Exploring Ancient Egypt: The Story of Harold Jones

This exhibition tells Harold’s story, from his birth in Barnsley to his life in Carmarthen and his work in Egypt, his short but brilliant career taking him from the Royal College of Art to some of the most famous sites in Egypt. 

See some of the fascinating objects he discovered alongside his wonderful paintings of tomb scenes in the Valley of the Kings, where he tracked down some of the very first clues to the location of the tomb of Tutankhamun!

Harold Jones’s Early Life

Ernest Harold Jones (1877-1911) was born on 7th March 1877. His parents William and Mary Anne (Marianne) Jones were both from Carmarthen. They lived there until 1876, when William was offered the position as first headmaster of a new School of Art in Barnsley.

So, the couple moved to the Yorkshire town with their two eldest children. They had a third child soon after their arrival, and Harold himself was born there the following year and christened in St. Mary’s Church. 

The family lived near the art school with their four children until 1880, when Harold’s father accepted a new role as head of Carmarthen School of Art and moved back to Wales with his three eldest children. Yet Mary Anne and young Harold were still in Barnsley in 1881, when the census lists 4-year-old Harold as a ‘scholar’.

Harold Jones the Artist

Harold Jones was part of a large family of artists. His parents William and Mary Anne had met at South Kensington Art College in London (later the Royal College of Art), and Mary Anne was described as ‘an artist of note’.

When the family had relocated back to Carmarthen, Harold attended the Queen Elizabeth Grammar School and then the town’s School of Art where his father was headmaster and his mother a teacher. Two of his sisters also worked there as ‘pupil teachers’ (teaching assistants), as did Harold, until he won a scholarship to London’s Royal College of Art in 1902.

As well as painting landscapes, portraits and archaeological subjects he was also inspired by pre-Raphaelite artists such as Lawrence Alma-Tadema, who later asked Harold for his opinion on one of his paintings set in ancient Egypt which last sold for over £28 million.

Harold Jones the Archaeological Artist

Having begun his studies at the Royal College of Art, Harold was diagnosed with tuberculosis and his doctor advised him to move to a drier climate. He could only afford to do this by working, so in 1903 he became an artist on excavations at Beni Hasan in Egypt.

At Beni Hasan he worked as the assistant of archaeologist John Garstang, and the two men lived in one of the ancient rock-cut tombs. There Harold drew and painted the objects they found, and painted portraits of the Egyptians with whom he worked, including local boys Abadi and Mahmoud and excavation foreman Saleh Abd El Nebi.

Harold also painted views of the local landscape to sell to visiting tourists, one of whom was Queen Victoria’s daughter Princess Beatrice who was so impressed by Harold’s artistic skills she later accepted one of his paintings as a gift. 

Harold Jones the Archaeologist

Although Harold had trained as an artist, he soon developed the necessary archaeological skills to run the Beni Hasan excavations himself. He was so useful to his boss Garstang that he returned with him to Egypt each year to work at important sites in southern Egypt.

Beginning at Hierakonpolis, Harold then oversaw excavations at Esna, at Nag’ el-Hassaya near Edfu and at Abydos, sending objects he found at these places back to the Carmarthenshire Antiquarian Society to help them establish a museum in Carmarthen in 1908.

Harold also worked with a team from New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, painting scenes from the northern pyramid site of Lisht and at the ancient city of Amarna, birthplace of a then little-known pharaoh called Tutankhamun. He copied wall scenes showing Tutankhamun’s father Akhenaten, stepmother Nefertiti and their small daughters who were Tutankhamun’s half-sisters.

Harold in the Valley of the Kings

Spending more time in Luxor, Harold’s friends included fellow artist turned-archaeologist Howard Carter, and Lord and Lady Carnarvon who invited him to stay at their home Highclere Castle.

He also met American millionaire Theodore Davis then funding excavations in Luxor’s Valley of the Kings, where his archaeologists were making many discoveries. These included the tomb of Tutankhamun’s father Akhenaten (KV.55) where Harold was asked to draw finds including a large gold shrine. Davis then took Harold on to draw jewellery found in the ‘Gold Tomb’ (KV.56) and to paint scenes in other newly discovered tombs including that of Tutankhamen’s eventual successor King Horemheb (KV.57).

By 1908 Harold had become Davis’s main archaeologist in the valley, finding Tutankhamen’s name on objects including goldwork from tomb KV.58 which Harold discovered in 1909. Now known to be a robber’s stash, his boss Davis wrongly claimed this was the actual tomb of Tutankhamun.

Harold’s Death and Legacy

“the work has been very dusty, being very painful and trying for me... I don’t feel up to taking it on again, if I live so long”

With the pressure of Davis always expecting more new discoveries, Harold’s health declined. He wrote home to his parents that “the work has been very dusty, being very painful and trying for me... I don’t feel up to taking it on again, if I live so long”.

Back in England he spent summer 1910 resting at the home of Carter’s new patron Lord Carnarvon, with Lady Carnarvon herself taking care of him. He then returned to Egypt later that year with his 18 year old brother Cyril to help.

On 7th March 1911 Harold celebrated his 34th birthday in his dig house in the Valley of the Kings, but died there only two days later. His funeral in Luxor was organized by Lord Carnarvon and Howard Carter, who then built on Harold’s legacy to finally discover the real tomb of Tutankhamen in 1922.