Details
A GESSO-PAINTED WOODEN ANTHROPOID OUTER COFFIN FOR THE LADY NESMUT, DAUGHTER OF AMENKHA'
DYNASTY XXIV, LATE 8TH/EARLY 7TH CENTURY B.C.
Comprising two halves as follows:
Upper half: female figure wearing a tripartite wig decorated with a lotus petalled wreath surmounted by an akhet-sign (sun emerging above the horizon), below she wears a broad floral collar, winged sun disc and panels below representing: (from left to right) falcon-headed and human-headed mummiform deities each wearing head-cones and holding maat (truth)-feathers stand before Osiris; jackal-headed and baboon-headed deities before falcon-headed Ra-Horakhty. Below, three vertical panels on either side bearing recitations by Nesmut, daughter of Amenkha', with representations of protective animal-headed deities, the base painted with a figure of the 'mummy-carrying' bull
Lower half: large painted figure of the goddess Nut of Behdet with the htp-di-nsw formula invoking food, drink, incense, cloth and every good, pure and sweet thing for the Osirid Nesmut, the outside of the coffin painted with hieroglyphs, a recitation by Ra-Harakhty, chief of the gods, and Atum of (Iunu) Heliopolis and Ptah-Sokar-Osiris that they might give offerings and food supplies to the Osirid Mistress of the House Nesmut, daughter of Amen-kha'
72 in. (1.83 m.) high; 21 in. (53.3 cm.) wide max.
THE GESSO-PAINTED FEMALE CARTONNAGE OF NEBSET
DYNASTY XXIV, 9TH-8TH CENTURY B.C.
Wearing a broad collar, winged scarab holding a shen (eternity)-sign below; seated cobra-headed deity, ibis-headed Thoth ''Lord of the Ogdoad'', standing before an offering stand, with water jar and lotus flower, right hand raised to seated falcon-headed god and standing goddess; below, Sokar in sun boat with oryx-headed prow, with shrine below, flanked by seated animal-headed deity and totem of Nefertem: panel below with seated deities including a jackal-headed deity, traces of invocation offerings, yellow striped bands still visible along the sides, in glazed wooden presentation case
73¾ in. (1.87 m.) long
A VICTORIAN BRONZE MEDAL ''INTERNATIONAL MEDICAL CONGRESS LONDON'' FROM THE ROYAL COLLEGE OF SURGEONS 1881
Presented to the 3rd Duke of Sutherland in return for the Egyptian mummy of Nebset which showed an abnormal number of vertebrae, the obverse of the medal depicts three sick devotees kneeling before a figure of Aesclepius holding his serpent entwined staff standing by a globe, the reverse a portrait of the young ''Victoria Queen of Great Britain and Ireland: Empress of India'', in presentation case
3 in. (7.5 cm.) diam.
Provenance
Sheikh 'Abd el-Qurna, Thebes, from the family tomb of Amenkha', position unknown, from a ''deep pit three miles north-west of Colossi in the plains at Gurna', discovered in 1868-9, containing thirty coffins (some placed there by Mariette), ten in Cairo Museum, the rest presented to the Prince of Wales and distributed by him to the British Museum, Cambridge, Dublin, Edinburgh, Oxford, other institutions, and his friends'' (S. Birch, Transactions of the Royal Society of Literature, 2. Ser. x [1884], pp. 185-213).
The Prince of Wales and the 3rd Duke of Sutherland were probably in Egypt on the occasion of the opening of the Suez Canal.
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