The Vizier Rekhmire's Unfinished Mortuary Chapel

Rekhmire was a big deal back in the day. He served as a vizier in Upper Egypt, which is basically the prime minister role. He handled everything from the royal cash to the temple economies. To show off his success, he put up a mortuary chapel in the Theban Necropolis. The architecture is honestly top-tier, especially the corridor that starts at 3 meters high and climbs up to over 8 meters.

The walls are packed with colorful scenes of everyday life and tax collection. You can spot gold being weighed and see monkeys hanging out while you read his massive stone resume of royal duties. There is just one weird catch though. Rekhmire likely never actually used the place. Even though he dropped a fortune on the chapel, his burial site is missing. It might be tucked away somewhere else, possibly even in the Valley of the Kings.

Things took a turn for the worse during the time of Amenhotep II. Someone literally went into the tomb and chipped the faces of Rekhmire, his wife, and his kids right off the walls. They even covered the damage with red paint, basically hitting the erase button on his existence. Later, during the Amarna period, more vandals came through to scrub out every mention of the god Amun.

If you head there now, you can still see the remains of those huge wall paintings. They are some of the best-preserved pieces in the Theban Necropolis. You can also see how the locals lived over the years because the spot served as a home and a stable for centuries, subjected to water infiltrations, soot from fires, and even bat droppings.

Sources: Wikipedia, OpenStreetMap, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons