An Egyptian mummy from Toronto's Royal Ontario Museum will undergo CT-scanning to uncover its sex as well as information about ancient life and funerary practices.
Specialists will perform a CT-scan on a five-foot-tall adult Egyptian mummy (Dynasty XXI, ca. 1000 B.C.) from the Royal Ontario Museum on October 29, 2007. This non-invasive procedure is now performed with some regularity by institutions such as the Brooklyn Museum. The cutting-edge process, also known as computerized tomography, will be conducted at the University of Western Ontario by Dr. Roberta Shaw, the ROM's Assistant Curator of Egyptology, Dr. Rethy Chhem of the London Health Sciences Centre and Dr. Andrew Nelson of UWO's Department of Anthropology, also a Research Associate at the ROM. CT-scanning equipment was recently acquired by the university. Three-dimensional images of the body will help determine the remains' gender and reveal any artifacts, such as jewelry and religious amulets, possibly concealed beneath some 18 layers of bandages.
The mummy to be examined arrived at UWO in mid-August 2007 with those of two infants who have already been studied. Both died at or shortly after birth. The first (ca. 1st Century A.D.) dates from Egypt's Roman Period and is in a bad state of preservation.
It's hoped that the analysis of such cross-sectional images will yield further important information about the health, lives and funerary practices of the ancient Egyptians. The mummy of Pharaoh Tutankhamun (Dynasty XVIII, r. 1332-1322 B.C.) was recently CT-scanned. Scholarly interpretation of the tests indicated that the young monarch died from an infection in his left leg resulting, perhaps, from a tragic accident.
