Scientific Research, The British Museum, Great Russell St, London, WC1B 3DG, UK.
Keeper of Nile Valley & Mediterranean Collections, The British Museum, London, WC1B 3DG, UK.
Sci Rep. 2020 May 20;10(1):8309. doi: 10.1038/s41598-020-64209-8.
Bitumen has been identified for the first time in Egyptian occupied Nubia, from within the town of Amara West, occupied from around 1300 to 1050 BC. The bitumen can be sourced to the Dead Sea using biomarkers, evidencing a trade in this material from the eastern Mediterranean to Nubia in the New Kingdom or its immediate aftermath. Two different end uses for bitumen were determined at the site. Ground bitumen was identified in several paint palettes, and in one case can be shown to have been mixed with plant gum, which indicates the use of bitumen as a ground pigment. Bitumen was also identified as a component of a friable black solid excavated from a tomb, and a black substance applied to the surface of a painted and plastered coffin fragment. Both contained plant resin, indicating that this substance was probably applied as a ritual funerary liquid, a practice identified from this time period in Egypt. The use of this ritual, at a far remove from the royal Egyptian burial sites at Thebes, indicates the importance of this ritual as a component of the funeral, and the value attributed to the material components of the black liquid.
沥青首次在埃及占领的努比亚被发现，来自于公元前 1300 年至 1050 年期间被占领的阿玛拉西特镇。通过生物标志物可以确定这些沥青来自死海，证明了在新王国时期或其之后不久，这种材料从地中海东部贸易到努比亚。在该遗址确定了两种不同的沥青用途。在几个颜料调色板中发现了地沥青，在一个案例中可以证明它与植物胶混合，这表明沥青被用作地面颜料。沥青还被确定为从一个坟墓中挖掘出的易碎黑色固体的一个组成部分，以及一种黑色物质被应用于涂漆和灰泥棺材碎片的表面。这两种物质都含有植物树脂，表明这种物质可能被用作仪式性的丧葬液体，这是在埃及这一时期发现的一种做法。在远离底比斯的埃及皇家墓地的地方使用这种仪式，表明了这种仪式作为葬礼的一个组成部分的重要性，以及对黑色液体的物质成分的重视。
