Original subtitles

- Mr. Hamada! - Yes, boss?

There's something down there.

Hold on, Ghareeb, I'm coming down.

It's over there.

What are we looking at?

Over there… something has appeared.

My God, the dust!

That's why I stopped. I can't tell what it is.

It's in that pile of dirt.

Okay, give me some room.

Hmm…

In the name of God.

What's this then?

This is something astonishing…

It's the lion goddess, Ghareeb!

Wow!

What in the name of God is this doing here?

To discover a complete tomb…

it is incredible.

The first time I went in, I nearly passed out from sheer joy!

Four thousand years old, hidden!

- Nobody touch it.

An unfathomable tomb!

There is absolutely nothing like this.

An ancient story is coming to life

from under the desert sands west of Cairo.

What's being called a one-of-a-kind discovery in Egypt.

…a tomb so perfectly preserved,

it's been called the most significant discovery in decades.

Untouched and unlooted for 4,400 years.

Newspapers, magazines, TVs.

Everybody in the world, they were talking about the tomb.

A rare discovery in Egypt.

The Antiquities minister says they uncovered a private tomb

belonging to a senior official from the fifth dynasty of the pharaohs.

…it's the latest in a series of big finds in Egypt.

The head of Egypt's Antiquities Council

says more discoveries are expected…

…is exceptionally well-preserved

and can offer more understanding of life back then.

This tomb… is a unique tomb.

To find this color…

to find this inscription…

and all these statues in a private tomb?

It doesn't appear before in all Egypt.

My name is Mohammad Mohammad Yousef.

I am a doctor in Egyptology.

From the beginning when we discover the tomb,

we found the name Wahtye.

Wahtye is the owner of the tomb.

But we don't know anything about this man.

We must read the hieroglyphics to find out…

Who is Wahtye?

Who is he to have a tomb like this?

It is a mystery.

Usually when we find a tomb,

somebody digs the burial shaft in the ancient times.

But sometimes you have a surprise.

When we cleaned the ground,

we found four shafts filled with sand.

And that day, everybody didn't sleep.

We dream.

Because if we can find the whole family buried in the shafts after 4,500 years,

that would be better than finding gold.

It would be incredible for us.

My name is Hamada Mansour.

I'm an archaeologist

and a member of the Egyptian mission at the Bubasteion necropolis.

Mr. Ahmed Zikrey is my supervisor.

He was also the person who taught me history in primary school.

-You're late. - Sorry, boss.

Every day, we start our journey…

from the world of the living…

to the world of the dead…

Saqqara.

Working at Saqqara,

I'm so lucky, because I love the history so much.

In just minutes, you can go from the green, and people, crowded…

suddenly to be in the desert.

It is amazing.

Saqqara is a magical place.

The secret of its enchantment

is that under its sands are treasures dating back more than 5,000 years.

All in the shadow of the Step Pyramid,

the oldest stone pyramid in the world.

For me, Saqqara is the most important archaeological site in Egypt.

Any Egyptologist must come to Saqqara to learn

the history from the beginning till the end.

The Bubasteion necropolis, where we found Wahtye's tomb,

is an ancient cemetery by the eastern cliffs,

less than a kilometer from the Step Pyramid.

We began our excavation here in the spring of 2018.

The whole team is Egyptian…

But it's tough to work in these conditions.

If the weather down in the city is 26 degrees,

it's 32 or 33 degrees up here.

It's exhausting work…

and, my God, the dust!

But we are the people who can best give a voice to our ancestors,

because they are our ancestors.

We are one step closer to them than the foreigner.

Mr. Sabry is the General Manager.

He keeps the whole operation running.

Him and his family practically live here!

Foreman Mustafa is in charge of the workers.

We'll put a group here, Foreman Mustafa.

- Yes. - Group number one.

And Dr. Mohammad Yousef is the site director.

I admire his reputation as an archaeologist,

so I always stick close in order to learn from him.

Since we discovered the tomb, we are waiting to dig the shafts

to complete our story for Wahtye and his family.

But until this moment, we are not able to work inside the… the tomb.

Because first we need to investigate the story of Wahtye

through what is written on the walls.

Let's start working around the frame.

Around three months, we are waiting,

but we haven't stopped working outside.

Our main aim here is to find a new tomb.

-We discovered Wahtye,

so maybe we will discover another tomb in this area.

It is a theory. Maybe it's right, maybe it's not right.

But we need to finish the work in this area

before the end of the season.

We have hundreds of people working at the mission.

It is the only source of income for them.

All the team are hoping for next season.

But everybody not sure that they come back again or no,

because maybe no money from the government this time.

We are sure we can find something,

but the ti… the time is running.

Ramadan is coming.

So we need to find something to complete our work.

What is it, Mahrous? Hmm?

Let me see.

Have you got something?

Move your hand, Mahrous, move your hand.

- Hold it from the top! - Go Tamer! Sweep.

It is a base of a statue.

"May Ptah give…"

-"All life…" -"…uh, all…

all life… give all health…

all life to…"

The name here.

The name, the beginning of the name, is not clear.

I've got a feeling she is not human.

-Ah. - It could be Sekhmet.

We need the other part to read the rest.

That would be good.

- That's your job, Mr. Hamada. -Yes, boss!

It's very beautiful!

Dr. Mohammad, this statue is very unusual.

-We found the base first, then the body. - Oh.

-Oh. - It fits perfectly.

We carried on working and we found the head.

There are some beautiful statues here.

We're close to where the temple was.

We've known that the eastern cliffs of Saqqara

were actually the space where there were major animal cult centers.

And one of the most important was the Bubasteion.

