LUXOR, EGYPT—Ahram Online reports that a wood coffin containing a mummy, a small coffin made of mud, and funerary equipment dating to the 17th Dynasty (ca. 1635–1550 B.C.) were found in a mudbrick chapel in the Dra Abul Naga necropolis, which is located on Luxor’s West Bank. José Galán, a member of a joint Spanish and Egyptian archaeological mission, said the anthropoid coffin was carved from a single sycamore tree, coated with whitewash, and painted red. The poorly preserved mummy of a girl, aged approximately 15 years old at the time of death, was found resting on her side inside the coffin. She was wearing two spiral-shaped earrings coated with metal in one ear, and two rings, one made of bone and the other of metal, string, and a blue glass bead. A total of four necklaces fastened together with a faience clip rested on her chest. One of the necklaces was made of amethyst, carnelian, amber, blue glass, and quartz beads. The small mud coffin contained a wooden ushabti figurine wrapped in four linen bandages. In a nearby funerary shaft, Galán and his team also recovered a pair of leather sandals that had been dyed red and decorated with images of the god Bes, the goddess Taweret, a pair of cats, an ibex, and a rosette. Based upon their size, the sandals are thought to have been worn by a woman, he added. To read about a painting of a leopard that likely adorned an Egyptian coffin buried 2,100 years ago, go to "Guardian Feline."
