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Egyptian artifacts in Chicago


kmt_sesh

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Most posters familiar with me know that I'm a docent working in the Egyptian exhibits at the Field Museum of Natural History and the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago. Ancient Egypt is my primary passion, but I've spent more than a quarter of a century researching numerous societies of the ancient Mediterranean world. In other words, I'm a boring bookish guy.

I spend most of my time at UM posting in the Alternative History forum but like to visit this one, too. I don't post in Paleontology, Archaeology & History as often but enjoy reading a lot of the articles posted by members. I figured the topic of this thread fits better here than in Alternative History.

I'd like to share some photos I've taken of artifacts in our exhibit, which will hopefully generate some discussion and interesting dialog. Most posters familiar with me also know I'm an unrepentant windbag, so my apologies up front. I just enjoy discussing the history of the ancient Near East.

At the same time, I'd invite other posters to post photos and descriptions they might have from their own museum visits or travels.

Here it goes, starting with some photos from the Field Museum. This first one is our favorite mummy, a Late Period man named Harwa. We have an inordinately large collection of mummies from Egypt, 20 on display and 20 more in storage (not including sundry parts including hands, feet, heads, and of course animal mummies). I would date Harwa to late Dynasty 25 or early Dynasty 26, so about 600 BCE:

HarwaProf.jpg

Harwa is our best preserved mummy. No one knows who unwrapped his head, but he came to Chicago in 1904. Radiographs were used to determine an approximate age at death of 60 years—which is a very old man for those days. Here is his coffin. In the same display case is a completely unwrapped mummified boy:

IMG_0177.jpg

Pardon the darkosh photo. He's hard to photograph (and often turns out looking like a raisin with legs). Unfortunately all we have is the denuded body and no one knows when or where he was unwrapped. Due to the absence of a coffin (which might in some other museum) we have no idea what his name was. Coffin typology is also important for pinning down dates, so when the little boy lived is uncertain. I can be much more precise with Harwa but with the boy I would estimate around 600 to 500 BCE. Radiographs of the boy show he was between 10 and 12 when he died. He evidences a deformed right foot, withered right leg, and a somewhat withered right arm. Cause of death is unknown, but given the deformities polio is a possibility.

One more for the OP. This is my favorite coffin in our collection at the Field Museum:

Chenet-aa2.jpg

Again, pardon the lighting. It can be tricky to work with. This is a style of coffin we call cartonnage, which is a durable ancient form of papier-maché (instead of newspapers, of course, the plaster base was laid over strips of papyrus or linen). This was a common style of coffin in Dynasty 22 and Dynasty 23, and I would date this one to late Dynasty 22. That means the coffin is around 2,700 years old. It's perfect. No one has retouched it, which always surprises museum visitors. Inside the full plasterform coffin is the mummy of a woman named Chenet-aa. Not in the photo is a standing wooden coffin behind the cartonnage one, and it is her middle coffin. The British Museum possesses the remains of this woman's wooden, outermost coffin, as well as the coffin of her husband, a Libyan man named Pasinhor. This era of Egyptian history is what we call the Third Intermediate Period, when Libyans had taken over Egypt. I love to show off this coffin to our visitors.

I welcome questions and contributions. Thanks for viewing!

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I grew up in the Chicago suburbs and visited the Field Museum many times. Thanks for reminding me of the many pleasant hours I've spent in that building.

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Thanks for sharing. :tu: We knew, but your the quiet one compared to F. Raffaele. :yes:

Parts is parts, got enough to make one more whole one??? :whistle:

Your 'mummified eyes' comment got me thinking, what did they do w/ eyes in mum. process?

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These are the remains, or at least part of the remains, of people who were once alive just like us -- in a different culture to be sure -- so long ago. The mummies are of course just objects, but they tell us of people who had their problems and hopes and all just as we do. I appreciate your posting the pictures.

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...

Your 'mummified eyes' comment got me thinking, what did they do w/ eyes in mum. process?

They went through extensive opthalmology treatments at Northwestern University just like I have.

Just kidding. About the mummies, at least.

This is actually a question I often get at the museum. The simple answer is, the ancient embalmers usually didn't do anything fancy. It depended a lot on the social status of the individual being mummified, meaning whether his or her family could afford the "top-notch" treatment. Considering the body was buried under salts for over a month, and also considering the eye is composed almost completely of fluid, the eyeballs essentially desiccated into ruin.

