Norman de Garis Davies

Dates: 
1865 - 1941

British Egyptologist; he was born Broughton, Lancashire 14 Sept. 1865, son of Revd James Dickerson Davies and Emma Mary de Garis; he entered Glasgow University, 1884, with a scholarship from Dr. Williams’ Library, London; MA, 1889; BD, 1891; later postgraduate at Marburg Univ.; Hon. member of German Arch. Inst., 1928; Hon. MA, Oxon; he was Congregational Minister at Ashton-under-Lyne where he became acquainted with Miss Kate Bradbury (afterwards Mrs. F. Ll. Griffith) who interested him in Egyptology, which he began to study; he next went to Australia 145 as a Unitarian Minister in Melbourne until 1898, when he joined Petrie at Dendera; during the following years he copied an enormous number of tombs for the Arch. Survey of the EEF: Sheikh Said, 1901, Der el-Gebrawi, 1902, and Amarna, 1903-8; these, together with five more tombs at Thebes were published in 10 vols. of the Arch. Survey memoirs, both text and plates being executed by Davies; the merit of this work was recognized by the award of the Leibniz medal of the Prussian Acad.; he also accompanied Breasted in his expedition to Nubia, and assisted Reisner at the pyramids; he married in 1907, Miss A. M. Cummings, herself an accomplished artist and a trained copyist; he then settled at Thebes and worked for many seasons copying tombs for the MMA, which were published in a series of sumptuous volumes; in addition to these larger works he made many contributions to JEA and other journals; he published, The Mastaba of Ptahhetep and Akhethetep at Saqqarah, 2 vols. 1900-1; The Rock Tombs of Sheikh Said, 1901; The Rock Tombs of Deir el Gebrawi, 2 vols. 1902; The Rock Tombs of El Amarna, 6 vols. 1903-8; The Tomb of Nakht at Thebes, 1907; Five Theban Tombs, being those of Mentuherkhepeshef, User, Daga, Nehemaway and Tati, 1913; The Tomb of Antefoker, Vizier of Sesostris I, and of his wife Senet, No. 60, with chap. by A. H. Gardiner, 1920; The Tomb of Puyemrê at Thebes, 2 vols. 1922-3; The Tombs of Two Officials of Tuthmosis the Fourth, Nos. 75 & 90, 1923; The Tomb of Two Sculptors at Thebes, 1925; Two Ramesside Tombs at Thebes, 1927; The Tomb of Ken-Amun at Thebes, 2 vols., with G. R. Hopgood and Nina M. Davies, 1930; The Tomb of Nefer-hotep at Thebes, 2 vols., 1933; The Tombs of Menkheperrasonb, Amenmose, and another. Nos. 86, 112, 42, 226, with Nina M. Davies, 1933; Paintings from the Tomb of Rekh-mi-Re at Thebes, 1935; The Tomb of the Vizier Ramose, based upon prelim. work by T. E. Peet and with H. Burton, Nina M. Davies, W. B. Emery, and G. S. Mileham. 1941; The Tomb of Rekh-mi-Re at Thebes, 2 vols. 1943; Seven Private Tombs at Kurnah, ed. A. H. Gardiner, 1948; The Temple of Hibis in El Khargeh Oasis, pt. 3, ed. Ludlow Bull and Lindsley F. Hall, 1953; A Corpus of Inscribed Egyptian Funerary Cones, ed. M. F. Laming Macadam, pt. I, 1957; his notebooks are in the Griffith Institute, Oxford, and a number of illustrated ostraca, small antiquities, and his large collection of funerary cones are in the Ashmolean Museum; he died at The Copse, Hinksey Hill, Berkshire, 5 Nov. 1941.