Diary Of An Archaeologist - Wattys 2019 Non-fiction Winner

That Time A Mummy Stole My Heart

As I explained in the intro, I've only been to Egypt once, as a tourist.
I had a local guide, who showed me all the major temples and attractions from Cairo to Aswan. We travelled by boat, because the Nile is just the best way to travel in Egypt.
Trust me, I've been on a train from Luxor to Cairo, and that has been the most uncomfortable journey in my life to this day.

But I'm not here to talk about my train ride from hell; I'm here to tell you about a very special mummy.

You see, I might not be an Egyptologist, but I have substantial knowledge of Ancient Egypt and its heritage. I was already acquainted with an Egyptologist before I started studying Archaeology so when it came to choosing my first internship I contacted him immediately, hoping he had a cool internship for me.

Turned out, that at that time he (I'll call him Michael) worked at a Dutch museum with a substantial Egyptian collection, and as luck would have it, he was looking for an intern to help with the reorganisation of the collection.
So, he got his intern, and I got to work amongst Ancient Egyptian artefacts all day. A good deal if you ask me.

He taught me a lot about the preservation of such a delicate collection, how to display objects and even let me assist in setting up the new exhibition. The job was very different from the fieldwork I had done so far, but I actually started to find myself more at home in a museum, telling the story of the artefacts to the public and finding new ways to present that story.

That brings me to that fateful day. Michael spend the morning in the museum, busy with the exhibition, so I was alone in his office working on collection registration when his phone rang. Now, I was used to answering the phone for him, and it was usually someone from the museum who had a question about a display or who wanted Michael's assistance with the transportation of one of the artefacts. But since he was already in the museum, it was unusual for the phone to ring.

I answered with my standard greeting, announcing my name and that I was Michael's intern. The person on the other end asked if I could repeat that in English and once I did they said, "can I speak to Michael?"

"I'm sorry, but he's not here at the moment. Is there a message I can pass on or would you like him to call you back?"

"Tell him dr. Hassan (not his real name) from the Museum of Cairo has called, and I need him to call me back today. It's urgent."

I wrote down the name and number, and immediately ran to Michael. Normally, Michael is the most chill person to be around, I had never seen him stress over anything. But as soon as I told him who had called, he ran back to the office faster than Usain Bolt.

Their conversation seemed to last forever, with Michael insisting that it had to stay in the Netherlands and that he would get the sample himself, but it couldn't possibly survive a flight back to Egypt.

I was sitting beside him the whole time, trying to pick up on the conversation, but getting more and more confused by the second.

It turned out, dr. Hassan had called about a mummy in our collection. It was a young boy who was found in a tomb in Luxor dating back to the Third Intermediate Period (around 800 BC). The boy had been excavated in the 19th century by a Dutch archaeologist, and they only took the mummy and some artefacts. But now, on re-excavation, dr. Hassan's team had discovered that the tomb had multiple rooms and was possibly a family grave.

So, Michael was asked if the boy could be sent back to Egypt for DNA testing. He refused, arguing that the state of the boy was far too fragile to be shipped back to Egypt.
There was even an entire meeting about the fate of the boy, where I wasn't present, but from what I heard it got pretty heated, and it was finally decided that the boy would stay in the Netherlands and Michael would gather DNA samples to send to Egypt.

With me being his intern, I was allowed to assist him, but I did get the orders to do nothing without Michael's approval since this mummy was so fragile. I assured him, I would be cautious, but the moment I walked into that climate controlled room, with a special suit, mask and gloves on, I must admit, I was too terrified to even breath.

The boy's mummy lay in a specially made coffin since his original coffin had been long lost. Unlike most mummies I had seen in the museum, he was partially unwrapped, and the first thing that I noticed was his hair. He still had a lock of copper red hair. The boy was no taller than 70 cm (2 feet) and the way he lay there, with his arms crossed over his torso, hands on his shoulders made him look so vulnerable, like he was hugging himself. His hands were so tingy, his fingers still clinging to his body, the way a child does when he's scared.
Michael understood my compassion for the kid, and we mostly worked in silence over the next days, giving the boy the nickname Ramses.

After a DNA sample was taken and send to Egypt, Michael asked me to assist him in getting one of the mummified cats from the exhibition and switch it out with another. I didn't understand why, since he had been adamant in keeping this particular cat on display before, but I helped him anyway, only asking what we were doing once we were making our way to the climate controlled room with the cat.

"Well, your internship will finish soon, and with you gone no one will be able to keep Ramses company, so I figured he would want his feline friend with him."

He then continued to explain that this cat was the only other artefact the museum had from the boy's tomb. So, we placed the cat beside the boy, each in their own special coffin.

Barely a week later we got news from dr Hassan; It turned out Ramses was closely related to the other three mummies that were found, probably his parents and sibling, and they were possibly a part of some elite family.
Dr Hassan was overjoyed with the discovery, but I almost cried. I felt so sorry for our little redhaired Ramses who would never be reunited with his family again, only having his pet cat as a companion in a country so far away from his home.

On my last day, I went to Ramses one last time, saying goodbye and promising that even though I could never show him to the world, I would never forget him or his story.

A/N: Thank you for reading, if you liked this story don't forget to vote. Your stars brighten my day and night. ⭐😘

-tomorrow I'll tell you about the time I got accused of being a member of the Illuminati-