One Coffin Two Eternities
Tip: Highlight text to annotate itX
My favorite object in this exhibition is the coffin that belonged actually to two different
women. It was originally made for a woman named
Weretwahset at the beginning of the nineteenth dynasty. It was then used again at the end
of the twentieth dynasty.
This is the hieroglyphs that were repainted for the second owner, and this is the painting
for the original owner. So, you can see there is a difference in that,
these are in color and these are in black and white.
It has been in our storerooms since 1937 and we never had the opportunity, until now, to
clean and restore it.
There are certain areas where there are losses that make the image less readable. We worked
with Ed Bleiberg, the curator, a lot in terms of determining how far to take an
in-painting or compensation of these losses. What the public should be able to see is an
object that's ancient, yet readable,
they can understand the aesthetics and not be fooled into thinking that there's something
there that wasn't originally there.
Visitors will find that it's a really spectacular object.
