Mummy Label

Wooden mummy label with the faint trace of a painted Greek text on one side. During the Roman Period (30 BC – AD 395) inscribed wooden labels were attached to the mummies to identify the dead person. Rectangular label with ornate blue border adhered to the surface marked with a previous collector's number 1264. Purchased at Sotheby's, London, 9-10 December 1907 (Robert de Rustafjaell sale) Lot 149/30 "Thirty wooden Tablets and Labels from Mummies, etc.; mostly of Coptic date; the names incised or painted".