The Legion of Honor is preparing for a new exhibit that will open October 31, called “Very Postmortem: Mummies and Medicine”. (I love that a show on mummies opens on Halloween!)
Part of that preparation took place this week, as researchers transported an unusual patient to Stanford Hospital for an advanced, whole body CT scan. Who was the patient? Iret-net Hor-irw, which means “The Eye of Horus is Upon You”. He was an Egyptian priest that has been dead for close to 2,500 years.
According to an article in the SF Chronicle, “He was probably about 20 when he died in the major Egyptian cult city of Akhmim, where thousands of other mummies have been a major source of respectful research by archaeologists and anthropologists for decades.”
The CT scan recorded thousands of x-ray images of the mummy, allowing researchers to see what the mummy looks like under its layers of thick linen and tree sap, used by Egyptians in the mummification process. With the pictures they captured, they will be able to not only see the body, but also the mummy’s ceremonial ornaments with which it was buried, rituals surrounding the death, and perhaps what may have ended the priest’s life.
The upcoming exhibition at the de Young will examine the cultural practices of ancient medical care and death rituals in Egypt. Some of the CT images from the priest will be on display, along with a clay reconstruction of his face so visitors can get a sense of what he looked like some 2,500 years earlier.
The video below from KGO-TV shows the scan taking place at Stanford Hospital and includes some interesting looks at the x-rays as well as the mummy’s burial ornaments and objects. And the photo set shows Irethorrou being removed from his home in Stockton’s Haggin Museum, where it’s been on loan from the de Young since 1944.
Sarah B.