A teenage boy whose mother had been kept in a museum since 1916 was covered in precious talismans, a study published Tuesday found.
A team of scientists has uncovered a 2,300-year-old mummy using a CT scanner to reveal its secrets.
The team discovered that the so-called “golden boy” was covered in gold and precious stones. 49 protective amulets were placed in exactly three pillars on his body, indicating that he was rich and noble.
The findings are “very surprising” because high-class women were often robbed for their precious jewelry, Sahar Saleem, study author and professor of radiology at the faculty of medicine at Cairo University, told Insider in an email.
Because the woman was not disturbed, she provides a unique insight into how embalmers carefully place amulets to protect the dead, he said.
Charms to protect the dead
Saleem said: “The ancient Egyptians believed that charms have powers that depend on things, their color and appearance.
“During the burial, the embalmers prayed and recited verses from the ‘Book of the Dead’ while placing amulets inside the woman or between the wrappings,” he said.
Each charm had a specific meaning to protect the boy, who was 14 or 15 years old when he died.
A scarab charm for the heart, and a golden tongue for speaking
A scarab-shaped amulet near the boy’s heart, inscribed with verses from the Book of the Dead, would help him receive a kinder judgment after death, Saleem said.
“The heart of the scarab was mentioned in Chapter 30 of the Book of the Dead; it was very important after death during the judgment of the deceased and the heart of the feather of Maat,” the goddess of truth, justice, balance, and many. order, Saleem said.
“The heart of the scarab was silenced on the day of judgment so that it would not testify against the deceased,” he added.
In the young man’s mouth he also placed a leaf that looked like a golden tongue. This allowed the boy to communicate with the gods after death.
Another popular amulet was placed near the boy’s penis. The “two-finger” amulet is designed to protect against the movements he made on the head, Saleem said.
Other amulets had different protective roles. The “bottle” amulet represents carrying holy water after life. The amulet of “Djed”, representing the spine of the god Osiris, guaranteed the revival of the deceased. The “right angle” charm brought stability and control to the deceased.
The findings are “exciting,” Wojciech Ejsmond, an Egyptologist from the Warsaw Mummy Project who was not involved in the research, told Insider in an email.
“This study provides important information about how the ancient Egyptians lived, died, and what they thought would happen afterwards,” he said.
Walking shoes
The boy was also found wearing white shoes at his grave. According to the Book of the Dead, the deceased must wear white shoes and be pious and pure before reciting his verses.
“The shoes were probably designed to get the boy out of the box,” Saleem said in a press release.
“Golden shoes were also found in royal tombs; for example Thutmose III,” Saleem told Insider.
This may indicate that although the boy was of high rank, he may not have been a royal.
An introduction to ancient Egyptian circumcision
Another unexpected discovery is related to the boy’s penis. Saleem said the scan showed that the boy was not circumcised. This is in contrast to another high-ranking figure, King Amenhotep I, whom Saleem also studied.
This may indicate that the ancient Egyptians were circumcised as adults, Saleem said.
But Salima Ikram, head of Egyptology at the American University in Cairo, has a different opinion.
“Uncircumcision is interesting because it tells us something about his race – the Egyptians used to be circumcised before the age of 13,” he said. The Guardian.
“It could mean that foreigners adopted Egyptian customs – and we know that the Persians did,” he said.
However, he warned: “I can’t hang all this on one fragile skin.”
Who was this boy?
The boy can reveal many secrets.
According to the history of the Cairo Egyptian Museum, it was first discovered in 1916 in a tomb used from 332 BCE to 30 BCE in Nag el-Hassay, Southern Egypt.
The young man would have been “an eyewitness to the western civilization of ancient Egypt, perhaps the upheaval of the last Ptolemaic kings, and perhaps even a brief revival of Egyptian greatness under Cleopatra,” Ejsmond said.
His name, as of now, is unknown. But scientists are studying his sarcophagus more to learn more about who he was, Saleem said.
The results were published in a peer-reviewed journal Frontiers in Medicine the second.
This article was originally published by Business Insider.
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