What Did Ancient Indians Write Inside Egypt’s Valley of the Kings? 2,000-Year-Old Graffiti Is Revealing a Forgotten Journey

It was around two thousand years ago when a man from the Indian subcontinent found himself in a place that must have seemed magical. It was none other than the Valley of the Kings in Egypt, a place where pharaohs were buried over time.

On this trip, the man left a small mark of his presence in the place. A name was carved into the stone wall of a tomb.

To casual eyes, it is simply a case of graffiti. But for historians, it has become a clue to the distance that people were traveling in ancient times.


In studying graffiti found all over the Theban Necropolis, researchers found almost thirty carvings inside six of the six different royal tombs. Most of them are in Tamil Brahmi, which is considered to be one of the oldest known writing systems from southern India. Others are in Prakrit, Sanskrit, and Gandhari-Kharosthi.

Specialists believe the markings were made sometime between the first and third centuries CE. That period coincides with an era when maritime trade between India and the Mediterranean world was expanding rapidly.

The inscriptions were thoroughly recorded in a series of field surveys conducted in 2024 and 2025 by epigraphers Charlotte Schmid and Ingo Strauch. The study is heavily dependent upon previous research, particularly Iravatham Mahadevan’s well-known study Early Tamil Epigraphy: From the Earliest Times to the Sixth Century CE, which is still widely used by scholars to identify Tamil Brahmi inscriptions.

The location of these carvings makes the discovery even more intriguing. The Valley of the Kings sits deep in Egypt’s Nile Valley, far inland from the Red Sea ports that are usually associated with Indian merchants.

The Name That Appears Again and Again

One detail immediately caught the attention of researchers. The same name appears repeatedly across the tombs.

“Cikai Korran” is carved eight times in different places.

The inscriptions are short and informal, much like the kind of marks travelers have left at famous landmarks for centuries. Some of the phrases read almost like a quick note announcing that the visitor had arrived and seen the site.

Language specialists believe the name reflects the cultural mixture of ancient South India. The word “Cikai” may be related to the Sanskrit term śikhā, meaning a crest or tuft of hair. “Korran,” on the other hand, appears linked to Tamil words associated with leadership or victory.

Finding the same name in several tombs suggests the visitor moved through the valley and deliberately left a mark in multiple places.

This behavior was actually common in the ancient world. Archaeological research on Visitors’ Graffiti in the Valley of the Kings shows that Greek and Roman travelers often carved short messages inside Egyptian monuments as well. Writing one’s name on a wall was a simple way to record a visit.

The Indian inscriptions seem to follow that same tradition.

Traces of an Ancient Global Network

These small carvings also connect to a much larger historical picture.

Trade between India and the Roman world was already thriving during this period. One of the most important sources describing these routes is the first-century maritime text Periplus of the Erythraean Sea. The document outlines busy shipping networks linking Roman Egypt with ports along India’s western and southern coasts.

Modern historians have explored these connections in detail. In Raoul McLaughlin’s historical study The Roman Empire and the Indian Ocean Trade, archaeological and literary evidence show that Roman merchants regularly sailed to India for spices, textiles, pearls, and gemstones.

But trade did not move goods alone. People traveled as well.

For a long time, historians assumed Indian visitors rarely moved beyond Red Sea ports such as Berenike or Myos Hormos. The graffiti in the Valley of the Kings now suggests something different. Some travelers continued their journey inland, reaching one of Egypt’s most famous royal sites.

The writing on the walls also shows that travelers came from different backgrounds. The use of Tamil Brahmi, Prakrit, Sanskrit, and Gandhari-Kharosthi writing means people from many parts of the Indian subcontinent visited.

These small writings tell a great story. Two thousand years ago, long before a world connected as ours existed, people were crossing oceans and deserts. And sometimes, after traveling thousands of miles, they would leave their name on a stone wall.