The coffins of Seqenenre Tao and Thutmose III were the focus of examination by Kara Cooney, chair and associate professor, department of Near Eastern Languages & Culture, and Egyptology PhD student Nicholas Brown during the 2019 season at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. The work was part of the UCLA Coffins Project at the museum, begun in 2016 as a collaborative effort between Egyptologists from UCLA and colleagues at the museum, who work together to reexamine the unique collection of royal coffins from sites at both Deir el-Bahari and the Valley of the Kings. The research objectives of the project include in-person examination, documentation (photographic and written), analysis, and study of the group of objects from the Royal Caches of TT320 and KV35 in order to identify and examine evidence of reuse of the royal coffins during the 21st Dynasty, a period of political, social, and economic instability for the ancient Egyptians. Cooney and Brown looked at the mummified remains of Seqenenre Tao, which were found within his original coffin, and who appeared to have died in battle based on the amount of ax wounds through his body. They found Thutmose III’s coffin to be a prime example of the theft and reuse of royal funerary equipment, as the royal elite found it necessary to systematically dismantle the burials of their predecessors, including famous pharaohs like Ramses the Great. All of this was done under the guise of “protecting” the remains of these former rulers and their families, Brown explained. He is currently based in Cairo for research and field work.
