The Dead Vault

Buried Alive in the Ohio Mounds




The Dead Vault




I


Prologue:


The dynasty XVIII 1570-1293 BC—from the diary of a mound maker, Hesmaglig, from Egypt, Memphis; written in hydrographs, and kept hidden in a vault within a mound in North America, in a land called Ohio, discovered in the year AD 2002. The scribing was found on the pyre within the vault on sandstone and the paper-reed [papyrus].


II

The History


I left Egypt for a few different reasons, Akhenaten was Pharaoh, and he looked more like a hawk than a king among kings. He was on his second wife, and I know he still loved his first though. No matter what anyone says. I never liked him; he was changing everything, our beliefs, or souls. He neglected our rituals, sanctuaries; in his desert home he lived alone among the scorpions like himself, I also lived there with his entourage for many years. I am only lucky to be able to write this, for surely the royal pharaohs assassins will seek me out until they know I am dead. But I will fool them for the third time. They will not have their way of sweet revenge. Akhenaten’s son Tutankhamen is now enshrined in the pharaoh’s shadow because of me and my wife and my two friends and a few other people. And so the seer has told me many things for the future.
Things that will never be told to mankind should I not write these down with the little air I have left in the tomb, deep within this mound, I must use sparingly.
I have chosen this way to die for not many people are allowed such a luxury, my mound contains a vault like appearance of timber, 12 feet by 13 feet with in the center of the mound. The mound if you are looking upon it from a distance will stand 20-feet high. Not like the pyramids of Egypt, but it will do. I have some limestone figurines we took with us from Egypt, I am writing my last minutes on them, along with the papyrus. For the air hole that leads down to my vault has been plugged up now, and so it is just a matter of time. The future must know the truth what happened on that day…that day my wife and I, along with our two friends were hired to kill, bash in the head of the pharaoh’s son, who was really the pharaoh.
His father changed everything. New gods or should I say, a new God, new everything; but those who hired us, betrayed us, used us as an escape-goat, they are the ones who has sent the bone collectors to fine us, and bring our bones back to them. For they will know me by my bones, for I am 7’3” tall. Yes, big boned, as is my wife. I do not regret what I did, for it was for the gods and the goddesses, and the land of Egypt, but to be betrayed by the very ones that hired you.


III

The Kill


It was late in the evening when I guarded the door, my wife was keeping the two guards busy, she had to surrender her body to them, let them have what they pleased to keep them occupied, but I told her it was for the better, it was for Egypt, and so they fondled her every part, and used her like a sex-rag-doll while I guarded the door that led into the young pharaohs sleeping chamber. He fell to sleep, and my two friends one on each side of the bed, stood silently, and the one on the left side of the bed, it was easy for him, who I will not name, to give the young pharaoh a blow on the back of his head, IT DID DAMAGE TO THE SKULL. And then they both panicked and I ran with my others companions.
I stopped behind one of the great pillars of the palace, and my wife was pinned against it as the guards, six of them now were taking their turns on my wife, I stabbed all six in a rage, stabbed them in their hearts, then grabbed my naked wife, putting a cotton robe around her, I had carried for this very occasion, and made our escape.


IV

The Priesthood


The Amun priesthood had the young pharaoh saying what they wanted for a while when he was eleven years of age. But when he defied them, they took a disliking to him. They wanted their temples to be restored and the gods reinstated. They wanted undone, what his father had done. I think Akhenaten became ill with this one God concept, maybe he got it from the Hebrews, no one really knows. Everything came from the office of Memphis, the dispatch to kill the pharaoh, and the money to be paid us in gold.
It was a hot year that was over 12-years ago, I remember when the army of scribes had to go to many places throughout Egypt to record how much grain was collected from the farmers. The Nile was high those years if I recall a few floods.


V

The Crossing


My wife is lying down now next to me, she is dying, her lungs are not as good as mine, and I am breathing very slowly. It took us two years to build this mound, in the far off land, west of Egypt. It took us three months on the mighty ocean to cross, until we found land that was several years ago. And then we went farther west, and then north, where I found one of my far off relatives, who were related to the great “Queen of the Serpent Watcher.” I heard of the legend, and knew I had a heritage that went back to beings that were half human and half spirit. It was said that an angelic-serpent being cohabitated with my great, great, great grandmother, and became “The Serpent Queen,” when she died, the angelic-being that looked like a serpent, built a mound not all that far from my mound, in the shape of a Serpent, about seventy-five feet long.
My mound is not special in those respects, but it is classical in that it has this chamber we are in. On top is pebbles, and then three feet of earth, and then sand, and then earth, and then more sand and way down is an alter I had put in place for the gods. Yes I buried myself alive…I am the mound maker, this is my diary, and my roots are the Serpent Queen I die with dignity how will you die my friend? So think of me as not bad for doing this.
It seems like my wife has stopped breathing, she was a good wife, obeyed me to the last moment: --no, I see her chest, it still moves, there is not much air left. My lungs feel heavy as if to say they are filled up with water, no room to hold air. It is a good time to die, for outside is very cold, and the white snows from the heavens have covered the land. I have never seen this kind of cold in Egypt; I do hope the assassins the betrayers sent to kill are freezing to death. Poetic justice is always sweet revenge.


