Meroe

"Is there any reason why the children were buried here?" Jan was struggling to get Rasheed to understand her question. "Because they were dead." Keith chipped in, unhelpfully. We were stood near a small reconstructed pyramid in the necropolis for the young royals of the ancient city of Meroe. The main site, just across the road, has one of the most photogenic collection of pyramids in the world. If you ignore the pylons and power cables behind them.


Our journey forward in time had taken us across the Bayuda desert, in a meandering loop of the Nile, along the route the last king of Napata would have taken when the city was sacked by the Egyptians in 591BC. Our journey, like his, ended at Meroe, the capital of Kush from the 6th century BC to the 3rd century AD.

After a pyramid by pyramid tour, we had a look at the remains of the royal city - well, the little of it that's been excavated. It once covered a vast area, reflecting its wealth through trading and particularly Meroe's speciality, iron-work. The few buildings uncovered include the ornate royal baths, a large Amun temple and a curious smaller one that a Queen had commissioned to celebrate her victory over the Romans. She probably only defeated a lost and starving garrison, but as her booty included the bust of Emperor Augustus, she wanted a place to show it off.

The Baths

Although Meroe was the capital, most kings continued to be buried in the royal necropoli of Nuri, El Kurru and Jebel Barkal until the 3rd century BC. After then, the royals were all buried on a small, sandy hill outside of the city. There are 40 pyramids split over two sites a few hundred yards apart, plus the royal children's one a kilometre away. 

We first saw them at sunset. After a day in the car, we'd decided to walk the 2km from the tented camp rather than wait until the next morning. Many of the pyramids are in good condition and five small ones have been fully restored, so they looked pretty impressive in their sand dune setting, glowing in the warmth of the evening sun. The locals on their camels thought we were nuts and kept trying to offer us a lift, paid of course. Keith laughed, then pointed to his belly and his balls saying "I'd prefer to walk, thanks, to lose this and keep these." One of the more persistent camel drivers (his name sounded like Diddyman) had a high-pitched voice that Keith also used to justify his decision not to have a ride. Not that the camel driver understood, but we had a laugh.



We eventually put them off with a "Maybe tomorrow", but then got pounced on the next morning. That's one of the downsides of being the only visitors. The camel drivers were all happy to be photographed, and Keith took one for the team when he mounted Diddyman's camel for the short ride from the Northern site to the bigger, newer Southern site. It had to be done.


All of the pyramids have a similar design, each with an east-facing funerary chapel whose walls were decorated with bas-reliefs depicting similar scenes to those we had seen in the El Kurru tombs. Two Egyptian vultures, flying just above the pyramids, added to the ambiance. It was lovely wandering around by ourselves, exploring the inside of each pyramid at leisure. For such a fantastic historical site, it was surprisingly neglected with many of the funerary chapels part full of sand or badly damaged by graffiti. Where are you UNESCO when you're needed?


We'd just emerged from the last, and had sat down for a rest, when a group of German tourists arrived on the scene and immediately got pounced on by the camel drivers. It was time to escape.

This is the stiff they put in museums