Abstract
This contribution focuses on the interdisciplinary study of a rare Egyptian mummy housed at the Museo Civico Archeologico of Bologna (MCABo EG 1974), carried out in the frame of the Bologna mummy project (BOmp), an interdisciplinary project promoted by the museum and the Institute for Mummy Studies of Eurac Research (Bolzano). The project started in 2020 with the aim of returning this and other inedited mummies to the scientific community and to the public. Long stored in the museum warehouses, the female adult mummy here presented has a notably preserved painted shroud, which is still wrapped and secured around the body and numerous layers of bandages with textile straps and resin. The pictorial style of the shroud can be traced back to the 1st-2nd century AD (confirmed by 14 C analysis), as evidenced by its similarity to the mummies and coffins belonging to members of the Soter family (53-117 AD), whose tomb was found in 1820-22 in West Thebes. The Bologna shroud belongs to the Soter group, but does not necessarily belong to the same archaeological context and the Soter family. It is particularly rare because only another female shrouded mummy from the Soter group is intact: Cleopatra’s mummy in the British Museum. In this context, scientific analysis aimed to deepen our current understanding of the artistic practices of the Roman period through an in-depth study of the painting technique, context of production, and possible provenance of the Egyptian mummy and its shroud, besides reconstructing the biological and the palaeopathological profiles. Moreover, insight into the embalming techniques have been gained. Additionally, the mummy underwent a complex conservation intervention. In particular, the treatments carried on the mummy with the painted shroud needed to include experimental activity to evaluate the performances of innovative materials for conservation.
The study relied on an integrated analytical protocol based on imaging techniques, noninvasive spot analysis.