Bayt Madinah

Ernesto Schiaparelli, on behalf of the Italian Archaeological Mission, built the original house at Dayr al-Madinah in 1904 and worked there at least through 1909. It is not known when he abandoned the house. The dig house site did not only include the small mud brick house but also conical tents were set up in front of the house, slightly farther down the mountain, as additional accommodations for the excavation team working there.

The precise years that other early Egyptologists lived at the house are not thoroughly recorded beyond, vaguely, the 1920s-1930s. At some point during these years, the house was expanded by Bernard Bruyère who added five rooms, and tents were no longer used outside the front of the house. Once occupied by the French, the Italian flag was exchanged for the French flag. During the early French occupation of the house, two Egyptology notables, Bernard Bruyère and Jaroslav Černý, got up to some hijinks by pulling pranks and painting parodies at the house, all of which have been published by Anne-Claire Salmas (see bibliography for these articles).

Jaroslav Černý had decorated a large limestone ostracon with hieroglyphic text describing, in the manner of ancient Egyptian prayer formulae, a wish for beer and coffee to be offered at the house. At the end of the text, the prayer is offered to Étienne Drioton. In one of the bedrooms of the dig house, Bernard Bruyère had painted a parody of an ancient Egyptian funerary scene. The scene depicts Anubis mummifying a giant fish. In this same scene, Nephthys is shown crouching and petting the chin of the lion head that forms part of the funerary bed; Isis cheekily giggles while tying a pot to Anubis’s tail. Some other humorous parts of the scene include two wedjat eyes surmounting the funerary canopy that are depicted as wearing pince nez glasses, while two pairs of the Sons of Horus appear to be locked in an embrace. In the accompanying hieroglyphic text, Bruyère had signed his name as the artist of the amusing painting. So rarely are we given a glimpse into the frivolity that surely took place at every dig house. It is certainly a mainstay element of dig life today!

Now, owned by the Supreme Council of Antiquities, the Institut français d’archéologie orientale (IFAO) primarily occupies the house during archaeological missions. Between 2010 and 2012, Marcel and Monica Maessen conducted a photographic survey and preliminary research on the history of the house.