SHARQIYA GOVERNORATE, EGYPT—Ahram Online reports that a collection of some 225 ushabti figurines has been discovered in a tomb chamber in northern Egypt by a team of researchers led by Egyptologist Frédéric Payraudeau of Sorbonne University. The figurines were found in layers of silt near a granite sarcophagus now thought to belong to Shoshenq III, a pharaoh of the 22nd Dynasty who ruled from about 825 to 773 B.C. Shoshenq III is known for his building projects in the city of Tanis, his capital. The tomb belonged to Osorkon II, an earlier ruler of the dynasty. “It remains uncertain whether the king was interred directly inside Osorkon II’s tomb or whether his funerary equipment was relocated there,” Payraudeau explained. Mohamed Abdel-Badie of Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities added that inscriptions were discovered in the same chamber that could help archaeologists understand how the tombs were used. To read about a recent study of a sarcophagus that had been reused in antiquity, go to "A Pharaoh's Coffin."
