AIC's 43rd Annual Meeting

The coffin of the “unknown” is an example of the anthropoid (human-shaped) type used in the late Third Intermediate period, this coffin was found in the basement of the Egyptian Museum of Cairo in two pieces without any kind of information regarding the province. Basically, one half of the coffin is considered to be well preserved comparing with the other half that have a severe damage. Although only a limited range of colors, green, black, red and white - are used on this coffin, it is done with very good effect. The typology of the constitutional material is: wood , textile, preparation layer” gesso” and the pigment. The damage varies between partial and total loss in the two pieces. The type of wood will be determined later after investigation but it’s condition is apparently weak as it had a biological damage. There is areas of losses, detachment of fragment, disjoints, alteration, abrasion, cracks and losing is the structural cohesion especially in the second half. The two halves were preserved in an oxygen-free case for 21 days, it’s currently under investigations and analysis to know the type of the wood, the manufacture technology to determine if the two halves belong together or not. Non-invasive imaging analysis will occur to explore more about the Egyptian Green and other pigments. For the 3D documentation, photogrametry will be applied to help in matching the two halves through the edges. An environmental monitoring is currently ongoing to compare the environmental conditions in the museum basement and in the conservation lab using dataloggers for a course of one month. An intensive conservation treatment will be implemented later especially for the second half to consolidate the fragile parts and rejoin the parts together. This paper will discover the difference between the theory and implementation in the conservation approach and highlight the challenges to work with very low-coast and limited tools to perform a good case. This object is not registered yet or published before, It will be very beneficial for Egyptologists to discover more about the ancient language and figures characteristics as a good model to study after the conservation will be finished.