Coffin of Rehu-er-djer-sen
Description
<p>This coffin, made for a man named Rehu-er-djer-sen, is an early form of burial container. The exterior was left largely unpainted, perhaps because it was made from expensive, imported cedar wood. The interior is painted with brightly colored objects and offerings considered essential to a wealthy burial. "Coffin Texts," common to coffins of the early Middle Kingdom, were written on the wood to help the owner gain access to the afterlife. The texts are a series of magical spells intended to safeguard the body and spirit of the deceased and ensure resurrection. Deities were also depicted from the myth of Osiris that guaranteed protection. In the afterlife, the individual was to travel the heavens with the sun-god Re. Hieroglyphic inscriptions on the exterior of the coffin include a prayer to Osiris for funerary offerings. Along the floor of the coffin flows the Nile of the underworld. Rehu-er-djer-sen would have lain on his side so he might see the world through the eyes painted on the outside of the coffin.</p><p>For the latest information about this object, <cite><a href='https://purl.thewalters.org/art/62.5' rel='external'>Coffin of Rehu-er-djer-sen</a></cite>, visit the Online Collection of the Walters Art Museum.</p>
AI image analysis GPT-5.4-nano
Machine-generated from the object's image on Jul 2026. Not curatorial; treat deities, names, and signs below as the model's best reading, not authority.
Photograph of a decorated wooden Egyptian coffin with hieroglyphic bands and stylized eye imagery along the sides.
The image shows a long, rectangular coffin lying on a support, viewed from the side. The surface is light-colored and painted with black hieroglyphic signs arranged in horizontal registers. Decorative elements include a prominent painted eye motif set within a rectangular frame on the right side, and additional vertical columns of hieroglyphs at the corners/edges. The coffin lid seam and edges are visible, and the paint appears weathered in places but largely intact. No clearly legible cartouche or royal name is identifiable at this resolution; the text appears to be non-royal funerary spell/decorative inscription. No Greek, Coptic, or Arabic text is visible.
Inscriptions (1)
English description
Cross-references (2)
- Walters-AccNum 62.5 tier-2
- Walters-id 30212 tier-2
About this record's data
- From the source institution — accession, description, dimensions, and dating are as catalogued by Walters Art Museum (Egyptian).
- AI-inferred — the image-analysis panel (deities, names, signs) is machine-generated and may be wrong.
- Approximate location — most map points are plotted at the site centroid, not the exact findspot.
- Inferred links — cross-references marked with a match method other than explicit-source-field were matched by us, not stated by the source.