My name is Salima Ikram,

and I am a funerary archaeologist and an archaeozoologist.

This part is important. This is not.

One of my specialties is animal mummies.

- My dear, a little this way.

The Bubasteion was a cult center and temple

devoted to the goddess Bastet.

She is the goddess of motherhood, beauty, and love,

most commonly seen as a cat or a woman with a cat's head.

I really love these small cats.

- Small is beautiful, Mr. Ahmed.

Like any Egyptian goddess, Bastet has a calm side

and a scary side.

On the calm side, she's a pussycat,

and so she'll be nice and playful and she'll sort of look after her kittens.

Ah.

- Oh, look, it's a kitten. - Yeah.

Humerus bone, there are two,

and the radius.

-That's the radius there.

But the scary side, she's a lioness.

And she is the goddess of revenge and plagues,

and she's called Sekhmet in that guise.

Be careful with that mattock.

What is it? Sekhmet?

God willing!

Wow, a great example!

Words, uh, saying, "To Sekhmet, beloved of god Ptah,

may he give her all the health

and all the pleasure,

like Ra forever."

-Beautiful.

To be the first one to hold something in your hand

after thousands of years…

Millions of people dream to do this work.

We are working here, but we are ready at any time to move quickly

to work inside the tomb.

We dream to finish the story of Wahtye.

Who is this man?

"Purified Priest to the King."

Purified Priest to the King? Where's "the King?"

Ah…

"The King" is right there. See it?

But it's eroded.

You're right.

-Can you see it now? -Exactly. Good point.

When we are about to read a hieroglyphic text,

there are certain rules that we follow.

These are remnants of the symbol for "Divine Estate,"

-or is it just my imagination? - These are remnants of…

- Of "Divine Estate." - "Divine Estate."

The writing can go from right to left, left to right,

from top to bottom, or even the opposite.

-After this horizontal row of hieroglyphs… - Ah.

…it's then this northern frame and these vertical inscriptions.

So the whole idea is we figure out what direction it's going in.

The simple trick is to look for the bird.

If he faces right, we start from the right.

If he faces left, we start from the left. Then we see if we can make sense of it.

I think it's "Revered with…"

because this part is the rest of the phonetic symbol

for "'Revered," these three together.

-Followed by "the Great God." - Right, right.

Okay, let's read it?

-This is very clear. - Hmm.

Did you write that?

Improve your handwriting a little for when you're reading.

Improve your handwriting. I beg you!

This is how I write. All geniuses are like that.

-How can you read this? -I'm the only one who can.

That's where the joy comes from.

Every aspect we discuss will lift the veil on who Wahtye was.

And as the basis of everything, we must consider Wahtye as a priest.

The priest in that period was considered one of the highest officials.

He was the middleman

between the king and the people, and between the king and his god.

That's how he was able to build such a wonderful tomb.

Wahtye, based on my first impression…

I like the guy!

Even if I see him as a bit of an egoist.

He mentioned his own name a lot in the tomb.

And he put in a lot of statues of himself.

Fifty-five statues is an immense number!

He is glorifying himself.

He wanted to say,

"I am a strong personality, an important personality."

He wanted to be transported to the afterlife

in his full strength,

with all of his wealth.

He depicted an incredible array of activities.

We have multiple scenes of daily life…

and religious scenes…

showing the afterlife.

This whole thing is scenes, it's very nice.

The scene is magnificent.

He cared to portray everything in great detail.

This man wanted it all.

He wanted to transfer all of this to his afterlife,

and he was saying, "I will be master of all this for eternity."

For the ancient Egyptians, because they loved life so much,

they wanted to have a fabulous afterlife,

and the best way was to have a very nice tomb.

They would build tomb chapels, which were above ground.

And then there would be a shaft connecting to the below-ground bed,

where you're actually buried.

Because the idea was you preserve your body

so your soul can reanimate it.

Above ground, the chapel was beautifully decorated

with all kinds of scenes that showed the ideal life

that they wished to enjoy for eternity.

And also, you have things called "false doors,"

and that's where your soul goes in and out.

And so, one part of your soul could go into the afterworld.

Another part could hang out in your tomb…

…and every time someone came in for a chat, you could listen.

So, this whole tomb complex

acted as a kind of resurrection machine

that guaranteed being able to safely go from this world to the next world

and to sort of live this fabulous existence for eternity.

Incredible!

It is a special tomb.

But in my own personal perspective,

uh, this tomb contains a lot of riddles.

This is a family tomb, and there are certain characters that are shown,

such as Wahtye and his mother,

his four children,

and his wife.

But some characters are missing.

He had a brother?

Wahtye's name was mentioned so many times.

What's the deal?

It's as if he was saying, "This tomb is mine!

This tomb is mine, mine, mine!"

It's too much!

I smell the scent of conspiracy in this tomb.

My name is Foreman Mustafa Abdo Sadek Mahmoud.

I am the foreman of excavations at Saqqara.

I became a foreman because this is the work of my forefathers.

My father, my grandfather, and my great grandfather were all foremen.

It was passed down to me generation by generation.

This is our land.

I come here after I finish work.

These trees and palms have been around since the time of the pharaohs.

I plant and harvest just like the ancient Egyptians.

There are many things on Wahtye's walls that I recognize from my daily life.

People imagine the ancients living in the desert sands

because that's where we find them now.

But this is the Egypt where Wahtye lived…

…and he believed that he could take all this with him.

So he spent his whole life preparing for the next life.

Ancient Egyptians hoped that after death,

they would live for eternity in the Field of Reeds,

which was a lot like the Egypt they knew, only better.

