AN EXCEPTIONAL ANCIENT EGYPTIAN MUMMY HEAD, EGYPT 750-800 BC.
An extremely rare and fine mummified head, Radio-carbon dated to between 750 and 800 BC, therefore the Third Intermediate Period of ancient Egypt (1070 – 664 BC). This period began with the death of Pharaoh Ramesses XI in 1077 BC, which ended the New Kingdom, and was eventually followed by the Late Period.
Provenance: Private collection, acquired by the vendor through the family collection. By family repute dating to World War I.
Press Release
3000 year old Mummy for sale in Belfast Antique shop.
“After more than a decade in the antiques business, I still found it hard to answer the same inquisitive queries from our intrigued customers. Namely; “what’s the oldest thing you have had?”, “What’s the strangest thing you have had?” and “what’s the most expensive thing you have sold?” Now I have an answer for all 3. A genuine near 3,000 year old Egyptian Mummy’s head!”
Justin Lowry, owner of On The Square Emporium
On The Square Emporium is Irelands Largest Antique store, situated in Heron Road Belfast, close to the Holywood Exchange. It specialises in antiques, vintage furniture and collectibles. It is a true emporium, as it is vast in size with an over 14,000 square foot interior showroom and over 12,000 sq ft of storage and workshops. It has a huge range of products, covering antiques, vintage items, collectibles, taxidermy, Persian rugs, vintage industrial, breweriana, militaria, toys, art, artistic crafted pieces and a range of Heritage reproductions including William Morris wallpaper and TG Green ceramics. But many people come for On The Squares collection of the weird and the wonderful, human skeletons, shrunken heads, full zebra, lioness taxidermy, a couple of giraffes and lots of strange medical and scientific equipment. Their new acquisition tops all that; A 2,800 year old Egyptian mummy’s head.
“As far as I am aware this is the only mummies head that is for sale, or has been for private sale in the last few decades.”
Justin Lowry
The rare Egyptian mummy’s head brought to the UK by a British soldier during World War I. The head remained in the possession of the family of the soldier for a century, where it was kept under a glass dome for safekeeping. Because some visitors didn’t like looking at the artifact, the head ended up being put away in a cupboard.
The head has been carbon-dated to between 800 BC and 750 BC.
This coincided with the collapse of civilizations in the late Bronze Age in the ancient Near East and eastern Mediterranean.
In the early 1900s it was commonplace for artifacts including mummies to be sold by street traders in Cairo, Egypt. This is most probably how the mummies head came into the possession of the British army officer sometime between 1915 and 1920.
“We have secured a local buyer for the head, but the head will remain in the Emporium until the end of September so the public can get to see it. Then it will be going into a private collection”
Justin Lowry
Mummification in ancient Egypt involved removing the internal organs of a corpse, drying the body with a mixture of salts, then wrapping it in a cloth soaked in a balm of plant extracts, oils and resins.
Ancient mummies are believed to have been preserved naturally by being buried in dry desert sand and were not chemically treated.
However, Russian scientists believe that different conditioners were used to keep the hair in shape at the time than the formulations that were used on the rest of the body.
The hair was treated with a conditioner made from a mixture of cow fat, castor oil, beeswax, pine gum and a drop of pistachio essential oil as an additional option.