The Brooklyn Museum Conservation Laboratory is beginning a study of the human and animal mummies in the Museum’s collection, using the tools of modern-day scientific investigation to reveal new information about mummification practices in ancient Egypt thousands of years ago.
The project will bring together scientists from the Brooklyn Museum, the Getty Conservation Institute in Los Angeles and the University of Bristol in England. It will begin with the X-ray fluorescence (XRF) of the first-century C.E. mummy known as Demetrios, which will be a part of the forthcoming exhibition “To Live Forever: Egyptian Treasures from the Brooklyn Museum.”
X-ray fluorescence will allow analysis of the painted surfaces associated with the wrapping of mummies, including painted linen bandages and shrouds. Preliminary results have shown that the red paint used on the Demetrios mummy may have been made, in part, from components imported from Spain. The lead in the paint is suspected to have come from a Spanish silver mine, but it remains unclear whether the paint itself was manufactured there or, alternatively, whether if the lead ingredient was traded to Egypt with the paint then produced locally.
See the above page for the full story.
No comments:
Post a Comment