But to get there,

they had to go through a series of tests in the underworld.

The most important of these tests took place in the hall of judgment

before Osiris, god of death and resurrection.

To get to paradise, the person had to stand in front of 42 judges

and swear that they had not committed certain sins…

…and so on.

After that came "the weighing of the heart,"

where the person's heart was weighed against the feather of truth and justice.

If the heart was heavier than the feather,

it would be eaten by a crocodile-headed demon

and the person was lost forever.

But if the heart and feather were in balance,

the person was declared "true of voice"

and the journey to the Field of Reeds could begin.

Okay, same time tomorrow, boss?

Right, okay.

Don't be late, boss!

All the work that involves danger is my work,

because, basically, I'm the only youthful one on the team.

But I always liked difficult things, not easy ones.

The Bubasteion necropolis, I must say…

is a very strange place.

It always gives us what we aren't expecting…

And that's a wonderful thing.

Hey, Ghareeb! In the name of God!

-What are all these? - It's strange!

In the name of God!

No, no, no…

What's this?

-Hmm, they're still in their wrappings. - Hmm.

Look at this lovely piece, Ghareeb.

This fellow I see before me now is a…

cat!

-See how many there are, Ghareeb? - Yeah.

So many!

Are these all cats?

-Where did they get them from? - I have no idea.

But there are so many cats, it's really shocking.

Hello!

What's this, then?

Is this supposed to be a cat, Ghareeb? Well, look!

Oh, my days!

In the name of God! This is no cat, Ghareeb!

Let's take it into the light.

- This is something… - Something astonishing.

Is there any cat this size, Ghareeb?

It's as big as my nose!

Oh, my days!

Flip it over.

Flip it gently.

Hello!

-Look!

The mouth, it's drawn!

And the eyes and nose…

and the ears too.

Masterpiece!

Do we have any creature in our country

remotely like this?

Nope.

If you had a cat this big, what would you do with it?

- I'd scare the kids with it!

Could this be a cat?

-Where will we put all these, Ghareeb? - I don't know.

-And they're all cats? - No, no, no.

Praise God, man.

This is not a cat.

Is it a mongoose?

Look at its tail! Its shape, Ghareeb.

This is a crocodile, boss.

-Take this… - Hmm.

- …and put it aside. - Sure.

This is something else.

This is a crocodile mummy, boss.

I think we're done, Ghareeb.

We're going to take them out and get ourselves some fresh air.

Send us a crate on two hooks!

I want to tell you something.

Since I started working in this cat necropolis…

…when cats see me around my house, they run.

They're afraid of me!

They don't act like pets towards me like they used to.

But when a cat runs, I say to her, "Well, you have the right.

I just took your ancestors out of the ground…

and put them in storage."

She's scared I'll do the same thing to her!

As far as we know,

people didn't give their pet cat as offerings.

The ones that they gave as offerings

were actually bought from the priests.

Ah, this one is lovely.

So this is a very nice Bubasteion special.

So, we think that the priests would be breeding them,

and they'd probably subcontract it out to villagers

all around the area of Saqqara,

where people were farming these cats and probably having kitten farms as well.

The way a sacred animal cult worked

was that there was one animal in the temple,

which was supposed to be sort of the divine manifestation

of the goddess or the god.

During its lifetime, this creature would be treated as a god.

Fed, watered, prayed to.

People would give offerings to this creature.

Oh.

-It's a beautiful bronze head!

They would give amulets and statues

made of wood, stone, faience, and even bronze.

But they also would give animal mummies,

because, of course, the idea was that if you make a blood sacrifice to the god,

that would mean perhaps more than something made out of wood or stone.

But it's in very good shape for what one would expect after about 2,500 years.

Where the Bubasteion was built,

there were a lot of old tombs that had been cut

in the past 2,000 years of Egyptian history.

So, the priests would take them into these old tombs

-and bury them in mass graves…

…which is what we're finding.

- How's it going?

Like anyone else, I've seen cats of many sizes.

But a cat that's absolutely massive like this?

I've never seen that before.

We need to get the bones tested to see what it is.

The evidence

that this tomb contains a riddle

is substantial.

-What is this? Fabulous! - There's something.

Look, Nermeen.

There's no other engraving like this.

Next to the first false door, there is a scene of an offering table…

with the owner sitting in front of a beautiful lady.

I see a few unusual things.

-This is unusual. - Right?

All of it is unusual.

Usually, it would be the man and his wife.

So we expected it would be Wahtye and his wife, Ptah-Weret.

But when we read the inscription…

it says, "His wife, Merit-Min."

We were standing there…

in astonishment.

Because Merit-Min…

was his mother!

So we started thinking,

-"Did he marry his mother?"

Of course that conflicts. It's impossible!

The names have been changed.

-I think they've been tampered with. -He replaced them.

The names had been scraped off.

Anyone who runs their hand along the wall would say,

"No, something was afoot here."

Ooh…

Ooh. It isn't Wahtye.

The entire tomb is Wahtye, Wahtye, Wahtye.

-Here is something different. -Is he a thief then?

He's a thief!

Holy crap.

Is that all? No!

The main statue itself!

Looking at the features of that statue…

This statue is different. It doesn't look like any other statue…

- Hmm. -…in the tomb.

Clearly a different person than others in the tomb.

Which makes me even more convinced

that a conspiracy took place here.

I think that Wahtye seized this tomb

and that it wasn't meant for Wahtye at the beginning.

Who is the victim?

The victim is unknown.

But we have a theory.

Yeah. We have a bunch of clues.

There is mention of a brother. Wahtye's brother.

He's mentioned in the eastern wall.

