Passage: The main problem is the correct reading of the cartouche name found within at least six ink inscriptions. Whilst the lower and therefore second hieroglyphic sign is certainly a Ka-symbol, the first sign is illegible. Unfortunately the excavator, Alessandro Barsanti made no facsimiles of the inscriptions and made rather slipshod hand-drawings instead, so that the first hieroglyph remains indecipherable. As a consequence there are several alternative readings of the cartouche name: Kurt Sethe reads Nebka ("His Ka is the lord"), Jean-Philippe Lauer reads Bik-Ka ("his Ka is divine"), Peter Kaplony reads Schena-Ka ("his Ka is forceful") and Gaston Maspero reads Nefer-Ka ("his Ka is beautiful/flawless"). Wolfhart Westendorf even proposes the depiction of a giraffe, an animal that was seen as wise and bedizen with shamanistic powers.Jürgen von Beckerath and George Reisner instead think that the pyramid was planned as the tomb for a well attested prince of the 4th Dynasty named Baka, a son of king Djedefre. Baka's name is written with the hieroglyphs of a ram together with the Ka-symbol. Beckerath assumes that Baka changed his name into Bakarê ("Soul and Ka of Râ") when he ascended the throne but then died unexpectedly, leaving nothing more than an unfinished tomb shaft. Thus, Beckerath and Reisner read the mysterious name at Zawyet El Aryan as Ba-Ka ("His Ka is his Ba"). Aidan Dodson instead sees a sitting Seth-animal and therefore reads the name found in the pyramid as Seth-Ka ("Seth is my Ka"). He believes that the pyramid was planned as the tomb of prince Setka, another son of king Djedefre. Dodson doubts the reading "Baka" and wonders why the cartouche name at Zawyet El Aryan contains no sun-hieroglyph when it was meant to be addressed to the sun god. Either way, both theories, if correct, would place the pyramid of Baka firmly in the 4th Dynasty. Supporting this datation, von Beckerath, Reisner and Dodson point to the architectural features of the burial shaft, in particular the use of hewn granite blocks for...

Question: Why wasn't Beckerath's tomb finished?
died