Abstract

World collections include an important group of textiles with inscriptions in Greek and Coptic dating from the Late Antique and early Islamic periods in Egypt. Among these we find a group of cloths with elaborated inscriptions that represent a Christian version of ‘tiraz’. The evidence indicates that extensive inscriptions were embroidered on funerary cloths as a means to convey prayers and blessings for a loved one.Through this paper, we demonstrate how interdisciplinary research methods are necessary to interpret these complex artefacts. Our goal is to share work in progress through a case study of an unpublished funerary shroud in the Kelsey Museum of Archaeology (KEL 88017a,b). Research methods include textual analysis, technical textile analysis and experimental archaeology. The evidence suggests that this artefact was the product of a professional industry that produced luxury funerary shrouds for the Christian market. The authors are currently working to create an interdisciplinary international project to analyse and publish a corpus of inscribed textiles.KeywordsCopticGreekEgyptTechnical analysisExperimental archaeologyEpigraphy

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