticket. Finding them was not easy, but, after accepting a lift on the back of a moped, I discovered a new metal sign which indicated that they are at the top of a steep stone pathway leading off the approach road to Deir el-Bahri.

At the time of my visit, the path was located next to an alabaster factory called ‘Mona Liza’. There are two tombs open to the public – TT159 Raya and TT286 Niay – and both have painted rather than carved decoration. They were restored between 2015 and 2018 by a joint conservation project between the American Research Center in Egypt (ARCE) and MOTA, with funding from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). They officially opened to the public in September 2019, although the news was overtaken by the COVID pandemic, and they have been overlooked by recent visitors. Raya was an official known as the ‘Fourth Prophet of Amun’ during the Nineteenth Dynasty, and Niay was a ‘Scribe of the Table’ in the Twentieth Dynasty.

TT159 Raya

TT159 (Raya) is a T-shaped tomb with a courtyard leading to the main entrance, a decorated transverse hall with a burial shaft on the western side, a decorated longitudinal hall, and a shrine. In the shrine are severely damaged statues of Raya and his wife Mutemwia, a ‘Singer of Amun’ at Karnak, seated side-by-side. Among various highly detailed scenes painted on the plastered walls is one of a group of female mourners, standing in front of two coffins that have been placed upright outside a tomb-chapel that is seen emerging from a mountain. The scene is located directly above the burial shaft of the tomb. In another scene of mourners, one female is unusually depicted with her bare chest facing towards the viewer, rather than in profile. Yet another scene shows a rather startled-looking cat under the chair of Mutemwia, while a monkey is eating what looks like a bunch of dates under Raya’s chair.

TT286 Niay

TT286 (Niay) is a simply constructed tomb. A small entrance leads to a squat, highly decorated hall with a small statue niche in the northern wall. There is a burial shaft located in a side chamber on the north-west corner. The decoration is hand-painted in a fresh and lively style on whitewash. The rock has been coated with layers of thickly applied mouna (a type of mud plaster bulked up with crushed straw), overlaid with a fine lime and gypsum plaster. The colours that remain are still very vivid. On the door jambs are damaged depictions of Niay and his wife Tabes. Inside there are processions and funerary scenes, a scene from The Book of the ᴅᴇᴀᴅ, and one of Isis emerging from a tree. The ceiling is decorated in ᴀssorted geometric designs. The decoration has suffered some damage from theft and attempted theft, but the tomb is well worth a visit. There is a decorated panel from the tomb in the Louvre.