Mummy shroud of a woman & a boy

This reconstructed mummy shroud of a woman and a young boy from Saqqara, with the gods Osiris and Anubis dates from the 2nd Century, A.D.

In 2015, conservationists from Moscow, New York and Paris, worked intricately to restore this piece to its former glory, and this below is the result. Notice the removal of the wooden backing frame as seen in the picture above, where once Anubis’s body would be seen.

The fabric, due to the gelatinous glue used for the 19th century backing, had become very brittle, and the team of conservationists had to work intricately and treated the shroud extremely gently to remove the glue and backing from the ancient piece.

Related: First Full-Color Portraits of Egyptian Mummies

The shroud was then backed again, this time with dense and translucent Indian cotton. Microscopic research and a detailed research of similar images on other shrouds and Faiyum portraits helped to make a reconstruction of the woman’s face and the overall composition of the shroud.

The face had been printed on a special fabric and placed under the remaining fragments of the shroud.

During the Roman period, there was a significant influence of Egyptian culture on the Roman Empire, particularly after the conquest of Egypt by the Romans in 30 BC.

It is known that during the Roman period, there was a blending of cultural practices between the Romans and the Egyptians. This cultural exchange could have potentially influenced burial customs, including the use of Egyptian funeral shrouds in Roman-period burials.

Egyptian funeral shrouds, known as mummy wrappings or funerary textiles, were typically made of linen and adorned with various symbols and religious motifs. These shrouds were used to wrap the deceased in preparation for burial, as part of the Egyptian belief in the afterlife and the preservation of the body.

This shroud is now on display at the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts.

Read more about the reconstruction