A Fragment of the Mummy Bandages of Wedjahor

Supplying the mummy with wrappings inscribed with texts from funerary books was common in the Late and Ptolemaic Periods. The fragment, once belonged to Wedjahor, son of Haireshep, came from the National Museum to the Museum of Fine Arts. It contains texts in hieratic script and outline drawings which are selected chapters and the accompanying vignettes from the Book of the Dead. The fragment has three columns of texts of which only the middle one has been preserved entirely. The vignette above it depicts the solar barque with the sun god represented with a scarab head and sitting in a cabin. In front of him is an offering table, and behind the barque stand the goddesses Isis and Nephthys. The text below the vignette preserved a shortened and highly distorted version of Chapter 108 of the Book of the Dead whose purpose, in other, more apt versions, is to repel the Apophis snake, archenemy of the sun god who, by swallowing up the waters carrying the solar barque, seeks to stop the boat and thus hinder the journey of its passenger. The piece contains two additional chapters of the Book of the Dead. On the right, scanty fragments of Chapter 107 are visible. The accompanying vignette again depicts the solar barque, the passenger of which is the falcon-headed sun god inside a sun disc. On the left is shown the figure of the deceased in prayer, while the fragmentary text below seems to be Chapter 109, which ensured that the deceased knew the “Souls of the East”.