Niagara Falls Museum Mummy 7
NFM M7

Ramses I

Mummy M7 is one of the most carefully studied mummies in the collection. At one time this male mummy was identified as "the wife of Amenhotep IV, and mother of his six daughters" - in other words, Nefertiti

In fact, it was to test this hypothesis, that the German team lead by Dr. Arne Eggebracht and Dr. Wolfgang Pahl came to Niagara Falls to study the collection in 1985 .In the early 1990s, the mummy's elegant profile, and his association with the New Kingdom coffin, would raise conjecture that he was not merely of late Ramesside date, (circa 1970-1210 bce) but perhaps of the royal family, possibly even one of the missing Ramesside kings.

The body is 1.60 m tall, and appears from x-rays to have been a man about 35-45 years old. The skin is now entirely black. The hands are folded across the chest, with no sign of the objects once held in them.

There are no artificial eyes. The brain had been removed through the right nasal passage.

The anthropometric data resembled Derry's measurements of King Tutankhamun. No autopsy has been performed, but laparoscopy and x-rays suggest canopic packages within the body cavity, which would argue a date later than the Ramesside period.

The presence of Harris lines on the distal end of the tibia would indicate a non-royal origin for the gentleman, though even kings, particularly XXth Dynasty kings, were not immune to serious illness.

To compound the mystery, material taken from inside the body for C-14 testing has returned a date of early Third Intermediate period (circa 1070-900 bce).

We now know that Mummy 7 is Ramses I. Read the articles related to this historic mummy.