VII

Ancestry & Genealogy


This mound is my pyramid, and this land is my Egypt, for Egypt is simply the residue of the great Atlantis, where my Serpent Queen Grandmother of long ago once came from. I was told this, and I have no reason to doubt. But Egypt is puffed up, and will not listen to reason; they think they are the only empire worthy of the gods. But Atlantis sank, as will Egypt.
I have told you I did this for my motherland, Egypt. Let me explain, Egypt was dying, and now with Tutankhamen on the throne, the young pharaoh, it was a new beginning, and we all felt that Egypt would gain its revitalization back through him and back through the temple priests who where telling the young Pharaoh what to say, do, and act, but the Nubia kept cutting off necessary goods to us, irreplaceable recourses we needed. And so our economy depended on the fact we control Asia and Nubia, if it meant war so be it. But the new King of Kings was looking a little hesitant, looking at this strange one God his father proclaimed to be, the one and only God. He could not be a martyr for the people, oh now that would not do: -- death by accident was better for the young pharaoh.
As you can see, I am giving my life for my beliefs, my wife gave her body, and we all gave something. Before, that is when Akhenaten was alive; the army was simply his bodyguard, no more, no less. Almost useless, but they kept him alive. Egypt will not find a more faithful man than I. Yet she wants to kill me. I violated my values for Egypt, for I liked Tutankhamen, and his half-sisters; and I liked Smenkare, the half brother to Tutankhamen.
I was Tutankhamen teacher for a year; I helped him learn the hieroglyphs [inscription], the phonetic. I had taught him the first twenty-five, other teachers gave the others to him, and he learned many on his own, through self-study. And so you see, I had access to the palace.
As I lay here almost dead now, still a few more things to write, I remember the hours, so many hours I worked devoted to his writing correctly with a reed bush made soft. I had him practice on pottery first, then on papyrus.
I did not teach him how to swim, but I watched him many times on the banks of the Nile with his sisters, and the royal guards watching for crocodiles. At nine years old, he was already driving a chariot, I’m not sure who taught him that, but one day I saw him from my palace window.


VII

The Ways of Akhenaten


My wife just grabbed my hand, she is dead I think. Yes, she is dead, my only sole mate who dreamed the same dreams I did, who cried when I did, who died for me, at my call, may the gods be with her, and if they are not, maybe the dreamers god will be with her, that is to say, Akhenaten. I do not have the full understanding of the new religion that came about, for only Akhenaten really knew I think, but I do understand one thing, He was a sole God, who Akhenaten felt made the earth alone, no one to help Him; without the help of other gods that is.
Akhenaten was a poet of sorts, and I remember the “Hymn to Aten” which explains that there is only one God—the Aten, and he created everything, earth, people, everything. This is what brought him hate. It was no more Egypt, but more about a poets love for a new god. Thus came the new policies, which was too divergent from the traditional ones.
“Goodbye my love, my life…my wife…” she is dead now. I will be dead in a little bit too. But Nefertiti was her name, the Pharaoh’s wife; it stands for beautiful, and that she was. Oh yes, sweet love. Many stelas were erected with her name on them in Egypt.
Akhenaten preached love and peace, and caused the land to become darken with the call of war—for no country wants to bow their knees to Egypt anymore. To be strong, and keep peace you must be able to fight, conquer. No, Akhenaten was not a good ruler, the army was lost and ignored, as was the revenue to collect tax and pay for services. But the Poet Pharaoh carved on tomb walls Nefertiti scenes. Yes the princess stood tall. She had whatever she wanted.
For the price of peace he gave gold to the people. And just where did he get his gold, it was from the contributions expected to be brought to Egypt from other kingdoms, and now they were saying, they did not have it. And the Pharaoh turned his back, and in time all such shipments stopped.


VIII

Death in a Vault


By the time you read these stones I write on, and laid upon this pyre [death alter], it will be but ancient memories; they will not stir you as they do my psyche. Images I write, landscape I talk about. But do not let your first impressions take hold of you, look at the architecture, the earthwork, it is done by me, this is my temple. Many tones of stones ravel on top my head now. Rooted in the earth, this is the greatest temple of all. My great…grandmother the Serpent Queen, her shrine which is the Serpent mound, has an egg in it, but it is not an egg, it is he earth she swallows, for this sphere we are on is not round, I have been told that by my seer. That information my Queen knew. And the great flood that was not long ago, about 2500-years ago, in a previous age, the mother goddess my Queen through the seer transmitted this knowledge to me. My seer was called the Python. I have but a few minutes before my light goes out, and I will then be dead, but let me tell you this, for the future: There are multiple layers of secrets within theses mounds, especially Serpent Mound, may the discoverers of the future use their imagination to uncover them, for they will fight with disbelief more than possibilities… light…out… out…out….