The necropolis of Der el-Bahari was no doubt used all through the period of the XIth and XIIth Dynasties, and many tombs of that period have been found there.  A large number of these were obliterated by the building of the great temple of Queen Hatshepsu, in the northern part of the cliff-bay.  We know of one queen’s tomb of that period which runs right underneath this temple from the north, and there is another that is entered at the south side which also runs down underneath it.  Several tombs were likewise found in the court between it and the XIth Dynasty temple.  We know that the XVIIIth Dynasty temple was largely built over this court, and we can see now the XIth Dynasty mask-wall on the west of the court running northwards underneath the mass of the XVIIIth Dynasty temple.  In all probability, then, when the temple of Hatshepsu was built, the larger portion of the Middle Kingdom necropolis (of chamber-tombs reached by pits), which had filled up the bay to the north of the Mentuhetep temple, was covered up and obliterated, just as the older VIth Dynasty gallery tombs of Shekh Abd el-Kurna had been appropriated and altered at the same period.

The kings of the XIIth and XIIIth Dynasties were not buried at Thebes, as we have seen, but in the North, at Dashur, Lisht, and near the Fayymn, with which their royal city at Itht-taui had brought them into contact.  But at the end of the XIIIth Dynasty the great invasion of the Hyksos probably occurred, and all Northern Egypt fell under the Arab sway.  The native kings were driven south from the Fayymn to Abydos, Koptos, and Thebes, and at Thebes they were buried, in a new necropolis to the north of Der el-Bahari (probably then full), on the flank of a long spur of hill which is now called Dra’ Abu-’l-Negga, “Abu-’l-Negga’s Arm.”  Here the Theban kings of the period between the XIIIth and XVIIth Dynasties, Upuantemsaf, Antef Nub-kheper-Ra, and his descendants, Antefs III and IV, were buried.  In their time the pressure of foreign invasion seems to have been felt, for, to judge from their coffins, which show progressive degeneration of style and workmanship, poverty now afflicted Upper Egypt and art had fallen sadly from the high standard which it had reached in the days of the XIth and XIIth Dynasties.  Probably the later Antefs and Sebekemsafs were vassals of the Hyksos.  Their descendants of the XVIIth Dynasty were buried in the same necropolis of Dra’ Abu-’l-Negga, and so were the first two kings of the XVIIIth Dynasty, Aahmes and Amenhetep I. The tombs of the last two have not yet been found, but we know from the Abbott Papyrus that Amenhetep’s was here, for, like that of Menttihetep III, it was found intact by the inspectors.  It was a gallery-tomb of very great length, and will be a most interesting find when it is discovered, as it no doubt eventually will be.  Aahmes had a tomb at Abydos, which was discovered by Mr. Currelly, working for the Egypt Exploration Fund.  This, however, like the Abydene tomb of Usert-sen (Senusret)