THE FLUVIAL SHIPS OF TUTANKHAMON.

"It rowed to prow of the ship with two hundred men.

It was rowed with spirit, but after advancing average Mile they felt to weaken the members.

They needed air...

His Majesty took determined the oar from twenty elbows of length.

He put themselves to row with spirit and he took earth.

After to have covered three miles rowing Without loosen the oar;

The faces of which they observed to him shone of admiration When seeing him to execute so large feat ".

(Of a wake found in sfing of Gizéh, referred to Amenofis II XVIII dynasty -- of the New Empire, according to the translation of S. Schott).

"Carnavon: It sees something "

"Carter: If '... wonders ".

When in 1922 Howard Carter it discovered the entrance of the tomb of Tutankhamon, the one of the last Pharaohs of XVIII the dynasty and last descendant by reporting line of the emperors of this one, which brought to light from the Valley of the Kings must its great resonance anywhere in the world, more than to the same Pharaoh (a young person of brief reign and Pharaoh of, second order), to the fact that its tomb had been conserved almost intact throughout the thousands of years. It was possible thanks to the cares of Mayan one of the civil employees of the Pharaoh, provider and ordered of the protection of the Valley of the Kings, loyal and jealous guardian of its tomb, not only of the traditional plunderers, but of the revenge of its successor in the throne, general Horemheb. History had begun long before, in the days of Amenofis IV, which it was made call Akenatón, whose reign he is one of the most exciting moments of the history from Egypt when trying to restore a religion monotheist, the cult to Atón, causing the sacerdotal resentment of powerful chaste and the military one. All the artistic manifestations of this period take the seal of the new vitality that this visionary Pharaoh tried to instill to his world. But it was a revolution from above that could not break the traditions of millenia and therefore never found the endorsement of no sector of the society of his time. The reform did not survive its creator and promoter and against reform was not made hope. When Tutankhamon (1343 B.C.) it raised the throne as soon as it was nine years old, that is to say, was a manageable boy perfectly for powerful chaste the dominant ones. Although been born and bred in the center of irradiation of the new "atonista" religion, the present Teil-el-Amarna, well-known then like Akhetaten (city of the horizon of the sun), it is forced to erase of his name the completion atón, "the divine solar disc", and to replace it by the one of amón, "the spirit of the sun", giving back to this sun, divine and only supreme being, to the traditionally secondary place in the complicated Egyptian pantheon, whose headquarters always was marked by the osiriatics rites. Nothing we know of the death of the young monarch, unless it went to the early age of 18 years. If she were victim of a disease or a palace plot he is something that deteriorated despoliation of mummi will hide us for always. Hardly the desperate reaction has arrived us from its Anjsenamón widow, at the same time niece and sister-in-law of the king, through the hitites archives, where it takes shelter with stupor and distrust the proposal of marriage of the queen to a prince of that nation, apparently not to see itself in the obligation take like new husband to which she herself denominates as "she writes of recruits", talking about without a doubt to general Horemheb, declared enemy of its dynasty and the amarnic heresy. When years later, this general assumes signals of the royalty, triggers an implacable persecution against everything what it was of the cult to Atón, only comparable persecution to which same Amenofis IV had triggered when implanting its "heresy". The ships the ship of Huy the figure is a transcription to pencil of a painting of the found ones in the tomb of that rich civil employee of Tutankhamon. By the data that we know Huy was a cultured man pertaining to the nobility civil employee of the Pharaoh, connoisseur of several languages, immensely rich and very powerful. Between its many titles we selected some as sonorous as these: "First prophet of the temple of Tutankhamon", "Messenger of the sovereign in all the foreign countries", "Divine Father", " it carries fan to the right of the king", "Intendant of the cattle of Amón in the country of Kusa", "Intendant of the countries of gold of the gentleman of two earth", "Brave of its Majesty in the cavalry"... In the walls of the funeral cameras of its tomb its history is narrated to us from the times in which already it occupied important positions in the administration with Amenofis III, to its solemn coronation like representative of viceroy of Nubia. In this painted history he appears as possessor of a great fluvial fleet in charge to bring the treasures and presents from Nubia and its dominions. With respect to the figure already indicated, Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt us describes it with these words: "Its magnificent boat was prepared sensibly analogous to the ship of the king. The great central cabin, decorated with drawings of hot colors, had in front of her the pavilion reserved to the horses, leaving to see horses already embarked. There were also in the prow and the stern two cabins adorned with images of the four Horuses of Nubia. The helmet of the boat took the representation of the Pharaoh, as if it go one esfinge demolishing to a black." This type of boat is known it with the name of "Papyrus form", since it remembers and it conserves the essential forms of the primitive boats that furrowed the Nile, constructed with this same material and of which have the news from end of the Neolithic one (between 4500-3000 B.C.), which it is known like predynastic time. It conserves the form, but in fact the construction technique is totally different, because the papyrus beams have been replaced by wood. Herodoto describes them like "constructed with wood pieces, mounted like masonry works". The pieces adjusted to each other by means of others in form of sand clock and they were caulkinged with papyrus and annoys. Doubtlessly one is a boat of luxury dedicated to the personal transport and possibly of the appraised merchandise more. The decoration corresponds, within the own luxury of the highest civil employee, to the character of old the Egyptians "cheers and practitioner", according to remembers the Greek writer-traveller to us. Light and of little openwork, its main traction consisted of the oars moved by good number of nubish servants, mainly when current sailing con. But either Huy, "divine father", " The one that carries the fan to the right of the king", could not escape to the revenge of general Horemheb and its tomb was sacked and its usurped treasures. The images and the names of Tutankhamon that were in the tomb of Huy were demolished to hammer blows. Also its own images. Horemheb never pardoned to the viceroy of Nubia to have recognized the Pharaoh, its gentleman, the force and the powers of the sun.

