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Mummy: The Inside Story
Nesperennub's wooden coffin
Nesperennub was alive around 800 BC and died
aged approximately forty years, possibly due to illness. His body
was discovered by local diggers at Luxor (the site of ancient
Thebes) in the 1890s. The exact location of Nesperennub's
tomb is unknown but the excellent preservation of his coffins
indicates that it was probably among the 'tombs of the
nobles'. These were already five, six or seven centuries
old by the time he died, but burials there are generally better
preserved than the newer tombs along the edge of the Nile
floodplain.
The wooden
outer coffin is simple in design, with a painted face, wig and
collar and a line of hieroglyphs identifying the occupant. The
reddish colouring of the background associates the deceased with
the sun god
Re.
The coffin was regarded symbolically as a kind of cocoon, with the
dead person lying inside like a child waiting to be reborn into the
Afterlife. The figure of a goddess, either
Nut or
Nephthys,
has been painted on the interior, with her arms outstretched to
enfold Nesperennub in a protective
embrace.
Other members of
Nesperennub's family were probably buried with him,
including his father Ankhefenkhons (whose coffin is also in the
British Museum) and his wife Neskhonspakhered.
Nesperennub's mummy and its cases were sent to England by
ship in 1899, having been bought by E.A. Wallis Budge on one of his
regular visits to Egypt to collect antiquities for the British
Museum.