© Michael C. Carlos Museum, Emory University. Photo by Peter Harholdt.

ClassificationsAncient Egyptian Art

Coffin Lid

Place CreatedEgypt, Africa

CultureEgyptian

PeriodLate Period, Dynasty 27 - Dynasty 30

Date525-343 BCE

MediumWood, plaster, pigment

Credit LineCollected by William A. Shelton, funded by John A. Manget

Dimensions71 5/8 x 17 11/16 x 13 7/8 in. (181.9 x 45 x 35.2 cm)

Object number1921.003 B

Label TextThis wooden anthropoid coffin lid is plastered and painted on the outside, but the inside was left undecorated. It is made of irregular pieces of native Egyptian wood, and gaps between planks are filled in with mud. The lid depicts the deceased as a mummy wearing a divine, tripartite wig and the long, braided beard associated with Osiris, god of the underworld, with whom the deceased is identified. Below an elaborate collar, a winged goddess with a sun disk on her head kneels with arms outstretched to protect the deceased. Beneath her, the mummy of the deceased lies on the lion bed that was used in the ritual embalming. Under the bed are four canopic jars to hold the viscera, with stoppers carved in the form of the four sons of Horus. These beings appear again on the lower part of the lid with mummiform bodies. Between them are five columns of text. The outer two identify the figures, and the three middle ones contain the traditional offering formula asking for a series of benefits for the deceased in the next life. The name of the owner would have been included at the end of this text but is now lost through damage. Figures of Anubis, the god of embalming, in the form of two black jackals lying on pedestals decorate the foot of the coffin.
Exhibition HistoryA Preview of the Collections, Schatten Gallery, February 15 - April 4, 1982
Monuments and Mummies: The Shelton Expedition, Emory University Museum of Art and Archaeology, February 8 - June 25, 1989
MCCM Permanent Collection Galleries, May 11, 1993 - Spring 2001
MCCM Permanent Collection Reinstallation, October 6, 2001 - 2006
Shadow of the Sphinx: Ancient Egypt and Its Influence, Munson Williams Proctor Arts Institute, Utica, New York, June 17 - November 25, 2012
GE Presents: The Mystery of the Albany Mummies, Albany Institute of History and Art, Albany, New York, September 21, 2013 - June 8, 2014
Hall of Ancient Egypt, The Houston Museum of Natural Science, Houston, Texas, August 2014 - February 3, 2025
Published ReferencesEmory University Museum of Art and Archaeology, A Preview of the Collections (Atlanta: The Museum, 1982), 8.
Michael C. Carlos Museum Handbook (Atlanta: Michael C. Carlos Museum, 1996), 28.
Peter Lacovara, "The New Galleries of Egyptian and Near Eastern Art at the Michael C. Carlos Museum," Minerva (September/October 2001): 9-16.
Peter Lacovara and Betsy Teasley Trope, The Realm of Osiris (Atlanta: Michael C. Carlos Museum, 2001), 56.

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