Issue No.590
Heritage
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13 - 19 June 2002 Issue No.590 Heritage |
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Dig Days: Is this Ramses I?
Again, we are exploring the topic of mummies, the magic associated with them, and how readily they capture the imagination. I witnessed the fascination of thousands of children who visited the exhibition entitled "Mummies: Secrets and Science" at the Museum of the University of Pennsylvania, where I obtained my PhD. As they gazed into the face of a mummy I could hear them gasp, see the astonishment, sometimes fear, on their faces. They had come to the museum to learn about the ancient Egyptians who were credited as the inventors of science, and what they wanted most keenly to know was why people went to so much trouble to mummify the bodies of their dead!
People are enthralled by mummies, and newspapers around the world capture the popular imagination by writing about them at the least provocation. Take the recent case of the thieves arrested in Alexandria, and the newspaper report that a mummy with a tail had been found in their possession. I kid you not -- a mummy with a tail! So people began to ponder, and ask questions: was such a thing possible? When could such a strange human being have lived? Unless one puts the media to rest, such stories simply generate more, so I was obliged to look into the matter.
I assigned the director of museums and antiquities in Alexandria, my dear friend Ahmed Abdel-Fattah, to head a committee to investigate the strange claim. The truth was just as strange as the fiction. The committee discovered that a tail had indeed been found in the linen bandages, and attached to the mummy in question. But Ahmed Abdel-Fattah made clear in his report that it was not an ancient mummy at all, but a corpse of a person who died quite recently!
I immediately met the director of the Tourist and Antiquities Police, General Said El-Beltagui, and asked him to make sure that the Tourist Police did not publicise new discoveries or information about antiquities dealers caught with artefacts until these objects had been examined professionally to determine their authenticity.
A new department has now been established at the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA) to specialise in reviewing and examining such objects. The archaeologists attached to this department will write formal reports on all confiscated objects before the press release to ensure that the public is properly informed.
An earlier story inaccurately covered by the media, which raised blood pressure and not a few eyebrows, concerned a mummy at the Emery Museum in Atlanta, Georgia. Some people believed it to be the mummy of the Pharaoh Ramses I, the first ruler of the 19th dynasty and grandfather of the great Ramses II. But it was difficult to believe that there could be a royal mummy outside Egypt. Apparently the story began a century ago when a set of miscellaneous mummies was sold to an antiquities dealer in Niagara Falls. An American wanted to show one of these mummies at a nightclub, and the media got hold of the story and ran it. CBS aired it nation-wide.
It was the summer of 1998, and I was teaching at UCLA. When the story broke, CBS interviewed me and asked for my comments, and I told them I was shocked at the idea of putting a mummy on display in a nightclub, and that I did not support the idea of mummies being exhibited in museums for the "thrill effect". It distracts from the spirit of our ancient heritage and is disrespectful of ancient beliefs. Mummification was necessary because of the ancient Egyptians' deep-rooted belief in a life after death. They believed that the deceased travelled to the afterlife and would live again in the Field of Iaru, the ancient Egyptian concept of paradise.
I told CBS about the visit of Princess Margaret to the Egyptian Museum and how, when she saw the mummy of Ramses II, she covered her face with her hands and moved away. I asked her the reason for her obviously heartfelt reaction and she said, "A mummy is a human being. How can we look at mummies for our enjoyment? They should be resting in their original tombs." Following her visit, President Sadat held a press conference at the Egyptian Museum and announced that people should show respect for the mummies. That they should be returned to their original tombs or placed in a special museum where they could be given the highest regard, that their faces should be covered, but they could still be examined by scientists to try to learn more about this great civilisation. At the end of the press conference, I jokingly said, "Let the mummy's curse rest on any man that dares to show the mummy in a nightclub!"
Later, the Emery Museum bought these mummies, and Peter Lacovara, curator at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston examined and studied them using X-rays. He announced that one of the mummies could, in fact, belong to Ramses I. He based his deduction on the shape and style of the mummy, which lacks any textual information. But, even without conclusive proof, the story of Ramses I's mummy was published and generated tremendous interest.
I personally do not think it is the mummy of Ramses I, or even a royal mummy at all. If it were, it would be from the discovery of the cache at Deir Al-Bahari in 1981, and there would have been a record of it. However, those who insist it is the mummy of Ramses I should note that in that case it should be returned to Egypt to rest alongside the other royal mummies in the Egyptian Museum. We at the SCA will further investigate this matter and then decide.
To be continued...
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