Rarely is anything left of them, but there are exceptions. We have a mummified, high-born woman at the Oriental Institute who underwent highly sophisticated CT scanning some years ago. Her name was Meresamun; perhaps I'll post a photo or two of her, in due time. Anyway, the imaging technology revealed bits of eye tissue still in her orbits. This was unusual (and only one of the very cool things you can discover when CT scanning mummies!).

In most other cases the embalmers merely packed the dried-out orbits with linen or other materials, to restore the natural look behind the closed eyelids. In rare cases the embalmers left the lids open and inserted perfectly round stones on which they had painted eyeballs. Here's a photo of one. Okay, that's not really a mummy. I couldn't find one on the net, but I've seen real photos in some of my books. These mummies are actually pretty damn creepy.

See? I told you I'm a windbag. I can go on and on even about mummy eyes. I like mummies. And if anyone missed it, the mummy photo in my avatar is of the Field Museum's mummy called Harwa, from my OP.

The eye thing is always a good question. A much stranger question, and one I've fielded numerous times and always from boys in early adolescence, is what did they do with a male mummy's...boy parts?

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These are the remains, or at least part of the remains, of people who were once alive just like us -- in a different culture to be sure -- so long ago. The mummies are of course just objects, but they tell us of people who had their problems and hopes and all just as we do. I appreciate your posting the pictures.

That's a great observation, Frank. You can imagine how some people (young kids especially) are wary of viewing mummies for the first time in their lives. This is especially true of partially or fully unwrapped bodies. I can't always say it helps, but I try to reinforce to them the fact that "mummies are people too." The important thing to remember is that they were loved and valued by their families, went to parties, laughed and danced and sang, and eventually died. And this is how they were buried.

If they were rich.

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I grew up in the Chicago suburbs and visited the Field Museum many times. Thanks for reminding me of the many pleasant hours I've spent in that building.

Thanks, Star, and you're welcome. I hope you get to return there some day.

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Scorpio's post got me interested in the mummy of Meresamun, who is one of the oldest mummies on display at the Oriental Institute (University of Chicago). This institute is one of the world-leading centers for the study of ancient Egypt and other ancient Near Eastern civilizations. Some years ago we had a special exhibit on Meresamun that was generated by CT scans conducted on her at the university hospital. Here's a photo of her coffin:

Meresamun-Full.jpg

You might notice it is also a cartonnage coffin, similar to Chenet-aa's in my OP. I still rank Chenet-aa's as more ornate and beautiful, but as a "Singer in the Interior" of the temple of Amun, Meresamun was definitely higher in the hierarchical structure of her society. I would also date it to a slightly earlier time than Chenet-aa's. Meresamun probably lived around 800 BCE. She was in her mid- to late thirties when she died (cause of death unknown).

Scorpio was wondering about mummy eyes, and in my reply I brought up the remains of eye tissue observed in the orbits of Meresamun's skull. I can't find an image that really clarifies that, but here's a great one I found online:

Meresamun_3.jpg

You can see the interest people as nerdy as I have in the CT scanning of mummies. This image looks through the cartonnage head of the coffin, past the mummified flesh on the face, and onto the skull. What you can see in the empty orbits are two semicircular disks the embalmers had used to help restore the basic shape of the eyeballs.

The Field Museum has done extensive CT scanning on some of the mummies we keep in storage (both Egyptian and Peruvian), and we mounted a special, short-run exhibit for it in 2012. It was a massive success. People love mummies!

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Gross....I mean cool. Thanks K, for all.Cool pics too.

I've always thought ALL mummies in Egypt esp. should be CT scanned. (Was called 'CAT' yes?) DNA Tests also, (IF we had needed imp. in Tech, etc). Amazing how some artifacts are so well preserved, and wondering how long our modern wooden coffins last.

I remember as a kid seeing? reading about mummy kept in Niagara Falls NY, 'Museum' (maybe a novelty shop?)

Have any info, maybe was eventually acquired by a real museum...........will search old pprs.

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Fantastic images. I, too, have fond memories of visiting the museum as a child in Chicago. Last time I was in town there was to play a show. Suffice it to say their wasn't much time to take in the sights. Except for the BEAN! ALL HAIL THE MIGHTY BEAN!!

