How the FBI helped crack a 4,000-year-old mummy case

In 1915, a team of U.S. archaeologists excavating the ancient Egyptian necropolis of Deir el-bersha blasted into a hidden tomb. Inside the cramped limestone chamber, they were greeted by a gruesome sight: a mummy’s severed head perched on a cedar coffin.

The room, which the researchers labeled Tomb 10A, was the final resting place for a governor named Djehutynakht (pronounced juh-hoo-tuhknocked) and his wife. At some point during the couple’s 4,000year slumber, grave robbers ransacked their burial chamber and plundered its gold and jewels. The looters tossed a headless, limbless mummified torso into a corner before attempting to set the room on fire to cover their tracks.

The archaeologists went on to recover painted coffins and wooden figurines that survived the raid and sent them to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, in 1921. Most of the collection stayed in storage until 2009 when the museum exhibited them. Though the torso remained in Egypt, the decapitated head became the star of the showcase. With its painted-on eyebrows, somber expression and wavy brown hair peeking through its tattered bandages, the mummy’s noggin brought viewers face to face with a mystery.

“The head had been found on the governor’s coffin, but we were never sure if it was his head or her head,” said Rita Freed, a curator at the museum.

The museum staff concluded only a DNA test would determine whether they had put Mr. or Mrs. Djehutynakht on display.

“The problem was that at the time in 2009 there had been no successful extraction of DNA from a mummy that was 4,000 years old,” Freed said.

Egyptian mummies pose a unique challenge because the desert’s scorching climate rapidly degrades DNA. Earlier attempts at obtaining their ancient DNA either failed or produced results contaminated by modern DNA. To crack the case, the museum turned to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

The FBI had never before worked on a specimen so old. If its scientists could extract genetic material from the 4,000-year-

MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS, BOSTON VIA THE NEW YORK TIMES A team of doctors from Massachusetts General Hospital extracts a tooth from a mummy head in 2009, hoping to extract DNA. The museum called on the FBI to see if its scientists could extract genetic material from the 4,000-year-old mummy, to figure out to whom the head belonged.