Bead Shroud Fragment

An arrangement of small faience beads mounted on cardboard annotated: "From the Ramesseum Q. XVIII DYN XV Cent / BC". They were collected during the 1896 excavations at the mortuary temple of Ramesses II (Western Thebes) by the Egyptian Research Account. This is a fragment of a text band from a funerary shroud constructed of faience beads strung together in a net pattern, that would have been placed over the outer wrappings of a mummified body. From Quibell's excavations for the Egyptian Research Account 1896; see J E Quibell, 'The Ramesseum' (London, 1898).