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Gross....I mean cool. Thanks K, for all.Cool pics too.

I've always thought ALL mummies in Egypt esp. should be CT scanned. (Was called 'CAT' yes?) DNA Tests also, (IF we had needed imp. in Tech, etc)

CAT and CT are essentially the same thing. Computed Axial Tomography is just an older version in the lexicon for what's now called Computed (or Computerized) Tomography. That's my understanding, anyway.

The Field Museum has a fully functioning DNA lab and I'm always meaning to ask one of the curators I know if there's any plan to try to test the DNA of some of our mummies there. Egypt has a couple of DNA labs specially designed for analyzing the DNA of Egyptian mummies. You may recall the now infamous DNA trials on numerous Amarna Period mummies, Tutankhamun included. The problem is, there is considerable controversy over whether viable DNA can even be extracted from Egyptian mummies. There seems to be no middle ground among the experts: some say of course it can be done, some say it definitely can't be done (due to the known issue of DNA degrading faster in especially hot environments).

A big problem with all of the DNA analyses Egypt has done is that its scientists continue to refuse to release their findings to other geneticists around the world. This reflects badly on Egypt. The woo-woo crowd already screams that this or that is being hidden from the public eye, so such behavior is detrimental. Consequently, as interesting as Egypt's genetic trials might have been, the conclusions cannot be and are not fully accepted by the wider scientific community.

I remember as a kid seeing? reading about mummy kept in Niagara Falls NY, 'Museum' (maybe a novelty shop?)

Have any info, maybe was eventually acquired by a real museum...........will search old pprs.

What, are you trying to make me feel old? Remember seeing as a kid? LOL I remember this well. The little museum/freak show at Niagara went belly up and the Michael Carlos museum in Atlanta purchased the mummies. One caught the attention of several specialists and Egyptologists, who convincingly argued that it was the mummy of Ramesses I (first king of Dynasty 19), whose mummy was otherwise unknown to that point in time. The Carlos museum soon voluntarily returned that mummy to Egypt, where it received full military honors and is now, as I recall, on display in a museum in Luxor (in Egypt, not Vegas).

This was in 2003, by the way. I can't believe you were only a kid, then. Now I do feel old. Maybe Harte is right and I do resemble the mummy in my avatar.

Here's a photo of the putative mummy of Ramesses I. I should note that not all are in agreement over the identification of this mummy, but a good case has been made.

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Fantastic images. I, too, have fond memories of visiting the museum as a child in Chicago. Last time I was in town there was to play a show. Suffice it to say their wasn't much time to take in the sights. Except for the BEAN! ALL HAIL THE MIGHTY BEAN!!

Oh, yes. I might be a resident of Chicago but even I act like a tourist around the Bean. I have plenty of photos of it. My little nephew saw it when he was around two and I have photos of his reflection in it as he was looking into the shiny surface.

Gotta love the Bean!

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That's a great observation, Frank. You can imagine how some people (young kids especially) are wary of viewing mummies for the first time in their lives. This is especially true of partially or fully unwrapped bodies. I can't always say it helps, but I try to reinforce to them the fact that "mummies are people too." The important thing to remember is that they were loved and valued by their families, went to parties, laughed and danced and sang, and eventually died. And this is how they were buried.

If they were rich.

When I was a child my grandfather took me on a tour to Amarna,Tuna al Gebel & Beni Hassan.That was when I saw a mummy for the first time, it was Isidora in Tuna el Gebel, Minya. For a child, it was almost magical. I remember we were told Isidora's story, how she drowned as she was crossing the Nile to meet her financé, her father's plea that a lamp be always left in her tomb because Isidora feared the dark, and how Taha Hussien (who was a blind author, poet & minister of culture in 1950) ordered that a lit lamp be placed there. Since then I can never regard mummies as 'objects', every mummy is a life & a story

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuna_el-Gebel

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What a pleasure this thread is. When I said the mummies were "objects" my intent was to disavow what I went on to say as being somehow superstitious. They were people but a corpse or mummy is an object.

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Meresamun_3.jpg

Amazing how all the teeth are intact. Having just gone through more dental work and tooth pulling than I ever wanted to and this ancient lady has a full set. I had actually recently pondered after my ordeal just what in the world did people do about dental issues before anesthesia?