Wahtye dedicates a song…

Why didn't he mention his brother's name?

I think the dedication of the song

is to assuage his conscience…

-He feels guilty-- -He's feeling guilty!

-So, this man isn't Wahtye? -No, it isn't Wahtye.

But it could be his brother.

All of these clues…

suggest that Wahtye seized this tomb from his brother.

So if Wahtye did steal his brother's tomb…

will he be punished in the other world?

No, I think he had a plan.

On the last wall we recorded in the tomb, which was the southern wall,

we found a very large text that says…

So he was placing himself in the ranks of those who judge,

so that he can personally absolve himself of this sin.

So it seems he really was convinced

that he would evade punishment and get to the afterlife.

But there are answers no one could provide but Wahtye himself.

As for the burial shafts,

there may be a discovery that answers all the questions

and all the riddles in Wahtye's tomb.

Everybody ready for a surprise?

-Okay.

Oh, my God!

-You have this one. - Unbelievable!

- Look at the face! -Unbelievable.

My God, look at the face!

Oh, sweetie pie.

Oh, my God.

Huge.

It's big, I can't imagine there was ever a cat this size.

My God, it's amazing!

This is the biggest cat mummy we have ever found.

Ah! I see a mustache.

- Like Hamada!

-Yes, like Hamada! -Like Hamada.

This is really interesting.

On the heads of other cat mummies,

there might be a scarab up here.

It doesn't look like a scarab. It should.

The other ones have actual scarabs painted on their heads.

This one, it looks more like a bee or something.

It's really strange. It's unusual.

And there is even this section…

Hi, baby!

-…which exposes the fur. -You can see fur!

- You see the fur. - What remains of it.

Okay, okay, okay.

- Golden yellow, a beautiful color. - Golden yellow, oh.

It can't be, it can't be.

Now you will find out.

All good?

That's the head.

I'm not 100% sure what we're looking at,

because the head, unfortunately, is finished.

It's really very big.

Can you zoom in?

So you can see it's a baby…

because these teeth are still mostly up inside the gums.

Big canines, huh?

-Yeah. -They're up…

The teeth have only just started growing.

Okay, go down. Carry on down.

The backbone. Look at the backbone.

The backbone. Nothing's fused.

This is definitely a baby.

And it's got an arch in the backbone.

So, if it were stretched out properly,

it would be more than a meter.

-Yeah. -Like this,

-from head to the base of its tail. -Yeah.

-Now, this is no domestic cat. - Yes.

It's too big for a lynx,

it's not a leopard or a cheetah.

So maybe the design is different because this is a different species.

-Yeah. Look at this.

Okay, let's just see this.

-Just an idea. It might be wrong. -Yeah.

Okay. Huh, see?

-Remember the way the lions frown? - Uh-huh.

Maybe this is supposed to be like that,

and they put the wings on because they're used to having the scarab.

-Yes.

Let's look at a cub. It's this… This is the long nose…

Yeah, yeah! That's why the nose is so long!

-You're sure? -Yes! And the color.

This is the first time in the known history of mummification

-that we have a lion here in Saqqara! -A mummified lion!

I hope so!

We think, based on the markings

that are painted on the face,

that this is actually maybe a baby lion.

It's a lion cub.

This is just extraordinary,

because there are stories of lion catacombs,

and some of us have been looking for years and years and years for this.

But now, the logical place is the Bubasteion.

I mean, it's… it's mind-blowing

to think of what this lion might represent in terms of our understanding

of ancient Egyptian culture, economy, religion.

It also changes how we think

about how the ancient Egyptians were interacting with wild animals.

How they might have been breeding them or keeping them tame,

how they might have used them to worship,

but also, in the same way as with some of the other animals,

they were breeding them and they were then giving them as offerings.

It's… It's just… so exciting.

I will tell Ghareeb, uh, "It's a… It's a baby lion, not a cat, Ghareeb!"

There will definitely be a reward for the team.

This area was coming down, so we've stabilized it.

That's great. Brilliant.

Yeah. We've been waiting so long, we just want to get on with it.

You can start then.

Since the first day we entered the tomb…

…I'd been staring at the sand in the shafts.

Give word to the workers.

Wondering what we'll find down there. Wahtye, his secrets, his riddles,

are they finished?

I come in daily hoping, "Please let us work inside Wahtye today."

I was going to lose my mind!

Listen up, men!

Yes, Foreman!

We're ready to start working in the tomb.

The restoration is complete and it's all been secured for you.

We need hard work and tough men!

- Do you understand?

-Then let's go!

Finding the original occupants of an old kingdom tomb

nowadays would be fantastic.

But it hasn't happened for the last 60 years, 70 years.

And now, with our greater technological abilities,

it's the bodies themselves, the bio-archaeology you can carry out.

- Understanding the skeletons,

being able to see what kind of diseases, or not, they had.

Trying to find relationships, if it's a whole family.

Put those down here.

It would be a real treasure trove.

We'll start with this shaft and the one Ghareeb is standing in.

In the name of Allah and may God bless us.

We need information, not object.

- Make a chain.

You stay here.

Carry it over your shoulder and take it outside.

We have statues, beautiful walls. It's enough.

But we need more information about him…

…to solve some mysteries written in his wall.

To understand what happened in his life.

Pick up any shards.

Any fragments, pick them up, Ghareeb.

Sometimes, when workmen working…

you feel that you go back many centuries during the time of ancient Egypt.

You work with the same materials which the ancient Egyptians used.

Sometimes, we discover the same baskets used by ancient Egyptians.

Sometimes we discover a chisel…

like a small chisel which we use until now.

So it's continuation.

