The architecture and the signification of the Tarkhan mastabas

Abstract

The palace facade mastabas at Tarkhan follow in general, in design and arrangement, the better preserved and documented examples excavated at Saqqara. Some features provide the same impression of a less evaluate status in comparison to Saqqara. Only one mastaba had chambers in the superstructure. There are only a few subsidiary tombs at Tarkhan, in marked contrast to the high number of such burials in Saqqara, or to the number and arrangement of subsidiary burials at Gizeh (Petrie 1907 : 2-7, pl. VI). Furthermore, there is not much inscribed material from these tombs ; perhaps this reflects the looting of these mastabas, but it is also possible that writing was, at that early state of Egyptian history, not yet so widespread across the country. A special feature are the well recorded cult places at the outside of many mastabas, not so well attested at other sites for this early period. Next to these cult places was always found a big amount of pottery, indicating a cult activity. The excavators did not record this pottery in detail. It remains unknown how long the cult functioned. However, for mastaba 2050 is mentioned that three pot marks found, relate to similar ones of the time of Semerkhet (Petrie 1914 : 5), indicating a cult at least for the following generation. For each generation from the time shortly before state formation to about the middle of the First Dynasty one large-scale tomb is known from the excavations. This creates the impression that these elite burials were reserved for the local governors at the town served by the cemeteries of Tarkhan. A gap is only visible at the beginning of the First Dynasty, between Narmer and Djet. There are two possible explanations for the gap. Either the governor tombs of that time are simply missing, or there was a governor with a particularly long reign, eventually buried in tomb 1060, the first of the extant palace façade tombs at Tarkhan. After Sequence Date 78, the time of state formation, a decline in number of burials is visible. One or two generations later the big palace façade tombs start. At first sight, this seems curious, but it has to remembered that Flinders Petrie did not publish all tombs found. Burials with not enough pottery were not included in his publication (Petrie, Wainwright & Gardiner 1913 : 4). With the time of state formation a polarisation of rich and poor is noticeable in the whole country (Seidlmayer 1988 ; Wilkinson 1996) ; perhaps, then, the number of burials remained at that time more or less the same, only with a high number of poorer burials, emptier or entirely empty and therefore not recorded by the excavators. After the middle of the First Dynasty there are no longer big palace façade tombs at Tarkhan. There are still some important burials of the Old Kingdom and First Intermediate Period (Petrie 1915), but in general it seems that the place lost its importance. Forty kilometres to the north the cemeteries at Helwan and Saqqara were growing, reflecting the rise of a new national centre, Inebhedj, the future Memphis. The history of Tarkhan must also be read against this regional and national setting.