Body covering on painted canvas from Deir el-Bahri. These...
Body covering on painted canvas from Deir el-Bahri. These date to the Roman Period (220-270 AD)
Shroud/mask with three dimensional head of a man. He is wearing a wreath on his head (thought to represent the transfiguration of the deceased), and holds a cup in his right hand. The hem shows henu-barque of Sokaris flanked by two seated jackals with iron keys around their necks (the key to Hades -this motif is not known until the twelfth regenal year of the emperor Trajan AD 109). These are from a group of shroud found at Deir el-Bahri dated to the mid-late 3rd century AD. Published by Christina Riggs in Journal of Egyptian Archaeology Vol. 86, 2000, 121-144 and Christina Riggs 2005 'The Beautiful Burial in Roman Egypt. Art, Identity, and Funerary Religion' Oxford University Press, p239-240.