Life goes in the same direction.

- Mr. Ahmed! - Yes, Osama?

- There's something here. - What is it?

Oh, yes! It looks like a wooden coffin.

-The head is pointing… to the west.

Mmm.

Let's just expose the feet and move this way as we go.

Osama, you have to be very careful here.

Something beautiful. A wonderful coffin!

This is the best coffin we've found in this condition.

As a part of my job,

Secretary General,

it means that I have to stop by most of the sites in Egypt.

This mission, it's very important science.

Opening a coffin…

What's in there?

Sometimes, we find a wooden coffin with a mummy

in perfect condition of preservation.

Sometimes, we found nothing.

Maybe the ancient Egyptians made the coffin,

but there's nothing in there.

So, nobody can be sure what's in there.

Slowly, slowly.

Mummification is about trying to preserve your image as yourself.

What's happened here, Ashraf?

It looks like it's burnt.

What the Egyptians would do is stick something up your nose,

break through your bone up here to access your brain, pull it out,

and then they would make a cut on the left side

and take out your internal organs.

They'd take out your liver, your lungs, your stomach, and your intestines.

So, after all of these internal organs have been removed,

you'd be dried using natron,

which is this combination of baking soda and salt.

Why would it look burnt?

It could be the natron used in mummification that caused that.

So some sort of…

-chemical reaction has occurred?

And then, they would start to wrap you using linen bandages…

-A female, I think. - A female.

…and reciting spells and praying and burning incense.

The bottom half isn't as badly affected, but it's good linen.

And all of this, what it did was transform you from a secular creature

to a sacred being.

That would be the end of it for your life on earth.

It would be the start of your life in the afterworld.

Mummifying the body is said to have been influenced

by the story of Osiris and Isis…

which had a profound effect on the way the ancient Egyptians treated their dead.

Isis and Osiris were brother and sister.

Osiris was ruling the world

-until his brother Seth murdered him…

…and cut him into pieces that were spread across the lands of Egypt.

Isis was a magician.

She went around Egypt collecting his pieces,

binding them together with linen in the first act of mummification.

Through this, she brought him back to life

and had their son Horus.

Horus grew up to avenge his father's murder

and rule Egypt as king of life on Earth.

Osiris became king of the underworld

and the god of death and resurrection.

That conviction in the power of mummification to transcend death…

was right at the heart of ancient Egyptian belief.

Get Dr. Mohammad and tell him the foreman needs him.

Mr. Ahmed!

They reached the floor of the shaft.

So, this is very bad news.

I don't know why. 'Cause the shaft is big,

like one meter by one meter.

Usually, these shafts with these measurements go deeper,

like six or seven meters with the room down.

But, unfortunately, this one finished quickly.

We don't know why. And they also…. They found some…

what remains of… of fragments of pottery.

-This came from down there? - Yes.

- These bones too? - Yeah, the loose bone too.

So they follow it here in the shaft. This… bad signs.

Boss, this is very disappointing.

The shaft has bottomed out already.

Only 60 centimeters deep.

- Hmm. - That's it.

I am Ghareeb Ali Mohammed Abushousha.

I work as a digger.

I've been working here since long ago. My father worked here before me.

Thirty or forty… maybe fifty years ago.

When I'm working, all my thoughts are about what's in front of me.

It's not just mindless digging, no.

When you're holding the mattock,

you have to have some sense.

Are you going to find something? You have to be prepared.

You could come across a mummy, a bone, a fragment of something.

You have to be ready for that.

A novice will end up breaking the thing.

Mahmoud!

-Mahmoud, come here!

Sit down here, Mahmoud, sit here.

Sit beside me. Have some tea.

This is Mahmoud, my son.

I brought him here to learn the ropes.

So when the foreman needs him to work, he'll have experience.

If he stayed at home,

he'd learn nothing.

Then I wouldn't be happy.

My happiness is having him here with me.

What can you see?

There's a wall here, I think, a mudbrick wall.

On which side?

- Eastern side. - The eastern side?

Isn't it a bit strange, east?

It should be west.

- Are you joking, Ghareeb? - I'm serious.

Be careful, his eyesight is bad and it worries me.

-I don't trust him!

Be careful, watch out.

If it turns out you're winding me up, Ghareeb…

-It's all good.

- Unbelievable! - Mm.

- It is a wall. - Mm.

It reminds me of the wall blocking Wahtye's tomb.

Turns out what I said was true?

Yes, and I have a big reward for you!

Fine.

-There is something wooden. - What?

Something wooden has started to appear.

About three centimeters of something wood.

Hmm.

What I can see now is…

there's a lid.

-It's a great feeling…

…taking apart something from more than 4,000 years ago.

The first hand to touch it after the ancient Egyptian who sealed it.

For that to be your hand is something phenomenal.

It's strange how well-sealed it is!

The person who sealed it is saying,

"Nobody come near it, nobody even get close to it."

- Peace be upon you!

- How's it going? - All good. Thank God.

Hamada is performing a heroic deed.

This space is tight and hot and really terrible!

But you're the first hand to open the blockage, Hamada!

It's my only consolation.

Take a look, Hamada. What is that?

Is that mud or what?

Yeah, mud.

Because of the water.

When rain seeped through the ceiling cracks,

it brought dirt with it, which will have filled up the coffin too.

So it'll be impossible to get it out in one piece.

No, it'll come out intact.

That's impossible! Get that block on the left first.

- That one? - To make room.

Yes, yes.

I told you not to touch that.

I didn't touch anything. I didn't even come close!

Look, in front of him, it's like a concrete wall.

Hmm, hmm.

It was compressed after it filled in the space.

