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The Coffins of Tayuheret

Tayuheret's outer coffi lid (on left) & inner coffin lid (on right.) From
Georges Daressy's Cercueils des cachettes royales (Cairo, 1909.)
Pl. LIV.

    The coffins which contained the mummy of Tayuheret, who is thought to be the wife of Masaharta, had originally been made for a Chantress of Amun named Hatet. They had been modified for Tayuheret's usage in a very expedient fashion by merely writing her name over that of the previous owner. Edward Loring notes that various spellings were employed, as though the people who reinscribed the coffins were unsure of the proper spelling, and describes their work as "crude." The coffins and coffin board had been badly damaged by having their gilded face masks, hands and gilded elements from the wig lappets all roughly hacked off with an adze. The foot end and headpiece of the coffin board had also been broken off. This is typically a sign that the burial had been plundered. However, the relatively intact condition of Tayuheret's mummy argues against plundering. G. E. Smith noted that insects had damaged the skin of Tayuheret's face and it is conceivable that insects had also attacked the wood of her coffin board, thereby making it fragile and more susceptible to breakage. The other damage to the coffins may be interpreted as the results of a rough processing job conducted by necropolis officials. Reeves and Loring both agree that Tayuheret had not originally been buried in DB320. Reeves proposes that she had originally been interred with Masaharta, her alleged husband. Loring disagrees because the damage to Tayuheret's funerary equipment is more extensive than that which appears on Masaharta's burial equipment. He argues that she had probably been buried separately in her own as-yet unidentified tomb prior to her reburial in DB320.
      Although badly damaged, the coffins and coffin board of Tayuheret exhibit interesting stylistic features. In view of the primitive fashion with which Tayuheret’s name had been added to her funerary ensemble, it seems likely that these stylistic details were original to the coffins and coffin board and were not modifications added after Tayuheret had acquired them. The hair depicted on the wigs is finely braided in a fashion found only on very high-status coffins. A winged goddess (probably Nuit) appears on the central panels of both coffin lids and the coffin board, and the foot board of the outer coffin has been decorated with an Anubis jackal motif. Rogerio Sousa calls attention to the lower section of the coffin board and notes that its decorative central partition is very unusual for coffin boards of this period. The vignettes on the panels of the central partition depict scarabs, ba birds, and wedjet eyes and follow the same general pattern employed for the central partition decorations on the lids of the outer and inner coffins.(Source Bibliography: CCR, 171ff., Pls. LIV, LVII; DRN, 214, no. 39; 256; GCSS, 50, n. 280; 133, n. 676; 158, n. 313; RM, 105; TRC, 67f.) Source Abbreviation Key

Tayuheret's coffin board (on left) and inside of inner coffin basin (on right.)
From Georges Daressy's Cercueils des cachettes royales (Cairo, 1909.)
Pl. LVII.

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