2,278-yr-old mummy dying a slow death

Times of India (Prakash Bhandari)

Thanks very much to Noreen Doyle for forwarding me the above link.

It is a 2,278-year-old mummy of an Egyptian priestess and decaying fast at the city's Albert Hall Museum. Displayed in a glass case, it is a key attraction of the museum but may not be around very soon, as exposure to oxygen and moisture has led to its case crumbling to dust.

Egyptian experts, who had visited the city a few years ago, had said that the mummy bought by Sawai Ram Singh, then ruler of Jaipur, from Cairo in 1887 needed to be kept in an oxygen-free environment.

The cost involved was a meagre $1,000, but the museum authorities seem to be dragging their feet over it, and it may cost the city one of its treasures -the mummy of a priestess of the Ptolemaic dynasty that ruled Egypt for nearly 300 years between 305 BC and 30 BC.

What's worse is the fact that the last time the mummy's case was taken out for restoration and paintwork, its beam was replaced incorrectly adding to the stress on the casket. Nassry Youssef Iskander, director of the Egyptian museum at Cairo who visited Albert Hall a few years ago, had remarked on this, adding that the mummy's base was in bad shape and needed urgent repairs.