Les Burdett's story of Kharmoun

The business prospered, people came from all over Egypt, and sometimes strangers from far off lands would bring unusual goods and exotic foods.

It was a great success and soon Tut and Kharmoun hyper-bazaars were springing up the length of the west bank of the Nile; things couldn't be going better.

Then one dark day, at the height of the weekend rush, disaster struck.

Hundreds of miles away in Persia there was an earthquake; the shock wave hit the whole of Egypt. Kharmoun's buildings were all on the west bank of the Nile, built on sand. Poor Kharmoun had only ever seen buildings being built from the walls upwards, and he didn't know they needed sound foundations.

In the space of ten seconds every single building sunk into the sand, leaving just the pointed roofs and the sphinx visible. Thousands of people just disappeared into the ground, never to be seen again.

The pharaoh was stripped of his office and along with Kharmoun was arrested and thrown in jail.

The state jail was a series of cells carved into solid rock and was situated in a valley on the west bank, quite close to Luxor. There criminals were imprisoned for life, along with their ill-gotten gains.

Above the door to their cell the guards carved the prisoners names Tut and Kharmoun, and there they stayed forever.

So that Kharmoun would not be remembered the angry people of Cairo disfigured the sphinx by smashing off the huge nose, and whenever they were asked about the roofs sticking out of the sand, they would simply reply that many people were buried in the chambers beneath them.