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number of folded cloths, is covered over lengthwise by one Characterlarge linen sheet. On the little finger of the left hand a mummies

istics of

scarab is usually found; but besides this there is neither of different periods. amulet nor ornament. The coffins in which mummies of this period are found are often filled with baskets, tools, mirrors, bows and arrows, etc., etc.

Mummies of the XIIth dynasty are black, and the skin is dry; bandages are not common, and in the cases where they exist they are very loosely put on. Scarabs, amulets, and figures of gods are found with mummies of this epoch.

From the XIIIth to the XVIIth dynasties mummies are very badly made and perish rapidly.

From the XVIIIth to the XXIst dynasties the mummies of Memphis are black, and so dry that they fall to pieces at the slightest touch; the cavity of the breast is filled with amulets of all kinds, and the green stone scarab inscribed with the XXXth chapter of the Book of the Dead was placed over the heart. At Thebes, during this period, the mummies are yellow in colour and slightly polished, the nails of the hands and feet retain their places, and are stained with henna. The limbs bend in all directions without breaking, and the art of careful and dainty bandaging has attained its greatest perfection. The left hand wears rings and scarabs, and papyri inscribed with chapters of the Book of the Dead are found in the coffins, either by the side of the mummy, or beneath it.

After the XXIst dynasty the custom arose of placing the mummy in a cartonnage, sewn or laced up the back, and painted in brilliant colours with scenes of the deceased adoring the gods and the like.

In the period between the XXVIth dynasty and the conquest of Egypt by Alexander, the decoration of mummies reached its highest point, and the ornamentation of the cartonnage shows the influence of the art of Greece upon that of Egypt. The head of the mummy is put into a mask, gilded or painted in bright colours, the cartonnage fits the body very closely, and the feet are protected by a sheath. A large number of figures of the gods and of amulets are found on the mummy itself, and many things which formed its private pro-. perty when alive were buried with it. Towards the time of

istics of

mummies

of different periods.

Character the Ptolemies, mummies become black and heavy; bandages and body are made by the bitumen into one solid mass, which can only be properly examined by the aid of a hatchet. Such mummies are often wrapped in coverings inscribed with scenes and texts, copied, without any knowledge of their meaning, by an artist who altered them to suit his own fancy or purpose.

Græco-
Roman

About B.C. 100 mummies were very carefully bandaged; each limb was treated separately, and retained its natural shape after bandaging, and the features of the face, somewhat blunted, are to be distinguished beneath the bandages.

About A.D. 50 the desire on the part of relatives and friends to see the face of the deceased resulted in the insertion of a piece of wood, painted with his portrait, over the face of the dead man. The mummies, from this time on to the fourth century, are of little interest, for they become mere bundles; scenes were painted, athwart and along the bodies, in which the deceased is represented adoring ill-shaped Egyptian deities; but little by little the hieroglyphic inscriptions disappear, and finally those in Greek take their place. A remarkable example of a very late Græco-Roman mummy, mummies. probably of the fourth century A.D., is British Museum No. 21,810. The body is enveloped in a number of wrappings, and the whole is covered with a thin layer of plaster painted a pinkish-red colour. Over the face is inserted a portrait of the deceased, with a golden laurel crown on his head; on the breast, in gold, is a collar, each side of which terminates in the head of a hawk. The scenes painted in gold on the body are: 1. Anubis, Isis, and Nephthys at the bier of the deceased. 2. Thoth, Horus, uræi, etc., referring probably to the scene of the weighing of the heart. 3. The soul revisiting the body, which is attempting to rise up from a bier, beneath which are two jars; beneath this scene is a winged disk. Above these scenes in a band is inscribed, in Greek, "O Artemidorus, farewell." APTEMIAWPH, EYYYXI; and above the band is a vase, on each side of which is a figure of Maat. Mummies of children of this period have the hair curled and gilded, and hold bunches of flowers in their hands, which are crossed over their breasts.

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In the early centuries of our era, mummies of wealthy people Descripwere wrapped in royal cloth made wholly of silk. When mummies Pisentios, Bishop of Coptos, and his disciple John took up by Pisentheir abode in a tomb in the " mountain of Tchêmi" (NITWOR the necropolis of Thebes) they

=

tios.

Ň Theer found it filled with a number of mummies, the names of which were written on a parchment roll which lay close by them. The two monks took the mummies and piled them up one upon the other; the outer coffins were very large, and the coffins in which the bodies were laid were much decorated. The first mummy near the door was of great size, and his fingers and his toes were bandaged separately (печтн6 N XIX NEL neytaλarx khс ǹ oт& o&); the clothes in which he Silken was wrapped were made entirely of silk (20λосHрIKON? cloths. яτε πιοτρωου). The monk who wrote this description of mummies, and coffins, and silk, evidently described what he had actually seen. The huge outer coffins to which he refers belong to a very late period, as do also the highlydecorated inner coffins; the fingers and toes being bandaged separately also points to a late Roman period. His testimony

1 Silk, Heb. (Ezek. xvi. 10, 13), LXX., tpixantov, onpikòs (Rev. xvii. 12), Syr., was common in Greece and Rome at the end of the second century of our era. According to Aelius Lampridius (cap. 26), Heliogabalus was the first Roman who wore cloth made wholly of silk, holoserica veste, and an idea of the value of silk in the early days of its adoption in Europe is gained from the fact that Aurelian denied his wife a shawl of purple silk because a pound of silk cost one pound weight in gold (Flavius Vopiscus, Vit. Aur., cap. 45). The custom of women wearing silk was railed at by Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, Ambrose, Chrysostom and others; yet Basil, about A. D. 370, illustrated the doctrine of the resurrection from the change of the chrysalis into a butterfly. The custom in Italy of wrapping dead bodies in silk is probably not earlier than the end of the third century, and in Egypt we may place it about one hundred years later. On the use of silk by the ancients, see Yates, Textrinum Antiquorum, pp. 161-249, and for the collected statements of ancient authors on the subject, see G. D. Hoffman, Observationes circa Bombyces, Sericum, et Moros, ex antiquitatum, historiarum, juriumque penu deprompta; Tübingen, 4to., 1757.

2 Greek ὁλοσηρικός.

3 For the complete text see Amélineau, Etude sur le Christianisme en Egypte, p. 143.

mummy

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