Egyptomania in Perth

The Egyptian collection of Perth Museum reflect the collecting of all things Egyptian, known as 'Egyptomania', that was hugely popular in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The bulk of the Perth collection was acquired in this way, by antiquarian and amateur collectors who sent or brought back items from Egypt.
Some appear to have been acquired first hand from excavations in the Valley of the Kings, Thebes, for example, whilst others were acquired second-hand via dealers in Cairo.

The star of Perth Museum's collection is the mummy, which was transferred from the Alloa Society of Natural History and Archaeology in 1936. Like the mummified hands and the mummified Ibis shown here it was recently analysed in Manchester by a team of Egyptologists and radiologists from the University and the Children's Hospital. This data was gathered as part of a UK-wide project to assemble a research database of human and animal mummy samples, CT scans and x-rays.

The exciting results of the mummy examination revealed that she had been badly damaged after mummification - possibly part of a tomb-robbing episode - that she had a name, Takerheb and that she probably came from a town on the east bank of the Nile called Akhmim. With public support Perth Museum would like to raise the funds to enable the conservation and display of the mummy, including a full facial reconstruction to give us a sense of what she might have looked like in life.