- It's solid, boss.

The coffin is full of mud and it's packed tight.

-And there's a skeleton inside! - Thank God!

I'll collect the bones.

Unbelievable…

We've been waiting a long time to know anything about him.

Pass the wood up.

Look, only 32 centimeters.

It must be for a young child.

Hey, Doctor!

- Check this out. - A molar.

Working at the site,

it's a naturally morbid place.

They're teeth.

- You're in the world of the dead. - It's even rotten.

Child burials in particular.

I mean, my heart breaks when I see the remains of a child.

These teeth have come from the mummy down there.

-They're molars, but they're very small. - How old?

More like 14, 15… something like that.

We thought that it is a child.

But not just one.

It is more than one child.

We collect all these bones,

and we ask our anthropologist who comes and investigates these bones for us.

Every piece of bone can tell you something.

Not only the way of death.

The more interesting stories are about their lives.

How did they live?

That's five…

Was he healthy? Was he happy?

Was he sad?

It can be known, just on the bones.

My name is Amira Shaheen. I'm a professor of rheumatology

in Faculty of Medicine, Cairo University.

And I work here to examine the bones

which are found in the different expeditions.

I'm going to spread this one, and then I'm going to study their pieces.

When Dr. Sabry asked me to come,

he told me there are small bones for children.

How many, we don't know.

That's it.

It's important we find, um, the number of persons,

and we want to know the common traits or the different features of the bones.

First of all, I say, "As-salamu alaykum."

I feel that I'm coming, introducing myself to someone who is sitting in front of me.

Even if he is, or she is, in pieces.

These small pieces, this is, um…

It's the same way that I approach a… a friend.

This is the right humerus, so I should put it here.

I don't know how to get feelings from bones,

but I can feel it. You can feel it.

And this is the right clavicle of one of them.

The shaft nearest the door had the bones of two teenage children.

We have this sacrum, and the other one which is large,

and both are still not un-united, not…

One of them was younger than 20,

and the other one was… most were younger than 18.

By comparing the size of bones,

I think these bones are the… the one with…

18 to 20.

Yes, and this… this is the younger one.

And there were pieces of bone,

most probably related to a younger person, maybe below six years old.

Cervical…

On the first one.

I find in one box, which contains three skeletons,

we have a strange situation of this family,

with the death of three of their children at the same time.

What happened here?

According to the reliefs in the tomb,

we have Wahtye, and his mother, and his wife, and his four children.

We have, now, three children.

So we start to search for the other part from the family.

All right, obviously, this shaft is done.

Now it'll be easier for the workers to work over here.

Come on, Hashem, we're going to work in this shaft.

What have you found?

Beautiful, beautiful.

What's this beauty?

It's a complete burial, um, late, late period, like 600 BC.

More than 2,600 years old.

The bones, it's, um…

collapsed, as you see.

It still has the equipment for the afterlife.

The box, Mr. Ahmed?

Yes, a very beautiful box, Foreman Mustafa.

A unique piece, Mr. Ahmed.

Hmm…

- Is it a game, Mr. Ahmed?

Yeah, Senet. It's a bit like chess.

Wow. These people were so cool to play chess.

Look what's inside.

This is bone.

Must've had a function in the game.

Hmm.

We can arrange them like this and play,

-you and I, Mr. Ahmed.

This is, um, something to play,

like chess in our life today.

In ancient times, it's called Senet.

I don't know exactly how they can play.

I don't understand, because here, we have like, uh, 20 places.

And that one has 30.

I don't know the function of it, how they can play.

…14, 15, 17…

-…19. - These are bones.

They look like vertebrae.

- Where do the bones go? - I don't know.

-No one knows how to arrange them. - Mm.

Put them all next to each other.

Mr. Sabry!

What's up, Osama?

Foreman, there's a hole in the cliff!

Mr. Sabry!

Have you got a flashlight?

Mahdi, get a flashlight!

Faster, Mahdi!

There's a skull.

-That's two, three skulls. - Hmm.

Looks like a stack of burials inside.

Look, boss.

Look, there's something beautiful here.

- Where? - Right there!

Look, see? It's there!

There.

Looks like a hollow of around three meters.

I think…

this hole is from around 13th and the 12th century BC.

We now clean this to see where's the entrance of this hole?

Because it must be in this area.

Let's bring it all down.

Give me your hand, Osama.

Oh, whoa!

-Very beautiful, Dr. Mohammad!

Clear a path.

It is a burial chamber.

We discover in it some wooden coffins…

…and some bones.

I think there's another entrance here, Dr. Mohammad.

And we also find another hole.

There's a big cavity in here.

Dr. Mustafa comes and we start to find the coffin,

wooden coffin.

Let's go! One… two… three!

Lift, Hamada!

The colors are beautiful, God bless.

Gather your strength, you lot! Put your backs into it!

Move it straight away!

Come on, lift! Lift, boy, lift!

Easy, easy!

With them, Ashraf!

This is all… For me and for all Saqqara, it's unique.

Some missions working for one, two or three months,

and nothing found.

And here, as you see today,

every 30 seconds, we found something new.

So, in all this one year, complete one year from April to April,

we have three storerooms complete,

full of masterpieces,

and that one in the lab, with Dr. Ashraf,

will have also many boxes full of masterpieces.

All of these things found here at Saqqara, in our site.

- Dr. Mohammad? - Yes?

- There are bones here.

- What's that? - A skull.

Is it just a skull on its own? Not part of a burial or anything?

All right, look, Osama. Grab that!

Look out, Osama.

There's a head…

- A skull? - Yeah.

-All the bones are piled in this corner. - Hmm. Hmm.

