Pyramid of Ity


The pyramid of Ity was probably the tomb of Pharaoh who reigned during the 8th dynasty. It has never been discovered and is known only from a cliff-face inscription at Wadi Hammamat in the Eastern Desert, where there were several quarries in Pharaonic times.
The name of the pyramid, Baw-Iti, may be a direct reference to the name of the pyramid of Neferefre, Netjeri-baw-Ra-nefer-ef, from the 5th Dynasty.

The inscription in Wadi Hammamat

The partially damaged inscription records that two ship captains, Ipi and Nikauptah, had been sent on an expedition to the site in order to acquire building material for a pyramid in the first year of Ipi's reign. The inscription's statement of the number of troops on the expedition is damaged and may have been inscribed wrongly, so that it is uncertain what it said: Wolfgang Schenkel reads 200 rowers, 400 pioneers and 200 rtn, while Christoffer Theis reads 200 soldiers and 200 emissaries with 200 men, using line drawings made by Lepsius and Sethe. In addition to Ipi and Nikauptah, the names of two troop leaders, Thiemsaf and Irinakhti, are recorded. Detailed information on the type and amount of stone they sought is not recorded.

Identifications

The English Egyptologist Flinders Petrie tentatively identified Ity with the Sixth dynasty Pharaoh Userkare, whose tomb has not yet been identified, but is probably in the area of Saqqara South known today as Tabbet al-Guesh, north-west of the mortuary complex of Pepi I. Petrie's identification relied solely on his estimation of the inscription to the Sixth Dynasty and the fact that Userkare was the only king of this period whose full titulary was not known. This identification is nowadays deemed conjectural
In the 1930s, Cecil Mallaby Firth suggested that the pyramid of Ity might be the Headless Pyramid at Saqqara. Firth supported this suggestion by reference to some pieces of pink granite and the broken lid of a sarcophagus found there, but could offer no other evidence. The Headless Pyramid has subsequently been identified as the tomb of King Menkauhor Kaiu of the 5th dynasty and Firth's theory is thus obsolete.