Hedvig Győry: Mélanges offerts a Edith Varga „Le lotus qui sort de terre” (Bulletin du Musée Hongrois des Beaux-Arts Supplément 1. Budapest, 2001)

ANDREY O. BOLSHAKOV: Osiris in the Forth Dynasty Again? The false door of 'Intj, MFA 31.781

Giza.

14 One may only hope that Manuelian will be luckier than his predecessors were, and the success of his concept will demonstrate once more that back to Junker usually means forward. However, when turning from generalities to the particular monument, Manuelian makes a regrettable false step. Since he is interested first of all in the phenomenon of préfabrication, the Boston false door being mainly an occasion to discuss the problem for him, he considers in detail the features of the monument proving that it was made for an unspecified person (male or female) and only later was inscribed for the lady Jntj, but he does not pay due 14 It should be admitted that préfabrication was a much more universal phenomenon far outstepping the territory of a single necropolis. Most probably, Manuelian's theses are true with reference not only to Giza, but to Abu Ravvash as well. The Old Kingdom Cemetery F at Abu Rawash is greatly influenced by the necropolis of Cheops. Huge stone mastabas are of approximately the same size as those at Giza and are arranged in rows forming streets, although shorter and not as straight as in the archetype necropolis, see F. Bisson de la Roque, Rapport sur les fouilles d'Abou-Roach II, Le Caire 1925, pl. 1-3. As at Giza, smaller, later tombs are attached to the original structures, thus blocking the streets (e.g., F. 12 between F.7 and F. 19). The architecture of the original mastabas with exterior chapels also has much in common with Giza, although stone replacing brick as a material for cult rooms marks a new stage of tomb development. The chronology of Abu Rawash is highly problematic. Jaromir Málék did not date the original tombs to the period prior to the Fifth Dynasty (PM IIP, pp. 4-8); Adolf Klasens (LÄ I, col. 24) placed some of them into the Fourth-Fifth Dynasties, but he never substantiated his opinion. The reason for this uncertainty seems to root not only in a very poor preservation state of the necropolis and the inadequate degree of its exploration, but also in the underestimation of the phenomenon of préfabrication. Indeed, although the cores and exterior chapels were no doubt constructed in the Fourth Dynasty (and, more exactly, under Djedefra, for a later date would be senseless from the viewpoint of political developments), the interior chapels seem to be later. Unfortunately only pitiful fragments of reliefs survived at Abu Rawash (Bisson de la Roque, op. cit. (note 14), pi. 29-30, 33) and the necropolis is published in the worst possible manner, but even imperfect plans (ibid., pl.

1-3) allow us to conclude that at least some of the interior chapels (F.7, F.17, F.19, F.21) were hewn in the cores destroying the original masonry and lining, while F. 13 that has only an extensive exterior chapel may be an illustration of the initial appearance of the original mastabas. Observations made by the present author during a visit to Abu Rawash in August 2000 seem to confirm this supposition. Cf. also M. Römer, Zum Problem von Titulatur und Herkunft bei den Ägyptischen "Königssöhnen " des Alten Reiches. Berlin 1977, p. 48. The main trend of the development of Abu Rawash may be outlined as follows. When Djedefra laid out a new necropolis by his pyramid, a number of mastabas without interior chapels were prefabricated, like at Giza, but since not so many high officials died during his short reign, most if not all of these tombs remained unused. When the court returned to Giza under Chephren, Abu Rawash was abandoned by the elite (the only exceptions were the sons of Djedefra whose monuments are not known elsewhere, see B. Schmitz, Untersuchungen zum Titel sí-njSwt „Königssohn", Bonn 1976, pp. 22-23), but the cult continued in the pyramid temple (for the sources on its length see A. O. Bolshakov, Royal Portraiture and 'Horus Name', in: L'art de l'Ancien Empire égyptien, Paris, 1999, p. 317; V. Maragioglio-C. Rinaldi, L'architettura delle piramidi menfite V, Rapallo 1966, pp. 6-9), the site had been inhabited, and the impressive tombs that could not remain derelict were reconstructed and decorated by the persons of a lower status according to later rules. Of course, only new excavations can sustain this no doubt speculative reconstruction, but, nonetheless, it seems most possible. It is more than probable that tomb préfabrication also existed in Dahshur, and when this cemetery will be at last completely excavated and adequately published, it will become obvious that the préfabrication of tombs is a universal phenomenon of great importance for our studies of chronology and ideology of Old Kingdom Egypt. It may be appropriate to mention here also a monument prefabricated not for a human being, but for a pet animal. In the Sixth (?) Dynasty, a coffin for the king's dog r

bwtjw was issued from the treasury (G. A. Reisner. The Dog which was I lonorcd by the King of Upper and Lower Egypt, BMFA 34 (1936), fig. on p. 96; H. G. Fischer, An Old Kingdom Monograph ' , ZÄS 93 ( 1966), fig.2), which means that a reserve of such prefabricated objects was kept there; for interpretation see A. O. Bolshakov, Man and his Double in Egyptian Ideology of the Old Kingdom, Wiesbaden 1997, pp. 262-263.