The Secrets of Tomb 10A

The Tomb

In 1915, MFA archaeologists spent a hot summer deep in the Egyptian countryside. They were emptying a tomb.

Strewn about the dark, airless room—sometimes smashed and broken,

sometimes miraculously intact—were hundreds of objects that captured one

man’s hopes about death and the afterlife. Four thousand years before, he had been governor of the province. His name was Djehutynakht.

As he prepared for death, Djehutynakht stocked his tomb with everything the Egyptians believed the dead needed for the next life. The tiny chamber contained a vast collection of tomb goods—arrayed around the extraordinary painted coffins that held the mummified bodies of the governor and his wife.

In 2009, a Belgian team retraced the original excavators’ footsteps in search of further clues. Layer by layer, the site is revealing its secrets.

The Mummy

Click on the picture to see it in motion

<!–Massachusetts General Hospital’s Dr. Rajiv Gupta explains the procedures performed on the mummy.

–>Among the human remains found scattered in the burial chamber was the mummified head of one of Tomb 10A’s occupants, detached from its body by the rough treatment of tomb robbers. We still do not know whether it is Governor or Lady Djehutynakht. DNA analysis of one of the mummy’s teeth is now underway to help answer this question.

Scientists from Massachusetts General Hospital examined the head using medical imaging techniques. This revealed dramatic new information about Egyptian mummification practices; for example, this mummy is one of the earliest to show evidence that embalmers removed the brain through the nose, a process that later became common.

Most intriguing is the skilled removal of several bones around the cheeks. This “surgery” did not help with brain removal, so it may instead relate to the funeral ritual known as the Opening of the Mouth Ceremony. This allowed the deceased to eat, drink, and breathe in the afterlife.

Coffin of Djehutyenakth

Click on the image to see closer the written Hieroglyiphics

The coffin was more than just a container for the body; it was a vessel that guaranteed the spirit passage to the afterlife. The texts and decoration are laid out from the point of view of the mummy. The mummy was placed in the coffin lying on its left side, facing east, the false door, and sacred eyes. All the inscriptions read from head to foot, with the hieroglyphic signs facing in the direction of the mummy’s head in order to make them easier for him or her to read. In this way, the coffin was complete only with the mummy inside it.

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The Painter in ancient Egypt

Ancient Egyptian wall paintings provide a fascinating glimpse into the past. In tombs it was the painter’s task to preserve the dead individual’s spirit. Most tomb art generally followed consistent rules and held special meaning to the ancient Egyptians.

The front and profile viewpoints depicted in a single human figure are one of the most characteristic features of Egyptian art. This is reminiscent of the fact that the ancient Egyptians saw the world in terms of dualities: life and death, flood and drought, good and bad. These composite images of the most recognisable parts of the human body were more detailed than a realistic pose and assisted the tomb owner’s ka (spirit) to recognise its body.

Size matters

Perspective and the status of figures were shown in a system of strips that looks much like a series of comics or a graphic novel. The use of perspective with a vanishing point was not used in Egyptian art. The lower border of a register was the ground line and depth was shown by the overlapping of figures or by figures stacked one above the other. The size of a figure indicated its relative importance in the image. Kings were portrayed larger than life to symbolise their god-like powers. Tomb owners, as the most important subject of the design, were also depicted on a grand scale. In contrast, wives and children, servants and animals were drawn smaller, indicating their lesser importance.

Grid system

Creating exact replicas of figures was critical. One way of ensuring correct proportion was to use a grid system – a set of vertical and horizontal lines painted onto the bare wall. This system allowed the initial draughtsman to faithfully copy and enlarge a design also overlaid with a grid. Cords soaked in red ink were stretched out between two pieces of wood and then snapped against the wall to create perfectly straight lines. These lines are sometimes still visible on unfinished walls.

A divine palette

A decorated wooden replica of an ancient Egyptian painter or scribe's palette shown with the lid taken off.

The ancient Egyptians used colour not only for its aesthetic appeal but also for its perceived meaning. Both warm and cool colours were used, offering depth and interest to their art as well as signs to their gods. The Egyptians believed that certain colours were not merely symbolic of but were imbued with specific powers or attributes that were linked to various gods. As a result, great power could be contained within an object if it was made or painted in meaningful colours.

The pigments used to make various colours consisted mainly of minerals that occur naturally in Egypt and surrounding areas. Minerals were ground up in a stone mortar and mixed in pots with water and an adhesive such as wood gum or egg white. Paint made in this way was called ‘tempera’.

Colours – their source and meaning

Part of a painted wooden mummy coffin from the Late Period (664-525 BCE). A mummy lies with a goddess at its head, a double bird-headed god and a winged eye above it.

• White was made from calcium carbonate (lime) or calcium sulphate (gypsum) and equalled purity. Calcite (also called Egyptian alabaster) was also used.
• Yellow was made from ochre while a bright, golden yellow was made from orpiment. Pale yellow was made from jarosite. Yellow was used to depict female flesh while golden yellow and gold itself was used to represent the sun and flesh of gods, particularly Re the sun god. Gold was considered a divine metal because it never tarnished.
• Silver was very rare in Egypt – it could be even more precious than gold. It was thought to be what the gods’ bones were made from.
• Blue was made with azurite (copper carbonate) and represented the heavens, vegetation, youth, water and the Nile River. The colour known as Egyptian blue was made from heating quartz, ground malachite and calcium carbonate together. The finer the grain, the paler the blue.
• Green was created with copper or by grinding up malachite and stood for Osiris, eternal life, prosperity and resurrection. It also represented regeneration and fertility so this colour was sacred to the goddess Hathor and was used to depict the flesh of Nephthys – the goddess of rebirth.
• Red was made with ochre, just like yellow. Ochre gives a range of colours from yellow to red to dark brown, depending on the amount of water used. Iron oxide was also often used. During the New Kingdom, realgar was used for red but it fades to yellow over time. Red was used to paint male skin tones. It also represented the sun, evil, power, blood and life force.
• Black was made from soot or charcoal and signified Egypt’s ancient name ‘Kemet’ or ‘black land’ and the silt-fed soil around the Nile. Black was also used to denote the underworld and Osiris.

Necklace with amulets from the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna

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Egypt Obssesive Order

By 5000 BC, the Egyptians had established a stable agriculture existence. They were the first settled humans to use images of the body extensively in their art. But the exaggerated, nomadic way of showing the body as a response to a harsh environment was long dead and gone.

Egyptian artisans lived and worked in groups, where originality was not highly prized. Images of the human body were regular and repeated, and nothing about them was exaggerated. Instead, the images were schematic and conceptual; schematic in the sense that they belonged to a larger plan, and conceptual in that the artist was more concerned with cataloging the parts of the body – one head, two arms, two legs, etc – then the actual appearance of the body. The Egyptians chose then to represent the human body from its clearest angle, and within a grid system that was applied to a plastered wall by dipping a length of string in red paint, stretching it tight, and then twanging it against the surface to be painted.

To the ancient Egyptians, their schematic and conceptual image of the body mapped within a grid system was a divine gift that would be spoiled by any deviation from the norm.

This gallery illustrates how an Egyptian artist would take a 3-dimensional human body and make a painting or wall carving from its various pieces. Starting with the chest, it would be shown front-on to emphasize its characteristic V-shape.

Source: Egypt Obssesive Order

Grid System