NME 007 :: Coffin, Botanical specimen, Flax seeds
- Object description
Outer coffin for Neswaiu, son of Takeretdjehuty.
A massive bivalve anthropoid case, depicting the deceased wearing a tripartite wig and a broad collar with raptor-headed terminals laid upon the chest. The whole coffin has a black resinous coating with painted whites of the eyes and the decoration drawn on in thin yellow-painted lines.
A string of amulets is depicted across the throat, with a ba-bird with outstretched wings forming part of the collar directly below the inner terminations of the wig-lappets. Below this, superposed over the collar, is depicted a shrine-shaped pectoral, containing squatting figures of Osiris, Horus, Isis and Nephthys.
Beyond the extent of the collar, the front of the lid is divided into eight registers, flanked on each side by two columns of text, extending from the bottom edge of the collar to the ankles. The eight registers are as follows:
I. 15 columns of text.
II. Winged solar scarab, flanked on each side by five standing deities.
III. 15 columns of text.
IV. Mummy on bier, with four jars below and ba hovering above,; vignette flanked on each side by five standing deities.
V. 13 columns of text.
VI. 11 standing deities.
VII. 13 columns of text.
VIII. Sun-disk with descending rays, framed by arms emerging from above; vignette flanked on each side by four squatting deities.
The upper surface of the feet has a pair of images of Anubis as a canine, recumbent on a shrine and holding a kherp-sceptre. The toes bear two lines of text, with a ba at either end. The front of the pedestal has 18 short columns of text.
The left side of feet has a single standing anthropoid figure, below which are four squatting deities parallel to the edge of the lid. Behind them, a ba adores the beginning of a procession of thirteen female solar deities who hold ropes pulling the bark of Re, placed on the upper arm of the lid. The bark is adored by another ba on a stand, and carries Thoth, Maat, Hathor, Re, a solar deity and a helmsman. Behind the bark is XXXXX upon a shrine-shaped podium. Short columns of text run from the upper margin of this sequence to the pair of columns of text that border the registers down the front of the lid.
The same situation is found on the right side of the lid, with a similar representation of the pulling of the bark of Re, but with twelve female solar deities, the bark at the foot end and the initial adoring ba on the upper arm; a squatting ape is placed behind him.
The inside of the lid is adorned with a full-face figure of Nut, extending the full length of the coffin, her arms and three strands of hair extended above her head and her limbs and body covered with five-pointed stars. There is a slight depression above Nut’s head to accommodate the nose of the inner coffin.
The lid was affixed to the trough by seven tongues each side of the lid, fitting into corresponding sockets in the trough, plus one each at the head and the foot. The edges of the lid and trough have stepped profiles to allow them to lock together. The long sides of the trough each have a single column of text running from just below the shoulder to the top of the pedestal. The entire length of the floor of the coffin has an image in profile of Nut, standing on a standard, with a column of text running from her waist down to a little above the hem of her dress.
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