1. provide a comprehensive and accurate published record of a rare and endangered archaeological site.
With permission of the Ministry of State of Antiquities and under the auspices of the Australian Centre for Egyptology (ACE), the team will undertake a detailed record of the architectural features, inscriptions and imagery contained in each inscribed tomb at Beni Hassan.
Prior to the work undertaken by the ACE, the earlier, and frequently cited, records of the tombs at Beni Hassan include works published by C.R. Lepsius as part of the Prussian Expedition to Egypt (1849); P. Newberry and his colleagues under the auspices of the Egypt Exploration Fund (1893); and the water colour copies of selected scenes and motifs from the tomb of Khnumhotep II by N. de Garis Davies as part of the Metropolitan Museum of Art New York's Graphic Expedition to Egypt (1931).
Work undertaken by the ACE highlighted that the earlier records of Lepsius and Newberry are frequently inaccurate and, furthermore, that some material was deliberately omitted. In particular, the line drawings of the walls published by Newberry are inadequate by modern standards as the figures and hieroglyphs as well as selected animal figures and inanimate objects are inexplicably rendered in solid black, obscuring many significant details.