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She probably didn't have access to refined sugar and the like. Until the current generation Vietnamese had excellent teeth.

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What a pleasure this thread is. When I said the mummies were "objects" my intent was to disavow what I went on to say as being somehow superstitious. They were people but a corpse or mummy is an object.

My post was not meant to be a criticism of your use of "object". I just wanted to share how fascinating & impressive my first encounter with a mummy was. I was a child & it was like seeing a fairy tale, particularly in the context of all the stories of magic, legends and ancient curses my grandfather was fond of. Nevertheless, I still see mummies/corpses as people not objects :)

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Sorry to go OT for a moment, but I want to narrate that when I was quite young I learned about burials and it disturbed me very much that someday I would be put underground like that, in the dark with no air. It took some monks explaining that the person who was is no longer in the body and the body is really just a material, unthinking, thing, that got me over it.

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CAT and CT are essentially the same thing. Computed Axial Tomography is just an older version in the lexicon for what's now called Computed (or Computerized) Tomography. That's my understanding, anyway.

The Field Museum has a fully functioning DNA lab and I'm always meaning to ask one of the curators I know if there's any plan to try to test the DNA of some of our mummies there. Egypt has a couple of DNA labs specially designed for analyzing the DNA of Egyptian mummies. You may recall the now infamous DNA trials on numerous Amarna Period mummies, Tutankhamun included. The problem is, there is considerable controversy over whether viable DNA can even be extracted from Egyptian mummies. There seems to be no middle ground among the experts: some say of course it can be done, some say it definitely can't be done (due to the known issue of DNA degrading faster in especially hot environments).

A big problem with all of the DNA analyses Egypt has done is that its scientists continue to refuse to release their findings to other geneticists around the world. This reflects badly on Egypt. The woo-woo crowd already screams that this or that is being hidden from the public eye, so such behavior is detrimental. Consequently, as interesting as Egypt's genetic trials might have been, the conclusions cannot be and are not fully accepted by the wider scientific community.

What, are you trying to make me feel old? Remember seeing as a kid? LOL I remember this well. The little museum/freak show at Niagara went belly up and the Michael Carlos museum in Atlanta purchased the mummies. One caught the attention of several specialists and Egyptologists, who convincingly argued that it was the mummy of Ramesses I (first king of Dynasty 19), whose mummy was otherwise unknown to that point in time. The Carlos museum soon voluntarily returned that mummy to Egypt, where it received full military honors and is now, as I recall, on display in a museum in Luxor (in Egypt, not Vegas).

This was in 2003, by the way. I can't believe you were only a kid, then. Now I do feel old. Maybe Harte is right and I do resemble the mummy in my avatar.

Here's a photo of the putative mummy of Ramesses I. I should note that not all are in agreement over the identification of this mummy, but a good case has been made.

You misunderstood. I'm 56 now, and I saw it as a kid, many yrs. ago in Niagara, (my GGma lived nearby).

Thanks for the info, my memory was seeing just one, probably the 'Ramesses 1' you mentioned.

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Amazing how all the teeth are intact. Having just gone through more dental work and tooth pulling than I ever wanted to and this ancient lady has a full set. I had actually recently pondered after my ordeal just what in the world did people do about dental issues before anesthesia?

They complained it hurt. (your comments are so funny.)

Since my Father would go to the Dentist and have a tooth drilled and filled without any novicane, etc.... my folks decided that us kids could do without novicane also, (I was about 12 yrs. old.). I've had 3 or 4 drilled and filled without any painkillers, not so bad actually, until the drill hits a sensitive spot. Our first Dentist would tell me, 'We can do without the sound effects plz', (after I moaned in pain...what a guy :cry: ). Eventually, we went to another Dr., and he was kind enough to let me, (others) raise our right hand when we wanted him to stop drilling for a sec. (Great tooth brushing motivation, at the very least, I had a total of 5 cavities by the time I was 15.)

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She probably didn't have access to refined sugar and the like. Until the current generation Vietnamese had excellent teeth.

I figured diet had a lot to do with it along with genetics.

They complained it hurt. (your comments are so funny.)