In the room of the tomb of the Pharaoh, well-known like "room of the treasure" or the "glasses canops", was found a great number of boats of all type: from those of papyrus, used for the hunting of hippopotamus, to the undertakers, destined to the trips and peregrinations of the king by the world of ultratomb accompanied by Ra and Osiris. But mainly it emphasizes the one, most complete one, probably a reproduction of the used one by the Pharaoh in life, in its trips by the Nile. Their dimensions are: length, 118 cm.; sleeve, 22 cm.; openwork, 10 cm. Painted with glad colors bari "or pleasure boat is like the Huy". The central cabin in form of "naos" is crossed by a high subject mast by several estays, but without no shroud, that is to say, it lacks maneuver ends fixes that they hold the wood to the flanks of the ship. Is characteristic of all boats Egyptian and that forces to think that they only could use the great rectangular sail of two yards, with stern wind. The two cabins of prow and stern take carved a bull and one sfing, the two representations of the Pharaoh. In the New Empire (1567 to 1080 a.C.) the type of waters had been arrived at a great variety of boats defined by its function and for which they were destined, all it made possible by the improvement reached in the construction techniques. This way, we were with ships military able to embark up to 200 men, processionals, undertaker ships, of recreation, merchants and of transport, as the immense designed river crafts for the transfer of the enormous obelisks of stone. The Egyptians did not forget to equip with suggestive names their ships, like for example the ship standard of Amenofis IV, well-known by "the Splendor of Atón" or the one of Amenofis III, "star of Menfis". In order to finish, the "words of the harpist", that appear in numerous tombs and that something says to us of the sense of somewhat skeptical humor whereupon old and glad the Egyptians took the things from this one and of the other world:

"Some bodies are in march, others enter immortality from the old times; the Gods that long ago lived rest in their pyramids, just like the noble, glorified, buried in their pyramids, have been constructed chapels whose location does not exist already. What has become of them? I have listened to the words of lmhotep and Hardjedef of that all comment the sayings. (one is two moralists of the Old Empire.) Where it is his tomb? Their walls are destroyed, their tomb as if it had never existed. Nobody comes down from saying to us how they are, to say to us of what they have necessity, to tranquilize our hearts. Until we go there where they have gone. He cheers your heart so that your heart forgets that also you will be a fortunate day... "

The only documentary data with that I have been able to count is a photography of the reproduced original model in the book mentioned in the bibliography of Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt, reason why some details of difficult interpretation exist, as they are the tops of the great oars rudders and the inscriptions of the two small cabins.

PAINTING.

to paint the helmet I used acrylic paintings in the range of satin colors. Before painting I used a primer of white tail for wood (of which there are many marks in the market). Once dry the glued wood, I rubbed with a brown cloth mixed with target until obtaining a shining surface and polished painting, although it does not uniform as far as the color.

OLD SAILS.

First the fabric in diluted synthetic water tail gets wet and the required form occurs him, wrinkling it most possible. Once dry and rigid one withdraws with a blade, but without leaving to edges or clean cuts. It is painted in ocher, blue and reddish tones, trying to report to the darkest colors in most hidden and the clearest tones in the salient parts. The sail must take a become stiff and rigid aspect.

ROPES.

They are dyed of ocher gray or and they are made happen through the edge of a knife without sharpening to wear away them and to age them. Once placed they become hardened, sliding by his surface the impregnated fingers of synthetic tail. Almost all the ends of the ends frayed and are frayed, that is to say, they do not finish in "fists". The knots are irregular and must make sure with something of tail.

WOOD.

To all the wood pieces without painting can be altered with brush and a mixture of gray and ocher very diluted to soil them. Another technique of aging Vista wood can be the dust pigment use with water (green, yellow, red, blue, earth, etc.), on which it scatters dusts of talc or white plaster, that soon it will have to scrape itself with diaper of aluminum. It is a this one interesting technique that will deserve a separate chapter, and whose results are excellent. The rest of the boat will age by means of adjustments of brown and ocher more or less diluted, according to the criterion of the modelist. And this is everything, that the great God Ptah, pattern of the arts, is to us propitious and it overwhelms to you with inspiration.