SEAMS

A Study of Egyptian Animal Mummy Styles

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Principal Investigator
Dr. Maria Diletta Pubblico

Scientific Supervisor
Dr. Christian Greco; Prof. Dr. Willemina Zwanida Wendrich

Partner Institutions
UCLA Cotsen Institute of Archaoelogy, Centre for Textile Research (CTR) at the University of Copenhagen (UCPH); Lund University (ULUND); Digital Heritage Innovation Lab (DHiLab) at ISPC-CNR
November 2023-October 2026, 3 years

Votive animal mummies represent one of the largest categories of artefacts produced in ancient Egypt, which offers a rich source of information about a variety of aspects of ancient Egyptian civilization. Unfortunately, a great deal of data was lost through the wild exploitation and trade in animal mummies for a variety of purposes, as well as the unconventional and unrecorded removal of them from their burial places, especially during the 19th and early 20th centuries. As a result, the vast majority are unprovenanced and it is difficult to connect them with specific places of production and/or within a more refined time frame. The SEAMS project focuses on the study of the only aspect on which who produced these mummies in a precise place and period left his signature, namely the wrapping patterns, in order to understand whether they could be markers of dating and geographic provenience. In doing so, SEAMS seeks to address the current knowledge gap on contextual data of votive animal mummies and provide a thorough insight into their manufacturing process using an interdisciplinary approach that blends traditional research methods with new technologies.

An experienced team developed a specialized reference workflow to gather unbiased, diagnostic, and dependable data for a thorough investigation. The first step of this workflow lies in a photogrammetric protocol meticulously structured to achieve both geometric precision and high-resolution detail in the resulting 3D models. These fine details allow to perform rigorous morphological and stylistic comparisons among the 3D entities. Further comparative investigations are carried out on the dyes present on the bandages through a non-invasive protocol, which couples multispectral imaging techniques (MSI) to fibre optic reflectance spectroscopy (FORS). The virtual stylistic restoration is subsequently undertaken to fill any volumetric and chromatic gaps of patterns in the digital replicas by using the collected data. This produces a digital edition of the mummies, which corresponds as much as possible to their original appearance. The digitally restored 3D entities are particularly important for the last research phase, as they are used as main references to reproduce exact replicas of the recurring wrapping patterns through textile and experimental archaeology protocols. A further contribution to this study is offered by the analysis of textiles, which gains a glimpse into the raw materials and fabric used for wrapping mummies, their quality and their weaving forms.

The SEAMS project not only offers a unique insight into the animal mummy craft, especially by providing thorough information on the variety of techniques used to wrap votive animal mummies, but also gathers new data from which to evaluate the economic weight of the wrapping chaîne opératoire. The systematic comparison of patterns across votive animal mummies is allowing to reveal the unique characteristics of regional wrapping techniques and record the stylistic trends. In doing so, it has been possible to bring back together the mummies scattered in different collections and reconstruct their original spatial dimension. The information collected throughout the overall research will lead to draft the very first classification of votive animal mummies based on their wrapping techniques and styles, which will be will be provided with a well-defined terminology that has been lacking until now. It is set to be an especially useful comparative tool to enable the identification of the currently unknown contextual data of the specimens kept in other museums, thus offering a significant contribution to the advancement of the current state-of-the-art in animal mummies and museum fields.

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SEAMS

SEAMS

Multimedia section

Visit

Events

Collection and research

Who we are

Fondazione Trasparente

HR and tenders

Press