Some ‘hawk’ mummies are the remains of birds who were bred and lived in captivity. Many hawk mummy bundles contain only partial skeletons, or none at all. Most animals, however, may have been seen rather as heralds who entered the Afterlife grateful to the sponsor who paid for their care and feeding and embalming. They...
Originally Egyptologists at the museum thought that the mummy of Ankh Hor was untouched, but recent x-rays found modern pins and clips. A re-examination of the cartonnage revealed that it had been cut, re-sealed and painted over. Although no one knows why it was opened, it is possible that Victorian researchers started to unwrap Ankh...
The mummy of Lady Rai is one of the oldest known mummies uncovered in Egypt. She was discovered in 1881 and researchers estimate that she was about 30 – 40 years old when she died around 1530 BC. From the writings left behind about Lady Rai, we know that she was the nursemaid to Queen...
This mummified falcon is covered with an intricate pattern of wrappings done in natural and dyed brown linen. The details of the face and head of the bird have been rendered in paint over a white gesso ground. The falcon was identified from the earliest times with the sun god Horus and the reigning king,...
King Thutmose IV died young and was buried in the Valley of the Kings, later, the mummy was moved to the Deir el-Bahari Cachette (DB320) with other royal mummies. His body was rewrapped in its original bandages, with the feet broken off, but not lost. The mummy of Thutmose IV was found within the mummy...
This baboon mummy is seated with its knees drawn up to its chest, and its tail curving around the right side of its body. Excavated by Mr. Theodore M. Davis in 1906 from Tomb (KV51) near the Tomb of Amenhotep II (KV35). The monkey appears to have been mummified through an enlarged cut in the...
The mummy of Djed-Ptah-Iuf-Ankh is in very good condition and examination has shown that the priest died at a very young age. He was buried in Deir el-Bahari Cachette (DB320), West Thebes. Djed-Ptah-Iuf-Ankh held the position of “Second Prophet of Amun” during the reign of Shoshenq I of the 22nd Dynasty. This very prominent position...
The mummy of Ramesses IV was found in the royal cache of Amenhotep II’s tomb (KV35) in 1898. After a short reign of about six and a half years, Ramesses IV died and was buried in tomb (KV2) in the Valley of the Kings. The king’s eyes were replaced by artificial ones made of small...
The preparations carried out on the mummy thus took place almost according to the prescriptions relating to the mummification of human corpses, since the falcon was the sacred animal of the god Horus. The body of the mummified animal was first wrapped in linen strips and after the mummy. Then thus shaped into a form...
Apparently, King Ramesses V died in his early thirties and this is perhaps the reason for the appropriation of his tomb by his successor, Ramesses VI. Nevertheless, the mummy later found its way to the Royal Cachette (DB320) at Deir el-Bahari. The king’s face was painted in red and his nostrils were filled with wax....
