Senenmut rediscovered
This is another post about museums finding ancient treasures that have been lost in their… err…..stores! Something that happens all too often.
Senenmut holding the princess Neferua
In Our Time on Radio 4 covered the story of one of first recorded females, the Pharaoh Hatshepsut. and her chief overseer and servant Senenmut. He was an unusually well documented character considering he lived 3500 years ago. Indeed 25 statues of him have been found with the 26th “rediscovered” in Manchester Museum earlier this year. Like many museums, Manchester has a large number of objects, not all of which are well catalogued or documented. The Senenmut statue had originally been brought to the museum at the beginning of the twentieth century and had never been fully identified. Today the curator of Egypt Dr Campbell Price was able to identify the statue celebrating Senenmut, one of the most well known ancient Egyptians of common birth.
Detail of the lost Senenmut statue found in Manchester Museum
Inspiring Collections hoping to emulate Dr Price, is now hunting down lost Egyptian collections to enhance the Red House Museum‘s Mummy Returns exhibition opening on the 17th January! Brendan Fraser watch out!
Brendan Fraser in The Mummy (1999)
