An ecological approach to determine the potential influence that the pyramid texts have had upon sixth dynasty tomb decoration

If the Pyramid Texts had any influence at all upon Sixth Dynasty tomb decorations, then it should be feasible to identify a correlation between tomb decoration programmes and the sequences of the Pyramid Texts. It would be expected that the distribution of the decorations should be observably different before and after the appearance of the Pyramid Texts. Two 'marker' scenes were identified and a distribution analysis was applied to the position of these scenes in tombs with dates ranging from the mid Fifth to the early Sixth Dynasty. The pattern that emerged suggests decorations changed in response to some influence other than the Pyramid Texts and suggests a new time frame for this inspiration.