Dr Zahi Hawass, the controversial former head of the Supreme Council of Antiquities under President Mubarak’s regime, has announced that there are significant discoveries still to be made in the Valley of the Kings, including a secret burial chamber which he believes lies in wait inside the Great Pyramid.
In the last two decades, archaeologists and scientists have been continuing their investigations inside the Great Pyramid using small robots with video cameras designed to explore inside the narrow shafts of the pyramid and beyond.
The robots have been up two shafts leading from the “Queen’s Chamber” (although there is no evidence it was ever used for a queen’s burial) and found that both contain doorways with cooper handles. On the other side of one of the doors was a small chamber with what might be a sealed door behind it. Hawass suggests that this may contain the burial chamber of Pharaoh Khufu (Cheops), the builder of the Great Pyramid, whose tomb has never been found.
“I really believe that Cheops chamber is not discovered yet and all the three chambers were just to deceive the thieves, and the treasures of Khufu [are] still hidden inside the Great Pyramid, and these three doors could be the key to open this burial chamber,” said Hawass. One piece of evidence to suggest this is that there are no other pyramids, out of the 123 in Egypt that have these types of doors, that have copper handles.
Hawass also believes that there are many more tombs to uncover in the Valley of the Kings. “The tomb of Thutmose II, not found yet, the tomb of Ramesses VIII is not found yet, all the queens of dynasty 18 [1550-1292 B.C.] were buried in the valley and their tombs not found yet,” he said in his lecture. “This could be another era for archaeology.”