Characterisation of the pigments in a Ptolemaic Egyptian Book of the Dead papyrus

A relevant subject of study in the sphere of ancient Egyptian painting technology is given by the evolution of the palette across New Kingdom, Ptolemaic and Roman periods. Functionally to secondary factors such as geographic occurrence of minerals and type of associated surface, the employment of certain painting materials provides relevant insights into particular issues such as relative dating of the object and social rank of the owner. The Book of the Dead of Amenemhet (ROM 978x43.1, middle Ptolemaic Period) has been analysed at the Department of Restoration and Conservation of Archivals, Graphics and Book Illumination of the Cologne Institute of Conservation Sciences (Germany). Together with visible reflectance spectroscopy, digital and optical microscopy, devices such as XRD, SEM-EDX and FT-IR have been successfully employed for the characterization of the pigments from the polychrome funerary papyrus displayed at the Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto (Canada). The present research took place within a series of investigations performed at the CICS, devoted to the interdisciplinary study of funerary Egyptian papyri dating from the early 18th Dynasty onwards.