Since my Father would go to the Dentist and have a tooth drilled and filled without any novicane, etc.... my folks decided that us kids could do without novicane also, (I was about 12 yrs. old.). I've had 3 or 4 drilled and filled without any painkillers, not so bad actually, until the drill hits a sensitive spot. Our first Dentist would tell me, 'We can do without the sound effects plz', (after I moaned in pain...what a guy :cry: ). Eventually, we went to another Dr., and he was kind enough to let me, (others) raise our right hand when we wanted him to stop drilling for a sec. (Great tooth brushing motivation, at the very least, I had a total of 5 cavities by the time I was 15.)

Wow your dad's hardcore for making you do that. Good for you but how about getting one pulled without numbing? I had one molar pulled years ago and I didn't get nearly enough novicaine. The dentist saw that I was in pain and asked but I thought to hell with it and muttered for him to keep going. A stupid moment of machoness I guess. I had angry face for at least an hour afterward. That hurt. Since I've recently been undergoing a lot of necessary dental work I honestly have wondered about the old days, like any time up to a hundred or so years ago. Imagine a cracked tooth or even a bad cavity or any kind of breakage or extraction back then. I'd imagine that back in the day that toothaches would be one of the most feared things a person could anticipate.

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And the tooth is the only part of the body that doesn't heal itself. I've done 2 extractions on myself, no painkillers...easier if they are loose.LOL

Sometimes extraction is best, if u can't get the proper care there's not many alternatives.

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Dentists can be too eager to extract a tooth that has an abscess. Sometimes an antibiotic clears it up.

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You misunderstood. I'm 56 now, and I saw it as a kid, many yrs. ago in Niagara, (my GGma lived nearby).

Thanks for the info, my memory was seeing just one, probably the 'Ramesses 1' you mentioned.

Sorry, scorpio. I completely misread that. I saw mention of the Niagara mummy and immediately thought of the events of 2003 in the Atlanta museum that ended up with it. And now that you've shared your age I can breathe easier because I'm younger than you, albeit not by much (I turned 48 last month).

I can no longer recall the particulars but I'm almost positive the Niagara museum had two or three different mummies. It would be something if the one you remember is the mummy argued to be Ramesses I. And it's a good thing you got to see it as a kid, because now you'd have to travel to Egypt to do so.

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Amazing how all the teeth are intact. Having just gone through more dental work and tooth pulling than I ever wanted to and this ancient lady has a full set. I had actually recently pondered after my ordeal just what in the world did people do about dental issues before anesthesia?

To this and other people's comments, Meresamun does seem to have pretty decent teeth. This, however, would be the exception. While the Egyptians didn't really have sugar or sweets (as we think of them) to cause cavities, they suffered all sorts of dental problems. This is primarily due to their stone-ground bread dough, a dilemma shared by many peoples in the ancient Mediterranean world. It was made worse for the Egyptians in their desert environment, where blowing sand was always an issue.

Analysis of ancient bread found in Egyptian tombs has occasionally revealed an unusual abundance of sand, leading researchers to theorize that ancient millers sometimes added sand to the grain to grind it finer. The end result is that by the time many Egyptians were in or near their thirties, their enamel had sustained such irreversible damage that their teeth were worn to nubblins or were mostly just gone, having fallen out.

Analyses of Egyptian human remains has established that many people probably perished from dental infections such as abscesses. The mummy identified as Amunhotep III, one of the wealthiest and most powerful of pharaohs (and King Tut's putative grandfather), had a massive abscess that ate away a portion of his jaw. Given the proximity of the brain to the jaw, it's a bad place to contract a massive infection—this may well have killed Amunhotep III.

On average the elite in ancient Egyptian society had better diets and nutrition, and lived longer lives. Above I showed the photo of our mummy Harwa and gave his age at death as around 60; this stands in contrast to the average age of death for males of his time, which was around 35. X-rays of the skull of Ramesses II, another of the greatest pharaohs and a man who lived to be around ninety, reveal the awful state of his teeth (click here). This was probably very painful to Ramesses.

We have a mummy at the Field Museum which is not usually displayed, but I've been fortunate to study her and her CT-scan images. She's known as the Gilded Lady because neither her coffin nor wrappings record her name. This woman was about 40 years of age at death, in a time when most women lived only into their early 30s. She has very good teeth. I have this image of her, which is accompanied by the fashioning of a forensic bust a prominent Parisian artist did for our museum:

3dxmuseums-field-museum-of-chica.jpg

The Gilded Lady is missing only a couple of molars on her upper-right jaw. She did all right for herself.

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