Cartonnage: E.GA.2887.1943

Entities

• Cartonnage

Categories

• Funerary equipment

Description

Cartonnage coffin fragment depicting the goddess Isis. Isis is identified by the hieroglyph of a seated throne ‘As.t’ above her head with a sun disc behind it and a short vertical column of text in front ‘Isis, the great, god’s mother’. Isis is shown here as a woman wearing a red dress with green skin and hair and a green pair of wings extending from her arms. With these wings she protected the body of her husband, Osiris, after he was murdered. Her sister Nephthys is also sometimes depicted in this way, and the pair were often shown on the head and foot of a coffin.

Above Isis are the remains of some feathers, most probably from another winged figure placed over the chest of the cartonnage, while below Isis are the remains of another register and hieroglyphic text.

Cartonnage coffin fragment depicting the goddess Isis. Isis is identified by the hieroglyph of a seated throne ‘As.t’ above her head with a sun disc behind it and a short vertical column of text in front ‘Isis, the great, god’s mother’. Isis is shown here as a woman wearing a red dress with green skin and hair and a green pair of wings extending from her arms. With these wings she protected the body of her husband, Osiris, after he was murdered. Her sister Nephthys is also sometimes depicted in this way, and the pair were often shown on the head and foot of a coffin.

Above Isis are the remains of some feathers, most probably from another winged figure placed over the chest of the cartonnage, while below Isis are the remains of another register and hieroglyphic text.

Acquisition and important dates

Method of acquisition: Bequeathed (1943) by Gayer-Anderson, R. G. (Major)

Dating

1st Millennium BC
Production date: circa 945 BC