Such was the case of an Egyptian mummy owned by the National Museum in Warsaw. For decades, the carefully wrapped corpse of an ancient Egyptian was believed to be a male priest. Well, the assessment couldn’t have been more wrong. Thankfully, that’s where the folks of the Warsaw Mummy Project come in.
This brilliant international team, founded in 2015 and lead by two Poles, Marzena Ożarek-Szilke and Wojciech Ejsmond, has been working hard to reassess our understanding of the residents of the Nile region 4000 years ago. The task is not as easy as it seems – and not only due to the lack of resources. Rather the problem with our understanding of the ancient Egyptians lies in the shortcomings of technology and… dismissal of written sources. All of that, however, has been brought together to retrieve the most accurate identity of our long-lost ancestors in the land of Pyramids.
(Left top) Marzena Ozarek-Szilke, Wojciech Ejsmond and Aleksander Leydo with the pregnant mummy at the National Museum in Warsaw (Photo by B.Bajerski – National Museum in Warsaw); (center top)Marzena Ozarek-Szilke & Wojciech Ejsmond with the pregnant mummy at the National Museum in Warsaw (Photo by A. Leydo – Warsaw Mummy Project) ; (right top) Marzena Ozarek-Szilke with the mummy of Panepy at the National Museum in Warsaw (Photo by A. Leydo – Warsaw Mummy Project); (bottom) CT examination of the pregnat mummy in the Affidea clinic (Photo by A. Leydo – Warsaw Mummy Project).
The revolutionary contribution of the Warsaw Mummy Project team consists of new digital imaginary data. Back at the project’s beginning, at the premises of Affidea Warsaw clinic, the scientists pioneered in undertaking the difficult task of scanning all the human and animal mummies from the National Museum’s collection. The X-Ray and CT scans allowed them to take an unprecedented peak underneath all the bandages and balms to obtain images of the persons buried in this manner millennia ago.
Facial reconstruction of the Egyptian mummies has a much deeper purpose than some might think. Answer honestly: how often, when at a museum, do you actually stop to ponder over the fact that the remains locked in glass cabinets and sarcophaguses are actually… human? The interrupted process of decomposition turned the corpses into objects that don’t, at first glance, resemble people. This is why the task of facial reconstruction of the mummies examined as part of the project assumed by the renowned Italian forensic anthropologist Dr. Chantal Milani, could be viewed as an important mission in the restoration of their dignity as once living beings, very much like us – filled with hopes, dreams, emotions and writing their own stories.
(Left) The Mysterious Lady Forensic Facial Reconstruction Chantal Milani 3; (right) The Mysterious Lady Forensic Facial Reconstruction Chantal Milani 1.
The process itself is as fascinating and complex as it is important. Since the scanning machines work using radio waves, it is important for any forensic anthropologist to take into account that the bandages and balms used in the mummification process may resemble the frequencies of human tissue. Also, it is important to consider changes that occurred over the centuries that altered the looks of typical Egyptians. How to deal with such an obstacle? Firstly, the scientists compared the sample data of the facial characteristics among contemporary Egyptian and Belgian populations. The cross-check of the results did not show any significant discrepancies. But the Warsaw Mummy Project used one more vital piece of data in their reconstruction that had never before been taken into account.
In ancient times, people had to somehow be identified, especially in higher societies as that which developed in Egypt. Thanks to this need there is an abundant source of descriptions of ancient Egyptians that tells us what the majority of them looked like. The scientists were able to learn that the vast majority of them had “honey” colored skin. The source also tells us about common injuries, eye color, hair, etc.And now to the one dreadfully mis-identified mummy mentioned at the beginning of this article – the so-presumed mummy of a male priest. Imagine the shock suffered by the scientists when the scan revealed the mummy was that of a 27-year-old, pregnant woman! She died in the 7th month of her pregnancy and is the only known pregnant mummy in the world.
(Left) Wojciech Ejsmond & Marzena Ożarek-Szilke Warsaw Mummy Project Directors at the National Museum in Warsaw (Photo by A. Leydo – Warsaw Mummy Project); (center) Wojciech Ejsmond at the National Museum in Warsaw with pregnat mummy (Photo by A. Leydo – Warsaw Mummy Project); (right) The Mysterious Lady, A.Leydo.
And now to the one dreadfully mis-identified mummy mentioned at the beginning of this article – the so-presumed mummy of a male priest. Imagine the shock suffered by the scientists when the scan revealed the mummy was that of a 27-year-old, pregnant woman! She died in the 7th month of her pregnancy and is the only known pregnant mummy in the world.
This case shows in a nutshell how immensely important it is to use contemporary technology in order to pay our respects to the millennia-old dead. Thanks to such technology, we are capable of restoring the true identity of those who were once laid to rest and listening to their story of where they came from and lived – without romanticizing and guessing.
