Ahmed Rassul was searching the hillside for a lost goat, he could hear it bleating and so he followed the sounds until he found himself stood at the edge of a shaft that the goat had obviously fallen into, Ahmed climbed down a rope into the shaft, once inside the tomb he realized he had found a great collection of mummies, so he retrieved the goat and went in search of his brothers to tell them of his discovery, together the brothers decided that they needed a plan to keep people away from the tomb and protect their discovery ensuring their wealth to come. They returned to the tomb and threw a dead donkey inside the shaft, the stench of the donkey as it decayed would erase any further curiosity from others, and possibly convincing any suspicious minds that a demon had woken in the tomb. Over the next ten years the tomb robbers prospered with their treasure trove that gradually made its way to the hands of collectors and auction houses. Eventually The Antiquities service realized that a tomb must have been found, and so Sir Gaston Maspero sent one of the museum staff Emil Brugsch to discover where the artifacts were coming from. Emile presented himself as a wealthy buyer which gained the trust of the traders, and finally led him to the Abd Rasul Brothers. The brothers were arrested and tortured and despite a severe beating on the soles of the feet they would not give their discovery away, eventually after a month they were released, but then the police harassed their family and the villagers at Quarna continuously, until eventually one of the brothers confessed to the police where the tomb was to avoid any further harassment of themselves or the rest of the villagers.
Once the Rassul brothers confessed to knowing the whereabouts of the tomb they begrudgingly led Emile Brugsch to the cliffs at the side of Hatshepsut’s mortuary temple at Dier El Bahari and he was guided down a rope into a tomb where to his amazement he found not one mummy case but the remains of over forty mummies. The tomb is known as DB320 it had originally been the family vault of Pinedjem 1 a High Priest of Amun during the 21st dynasty who had declared himself a king. During his rule He had removed some of the kings from their own tombs, possibly to acquire some of their wealth, after his death further kings moved them again and amidst all the confusion the kings all finally were found in this one vault, Some of the mummy cases held the bodies of the greatest pharaohs of all time, including Seti 1 whose empty sarcophagus had originally been found in his tomb by Giovanni Belzoni, Ramses 11 ‘The Great’, Tuthmosis 1, the father of Hatshepsut, who had also been the first King to be buried in The Valley of The Kings. His burial had been carried out in great secrecy and entrusted to a High Court Official named Ineni, Tuthmosis 11 and his son Tuthmosis 111 princes, princesses, court officials and royal grandchildren. Queen Nefatari’s mummy case was also found in the cache and took sixteen men to lift its weight and move it alone. The Coffin of Ramses 1 was found in this vault but his mummy was missing, it has since been discovered that the robbers had sold Ramses 1 to a Canadian man for seven pounds
After 3,000 years of seclusion the Royal mummies left Dier El Bahari and were carried by donkeys and mules to the banks of the Nile where they were transported to Cairo. Women came to the riverbank and wailed in mourning for the deceased kings and their kin. Never in the history of any nation has there been such an awesome entourage of deceased royalty, the glory of Ancient Egypt rose again as their pharaohs traveled to safety in Cairo, their final resting place, where modern scientists now continue the work of some of the ancient priests to protect and preserve the mummies of their kings.
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