"The Mummy Chamber" Exhibition

Brooklyn Museum

Permanent event

This installation of more than 170 objects from the Brooklyn Museum’s world-famous holdings of ancient Egyptian material explores the complex rituals related to the practice of mummification and the Egyptian belief that the body must be preserved in order to ensure eternal life. On view are the mummy of the priest Thothirdes; the mummy of Hor, encased in an elaborately painted cartonnage; and a nearly twenty-five-foot-long Book of the Dead scroll. Also in the installation are canopic jars, used to store the vital organs of mummies, as well as several shabties, small figurines placed in tombs, each of which was assigned to work magically for the deceased in the afterlife. The installation includes related objects, among them stelae, reliefs, gold earrings, amulets, ritual statuettes, coffins, and mummy boards.

[Image: "Coffin and Mummy Board of Pa-seba-khai-en-ipet." Egypt, from Thebes. Third Intermediate Period, circa 1070–945 B.C.E. Wood, painted, 76 3/8 x 21 5/8 x 12 5/8 in. (194 x 55 x 32 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund, 08.480.2a–c]