I think it's more than one person.

This shaft is strange for us.

We didn't find a burial chamber in this shaft.

It's just two meters and stop.

But we find the remains of two skeletons.

Hmm.

It looks like it's standing because the bones go…

uh… uh, from top to bottom.

There are things that are turned over, but they're small as well.

Why these people buried this way?

Why they didn't make a coffin for each one?

I think they are buried quickly in this shaft.

I mean, it's been crammed in here.

Could be something happened to the family of Wahtye.

So, on the glabella…

it is smooth, it's not that…

prominent,

so she is a female.

Most probably a nice lady.

Still, we don't know her age.

The middle shaft was another bag with totally destroyed bones,

totally covered by mud.

It's very fragile.

This mandible is pushed to the front.

I think because the effect of the mud.

Still, we need to clean the teeth in order to see her age.

I found the skull of an old woman,

more than 55.

So I'm trying to see something about how… how did this woman die.

The old woman had, uh…

some swelling here in the mandible,

in the inner side of the mandible.

The bone was distended, uh, from inside

with a cystic-like swelling.

I think I removed most of the mud.

We are lucky to find it because the bone was in a terrible situation.

It's not here.

This is another person.

They are not one.

Young, very young.

Small person.

No, this is the right temple.

I think we have three here.

And I think this is a mandible of…

an adult woman, I think.

This hole have two women and one child.

Old woman, younger woman, and a child, I think so.

So, in shaft number three?

-Two women. -Two women.

About how old?

One is over 50.

Probably his mother then.

And the other one,

you can say she was in her thirties from the wear on the teeth.

It might be the wife.

- All right, Doctor.

Anything else with them?

Yes, a child's bones.

The age isn't very clear.

-Bones of child, age unknown.

Really, a fourth child?

Maybe so.

Ahmed, we have four children.

-Are there four on the walls? -Yes, there are four.

Three boys and a girl.

The three boys might have been in that shaft,

and here, the two ladies with the girl.

They buried the females together?

The girl with the mother and the wife.

It's a good theory.

This is his family lying beside each other.

From their ages and the situation of the bones,

we must have strong suspicions

that the deaths of all these people were connected somehow.

Wahtye's life, it was very complicated.

What happened for his family?

Died at the same time? Or one by one?

Why they died so early like this?

I can't imagine myself.

I'm so lucky.

I have three daughters and one son.

Rawda, the smallest one…

Four years. I love her so much.

I think if I lost my son or daughters…

I put myself instead of him…

I can't believe.

It's very, very sad.

To lose the whole family?

It's terrible.

I think there's some tragedy

in the last part of life of Wahtye.

But how? We don't know at this time.

So we still have puzzle.

We need to find Wahtye to work this out.

And there's only one place left to look.

-Put your back into it! - Yes, Doctor!

Whatever shaft you go into, you jinx it!

You should read some of the Qur'an in the morning!

I did, Doctor!

Ghareeb, I like you, but you're jinxing the whole thing!

No, Doctor! I don't know what to say.

-If you'd taken more care of your men… - Take more care than this?

- Should I buy them chocolates?

God will deal with you, Mustafa.

Look, Mr. Sabry, the limestone is great.

This breakage is old. Broken from long ago. See?

It's the upper part of a beautiful stone statue.

-Yes, very beautiful. - And the wig is wonderful.

The details are amazing.

-Mr. Ahmed. What's this beauty? - Hey!

I sent for you immediately.

You know the reliefs that we found a few days ago?

-The King Rameses II ones? -Surely it's no coincidence?

Yes. They're from a chapel above, I think.

So we found, three days ago, uh, very nice reliefs from the same…

from the Ramesside time, with the cartouche of King Rameses II.

It was very clear.

And today, we have this one, also the style of, uh, Ramesside.

That's many more than 3,300 years old.

Uh, the tomb of this man must be close to here.

Maybe it's our part of, uh, the hill here,

near, um, the wall over there.

It's broken.

-I wonder, Ahmed… - Hmm?

Remember those two pieces of statue that we found?

-In the first season? -Part in the first and part in second.

Do you think this might fit with them?

Yeah, boss, I hope so.

As-salamu alaykum.

Look, Dr. Medhat. Remember the statue from last season?

- That was in several pieces? -In two pieces…

-We've put them together! - You have? Where is it?

Come, have a look.

God bless you!

Can we check that piece?

Bring it over, Mr. Ahmed.

This is the part we found last May at the top of the site.

And this one, we found in October at the base of a shaft at the bottom.

Give it to Dr. Ashraf.

Look, look. Move back, move back.

-Lower. Give me a second.

No, go back up a bit.

-Hold it! No, hold it! -Let go. Let go!

It's standing alone… Now support it!

- Perfect! Perfect!

-All right. Perfect, perfect. -As soon as I saw it, I knew it would fit.

Beautiful. Very beautiful.

-Perfect.

Thank God our brains are still working.

Nobody can imagine that this statue…

- …three pieces,

became complete statue.

So we are sure that we have something hidden below the sand.

We need to search for the tomb of the owner of the statue.

I'm sure we can find it, inshallah, this season.

-How's it going? -All good, boss!

There's a gap here.

What do you have there? Move the debris to the south. Gentle.

-Easy, easy! - Hold on, hold on.

Mr. Hamada will come down now.

When we go down to the bottom of a shaft…

particularly the shafts in Wahtye's tomb, we know that the rock is weak.

To me, this is the door to paradise.

I want to see him. I want to get closer to him.

I see an opening to the west in front of me.

The width of the opening is equal to the width of the shaft.

- About a meter? - Yeah.

