Analysis Of The Coffin Of Ta-Mit

Superior Essays
The coffin of Ta-Mit, from Luxor in the 26th Dynasty, stands in a room dedicated to the artistic standards of Egyptians. Bestowed to the Toledo Museum of Art in 1906, the coffin of Ta-Mit is on view with many archetypal pieces analyzing the cultural values of Egyptians. The daughter of a priest was to rest in the exquisitely detailed coffin; she went by the name of Ta-Mit or She-Cat. The text and imagery contains formal information about her whereabouts, but neglect to express what type of person she was. Coffin text has baffled art historians with its complex style and unique composition. It is dire to understand the evolution of text on artistic cultural pieces to better understand their train of thoughts, values, and beliefs of life, or …show more content…
Differing from Ta-Mit’s coffin, Old kingdom coffins were plain, undercoated, and a few inscriptions. Burial chambers were modest with few inscriptions. There was a shift at the end of the Fifth Dynasty inside the pyramid of their last king; their burial chambers were one of the first to be filled with long religious text. Grajetzki explains, with the burial chambers receiving more attention, the objects within the sit were fashioned just the same. Important texts of the underworld made their appearance on coffins and objects; Egyptians ensured a save passage between life and death, leaving only room for judgment of the deceased. Funerary objects started illustrating offering blueprints to the Gods to aid ones uncertain …show more content…
The process for coffins was a labor of love and a necessary tool for success in the afterlife. The coffin of Ta-Mit is a prime example of the perfected evolution, constructed with sycamore, linen, gesso, and paint. The coffin is slightly less than five and a half feet, small compared to today’s standard size. Coffins from the beginning dynasties, such as four though twelve, were simplistic compared to the preparation of the 26th dynasty. This box of death is painted with pictures and magical prayers in hieroglyphs to assist in the passage to the underworld for

Related Documents

  • Great Essays

    Jade Cong Museum Analysis

    • 979 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Caleb Richey 11-23-15 Ancient Art 101 Professor Sandra Johnson Jade Cong: Bowers Museum The Jade Cong is a detailed piece of art that is composed of two different colors—a grey and a green sort of color (jade). The green section of this piece is circular with a square area on the sides of the “Cong”. In addition, this circular section of the piece represents the heavens while the square part represents the planet Earth. This is a solid piece of art that is about an inch thick and fully designed with many lines and circles that sort of represents faces.…

    • 979 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Superior Essays

    The Mummy Portrait of a Man is from the Fayum region in Egypt. It was painted about 150-200 B.C. It is painted in encaustic on wood, and is a Fayum portrait. The term Fayum portrait is actually derived from a Coptic word meaning “The land of the lake,” which refers to the artificial Lake Qarun. This lake was a project of the kings of the Twelfth Dynasty, and it was this lake that made a desert area of about 100 kilometres into one of the most fertile areas in Egypt.…

    • 1813 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Throughout ancient Egyptian history, art and culture remained constant to support the idea of “order over chaos.” However, in the mid-14th century BCE a revolution occurred in Egyptian society, culture, and religion, consequently causing a brief transformation in Egyptian art. These changes can be detected in the Relief of Princess with an Earring. This sculpture was made in the 18th Dynasty (1353-1336 BCE), during the reign of Akhenaten. Although only a portion of the limestone relief is displayed in the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archeology, the sculpture still demonstrates the attributes that are found in art from Amarna Period.…

    • 1779 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Everyday we pass by a work of art and don't even acknowledge its existence. Art is everywhere we go, for example, a statue in a park is a work of art, it’s not only there for decorations. It has a purpose for being at that particular location, with hope that someone may notice it. Having the opportunity to learn about previous artworks, one of them really stood out to me from ancient Egypt. When an individual hears Egyptian art they mostly think about mummies, pyramids, or Pharaohs.…

    • 284 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Tasir Sarcophagus

    • 1262 Words
    • 6 Pages

    Sarcophagus and Mummy of Taosir This wooden coffin, discovered in the ruins of the ancient city of Ipu holds the mummified body of Taosir, the daughter of Nesmin and Taamun, priestess of Osiris in the city of Ipu around 600 BC. Its bright colors, the details of the decoration, and the good condition of its hieroglyphic text are excellent testimonies of Egyptian life in 600 BC. Falcon sarcophagus with Osiris mummy Within this sarcophagus, which was crafted in the image of the falcon god Sokar, lies an ‘Osiris mummy’ fitted with a beeswax mortuary mask and protected by magic earthenware balls. It is possibly from the 26th dynasty of Egypt.…

    • 1262 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Qin Shi Tomb

    • 770 Words
    • 4 Pages

    With Tutankhamun tomb it was very detailed and packed with many artifacts from the decade. Just like the Qin Shi Huang army, Tutankhamun death mask had extreme detail with such vibrate color, such detail of the two snake heads lunging out of the forehead. A wooden boost of a boy was also found in the tomb with such great detail, even down to the eyebrows. Over five thousand artifacts were found in the tomb from a solid gold coffin to food. According to Nicholas Reeves, “almost 80% of Tutankhamun's burial equipment originated from the female pharaoh Neferneferuaten's funerary goods including his famous gold mask, middle coffin, canopic coffinettes, several of the gilded shrine panels, the shabti-figures, the boxes and chests, the royal jewelry.”…

    • 770 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Ramesses Vi's Tomb Analysis

