KV7

Tomb KV7 was the tomb of Ramesses II, called Ramesses the Great, an ancient Egyptian pharaoh of the Nineteenth Dynasty. It is located in the Valley of the Kings, opposite the tomb of his sons, KV5, and near the tomb of his son and successor Merenptah, KV8.

KV7 follows the bent-axis plan of tombs of the earlier Eighteenth Dynasty. The entrance is dug into the Theban limestone hillside near the valley floor, and the first gate has a lintel showing the solid disk flanked by Nephthys and Isis, with Ma'at kneeling above the heraldic plants of Lower and Upper Egypt. The passage descends for about 58 meters (190 feet) into the bedrock at an angle that varies between 12 and 22 degrees. Gates C and D are painted with texts from the Litany of Re and images of the four sons of Horus. The passage then opens into a small well chamber and a pillared chamber, and continues about 12 meters (39 feet) before turning right to end in burial chamber J, partly carved in a layer of Esna shale, which has four doorways leading to four further rooms.

The walls carry images of funerary objects intended to help the pharaoh in the afterlife, and scenes and passages from the Book of Gates, the Book of the Dead, the Book of the Heavenly Cow, the Amduat, the Litany of Re and the Opening of the Mouth. In a recess between the 3rd and 4th corridors appears the cartouche of his Great Royal Wife, Nefertari, who was the only queen to appear in her husband's tomb during the entire Ramesside Period. The tomb was placed in an unusual location and has been badly damaged by the flash floods that periodically sweep through the valley, so much of the decoration is damaged beyond repair.

Christian Leblanc, as part of a joint Franco-Egyptian mission in 1991, determined that construction began before the end of Ramesses II's second year on the throne and took no more than ten or twelve years. After the tomb was almost broken into during the Deir el-Medina strikes, his mummy was moved to the tomb of his father Seti I and then to the mummy cache in DB320. His original granite sarcophagus was later reused by a high priest of the 21st Dynasty named Menkheperre, around 1000 BCE.

Tourists of the Third Intermediate and Roman periods left abundant potsherds in the burial chamber, and Greek visitors carved their names into the first corridor. Henry Salt and, in 1829, Champollion worked to clear the earth that had filled the tomb. Richard Lepsius crawled to its end in 1844–1845 and made the first precise plan, and Theodore Davis and Harry Burton excavated it in 1913–1914, work renewed by Howard Carter in 1917–1921, which revealed the first remains of the royal funerary furniture, now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the British Museum.

KV7 follows the bent-axis plan of tombs of the earlier Eighteenth Dynasty: the entrance to the tomb is dug into the Theban limestone hillside near the valley floor. The first gate, Gate B, has decorations on the lintel "of the solid disk flanked by Nephthys and Isis, representations of Ma'at kneeling above the heraldic plants of Lower and Upper Egypt, and door jambs contain[ing] the names and epithets of the King."

"The passage descends for about 58 meters (190 feet) into the bedrock at an angle that varies between 12 and 22 degrees." Gates C and D are painted with texts from the Litany of Re and images of the four sons of Horus respectively.

The passage opens into a small well chamber, then into a pillared chamber designated F. F has two directions. Turning right, are two more chambers. Going straight, the passage "continues approximately level for another 12 meters (39 feet), then turns to the right and terminates in the burial chamber J, which is partly carved in a layer of Esna shale." J has four doorways leading to two small (Ja and Jb) and two larger rooms (Jc and Jd), the last of these having two offshoots of its own.

Other decorations in the tomb include images of funerary objects intended to help the pharaoh in the afterlife; and scenes and passages from the Book of Gates, the Book of the Dead, the Book of the Heavenly Cow, the Amduat, the Litany of Re and the Opening of the Mouth. In a recess of the doorway between the 3rd and 4th corridors, the cartouche of his Great Royal Wife, Nefertari, appears. During the entire Ramesside Period (the 19th and 20th Dynasties), she was the only queen who appeared in her husband's tomb.

Unlike other tombs in the area, Tomb KV7 was placed in an unusual location and has been badly damaged by the flash floods that periodically sweep through the valley. Because of this, much of the decoration has been damaged beyond repair.