The entrance has widened.

- Yes. - Easier to see now?

- Yes. - What can you see?

One second.

I'll make sure before I get too excited.

Hmm.

-What? - Just give me a second.

Oh…

Whoo!

It's Wahtye, manager!

Wahtye! We've found him!

Thank God! What have you got down there? Tell me!

-A wooden coffin! -Finally we found Wahtye!

- Great, great! - Thank God!

Congratulations, boss! A thousand congratulations, Hamada!

This will be the first time he sees light.

You're lucky, Mr. Hamada.

Very lucky!

You're the first person to see the burial from the chamber.

You're the first to see Wahtye.

- Dr. Mohammad! - Yes, boss?

The skeleton of Wahtye is in here.

Great.

- I've found the skull. - Thank God.

Hmm.

-Mr. Hamada? - Yes?

- Are all the bones there? - Yes, all of them.

Thank God.

It's so curious that in all the extravagance of this tomb,

now that we've cleared the shafts,

-there are only two burial chambers. - Hmm.

This main shaft has…

a simple wooden coffin.

The story of this man still holds more riddles.

I think any father who loses his children is left with a scar inside them.

But we felt his statues portray

a sense of cheerfulness.

So maybe the tomb was already finished before his children died.

Because the only place I sensed true sadness

was in his burial chamber.

There were no signs of luxury or indulgence.

The coffin was just regular wood,

and he wasn't even mummified that well.

Maybe the shock of his children's death brought him to this.

-Manager! - Yes, boss!

The face of Wahtye!

- Yes? - Right in front of me.

-Wahtye has finally made an appearance! - Wonderful!

In very good condition.

Thank God.

We thought all would become clear when we found the burial chamber,

but there is more to discover.

We still need to find out how he died,

but it's something very beautiful

which fills your heart with joy…

to reveal the face of Wahtye.

Breathe a sigh of relief

and say, we've reached Wahtye.

Here is the tomb and there's its owner.

Now the picture is complete.

Has he arrived safely?

- He's arrived. -Thank God!

The skeleton is, um…

is, uh, kept better than the other one.

And though he's a man, but still having some feminine features for his skull.

He seems to be a very delicate man.

He's about 35 years old.

I think this was Wahtye.

At last, I met him.

He doesn't have that strong or rough muscle attachment,

which may indicate that he was a fine man with a fine job.

Maybe because he's a master.

He was the master of all these things.

The skull of Wahtye was showing, uh, thickening of the bone.

We can lay him here.

And these can give us an idea

that there was something happening inside these bones.

It's very interesting to be close to them

and to feel them as if I'm feeling his pains and…

…and suffering. I'm trying to.

It's not that easy, but I'm trying to feel that.

Okay.

The shape of his lower limb bones are not that healthy

because the knee is torted to inside.

This should be like this, and this should be like this.

I think that, uh, angle should be externally rotated,

but in this man,

instead of… of… of being this,

no, he has it like this.

As if he was walking like this.

I think he was, uh… weakened.

These bones weren't, uh, healthy.

Maybe he suffered a lot of pains.

They were eager for blood…

and that's why the bones are distended.

Which can tell us…

that this person may have some sort of anemia.

And the same swelling was found in the mom.

We have congenital causes of anemia.

But, uh, this is, I think, a remote idea because both died in different age.

So it's not that common.

But, uh, by putting the whole situation of that,

we may think of some sort of, um, a disease…

or epidemic.

Most probably malaria.

Which may affect this whole family.

And if that's true, that would change ancient Egyptian history.

Thank Allah.

Thanks be to Allah alone…

God's mercy is for the merciful.

Be merciful to those who walk the earth.

It is one of the, uh, rare examples,

to find all the people who are depicted in the walls in the tomb

are buried in the shafts in the tomb.

And this worldly life is but play and folly…

We thank our God for this full story

about this family.

Wahtye is pleased of us,

and we are pleased of Wahtye.

It is a communication. It's cooperation.

We made Wahtye famous after 4,500 years.

So, if Wahtye comes now,

he thanks us because of what we did for him.

But we thank Wahtye, because without Wahtye,

our work would very quickly be forgotten.

We got the wrong idea.

These are their dreams. This is not the reality.

We felt that they put their photos on the walls.

No, they don't have that belief.

They are not like us.

We just take our photos on Facebook? Like no, this is not their Facebook.

This is their dreams.

Because they believe in the other life much, much more

than they believe in their first life.

And that's why they made the dreams of the other life on the walls,

and this is their first life.

That's why you get a lot of mistakes about history.

Seeing the great temples, the great statues,

and you think everything in history was perfect.

And then, when you see the people, you discover they're like us.

Exactly like us.

This is the real story.

After we finished Wahtye's tomb,

all the team was very, very optimistic that we can find something

and we come back again next season.

But the head of the mission came to visit us…

…and he gave us very bad news.

We must finish this season after just two days.

The government's budget finished.

We need to complete our work.

Remove everything…

…because we must leave after two days.

Usually, in the last week of the work,

you try to secure the site and save it.

Ghareeb, help him.

Sometimes, you have a surprise.

The cliff face looks good.

Because, when you clean some place…

Get a mattock quick!

…sometimes you discover something important.

Where are the empty buckets? Come on! Grab that one by your feet!

Come around this way, Doctor.

"To-Bi-Mis…"

"To-Bi… Ben To-Bi-Mis."

"Ben… Ben To-Bi-Mis."

Look, "Judge," "The Great Judge."

The Bubasteion necropolis, I must say…

…is a very strange place.

It always gives us what we aren't expecting…

…and that's a wonderful thing.