    • 2355 Words
    • 10 Pages

    The textual description of the tomb begins with a history of Horemheb and how he ascended to the royal throne. The analysis of the tomb decoration is brief, since the decoration was not finished when the tomb was abandoned. However, it is addressed in conjunction with the tomb layout and structure. Frank Teichmann authors a chapter dedicated to what we can learn about tomb construction from the abandoned tomb, which shows various stages of completion. Lastly, objects found in the tomb are presented, most importantly the sarcophagus that was found…

    • 2355 Words
    • 10 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Mummies In Ancient Egypt

    • 463 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Next the body was wrapped with a thick layer of linen cloth. As the body was wrapped Egyptian charms were placed inside the layers of cloth which was believed to keep out evil spirits. Finally an ornate mask was put on the head of the mummy and placed in several layers of coffins. Astonishingly mummies from ancient Egyptian times are still preserved today. From massive pyramids, to famous sphinx, and amazing mummies one can see the astonishing creations fashioned during ancient Egyptians…

    • 463 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Death is inevitable and the customs that follow one 's death are representive of the beliefs and shared religion of that society. Through the scope of this paper I will discuss the death rituals and tomb burial practices of both Ancient Egypt and Ancient China. Over the examination of Ancient Egypt and Ancient China burial practices we begin to understand the complex thought process of respecting the dead, Furthermore, even though both of these civilizations have individually intricate beliefs we can also see the similarities in their ideals and rituals used to honor the dead and afterlife. These societies performed rituals for their deceased by using key components such as symbolic material objects buried alongside the dead, elaborate decoration…

    • 1051 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    This art study will provide a visual and iconographic analysis of “The Palette of Narmer” in the context of the Egyptian stonework from the 31st century B.C. “The Palette of Narmer” (circa 31st Century B.C.) is a carved stone object typically meant for grinding cosmetic powders (to adorn statutes of the gods), but this object was used as a formal ritual object in a temple. This palette was found at the Main Deposit of Egyptian antiquities in Nekhen, which presents one of the earliest known examples of Egyptian hieroglyphics ever found at an excavation site. The iconography of this piece expresses the traditional symbolism of government order in ancient Egypt through the unification of Upper and Lower Egypt under King Narmer.…

    • 1220 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Tutankhamun Discovery

    • 326 Words
    • 2 Pages

    In his book “The Discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb” Carter states “Surely, never before in the whole history of excavation had such an amazing sight been seen”. The aim of my analytical essay is to find out why the discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb became one of the most significant and vital disclosures in the archaeology and other fields concerning to old cultures and civilizations, and why even after decades of its discovery, it still continues to appeal attention of modern…

    • 326 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Passage Tomb Liminality

    • 561 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The architecture of Passage tombs reiterates the ritual stage of liminality in the articulation of entrances and the arrangement of motifs, features and space. The most illustrative examples of passage tombs are those at the Bend of the Boyne, Ireland. It is Knowth, Dowth and New grange tombs, which communicate liminality most clearly. Firstly, the entrances to these tombs emphasizes the threshold or liminality of the space, between the land of the living and the land of the dead (ancestors). Looking specifically at Knowth tomb; the entry is exaggerated by a forecourt with by paving composed of foreign or ‘unusual’ stones such as quartz and water-rolled granite .…

    • 561 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Cosmological Journey

    • 815 Words
    • 4 Pages

    2306 BCE). These spells were composed for the purpose of propelling the deceased king’s spirit into a favorable afterlife among the great gods, in the sky. From the late First Intermediate Period and Middle Kingdom (Dyns. 11-12, c. 1980-1760 BCE), the Pyramid Texts— formerly the prerogative of royalty—disappeared from royal tombs and began to appear in private tombs, alongside a new genre of so-called Coffin Texts. These series of spells are attested exclusively in private contexts and seem to have been available to anyone who could afford a decorated coffin. Within the Coffin Texts, one series of spells, known in modern scholarship as the “Book of Two Ways,” described and, for the first time, utilized figural images to depict the paths that the deceased might follow in the afterlife, through a variety of locales, such as to the “Field of Offerings” or the “palace of Osiris.”…

    • 815 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    1. The work of art is titled Burial Mask of Pakal, the Great. The mask was found on Pakal the Great inside of his tomb, the Temple of Inscriptions located in Palenque, Mexico. The mask was made in 683 CE, the same time as Pakal the Great’s death. The burial mask has over 300 tiles crafted out of jadeite, kosmochlor, albite, veined quartz, shell, and pearl.…

    • 793 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    The life they had known was a suffrage for the deities and that the life to come was almost like a reward and completely different from the lives they had already known (Connor, 167). Egyptians emphasized on geometric shapes, outlining, color and chiaroscuro, they built many pyramids and tombs for the dead in order to experience an afterlife in comfort and to have their possessions with them. A famous piece of work was the “Funerary Mask of Tutankhamun” it’s beautifully done with much detail, style and the use of complementary colors. This is the funerary mask of the young Egyptian ruler, Tutankhamun, the emblems on the forehead the vulture and cobra and on the shoulders falcon heads were symbols of the two lands of Upper and Lower Egypt of divine ruler ship. It was patterned with blue glass and gold and was composed of semiprecious stones, the stripes used to portray this work of art was to establish the abstract look as well as the geometrical position Egyptians often took.…

    • 1286 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays

Related Topics