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During the First Intermediate Period, the central government collapsed. Lacking the guidance of a strong central administration, various provinces developed self rule and acted independently. Provincial rulers, the nomarchs, aspired to royal privileges among which was the construction of prestigious tombs for themselves. The series of rock-cut tombs at Beni Hasan in Middle Egypt is an elegant example of a cemetery belonging (in part) to a dynasty of nomarchs who ruled the 16th Upper Egyptian nome, known as the "Oryx nome". The dynasty survived well into the Middle Kingdom. Contrary to Egyptian tradition, the tombs were cut on a graphic cliff slope at the east bank of the Nile, because the nome itself had no territory on the west bank. The spacious tombs are well known for the quality and originality of their wall paintings.
Particularly interesting are series of wrestling poses aiming to convey a sequence that could be animated in the viewer's mind, scenes of warfare among the nomes showing tactics of attack and defence as well as the weaponry of the period, birds of many species in various stages of flight and scenes of daily life.
Aparticularly original scene from the tomb of Khnumhotep depicts a delegation of semites (Aamou) who came to trade galena, a black substance used by the Egyptians as eye paint. The members of the delegation include men, women and children, dressed in non-Egyptian clothes and armed with spears and axes. Their belongings are carried by donkeys. Their leader, Absha, is qualified as Heka-hasout (ruler of foreign lands), equivalent to the modern title Sheikh.
The most famous among the tombs have their ceiling decorated in geometrical patterns, a tendency which became very popular in the private tombs of the New Kingdom. The entrances to the tombs of Beni Hasan are sometimes adorned with a characteristic rock-cut portico, elegant rock-pillars hewn in the fluted "protodoric" style, and painted wall scenes.
The provincial cemetery of Beni Hasan is the most accesSible (to the tourist) among a long series of similar rockcut tombs of nomarchs which were discovered near the principal cities of other nomes (Asiut, Meir, Sheikh Said, Deir el-Bersha, Deir el-Gebrawi, el-Moalla, etc.).