"Unguent (perfumed salve) cones were worn on top of heads by women in banquets, but likely also during ceremonies to honor gods in temples," he told Discovery News, adding that the mixture may have also been applied to objects. Texts on the jars link them to the gods Amun-Ra and Mut, and not Osiris, the god of death.
The researchers believe the containers were then reused hundreds of years later as canopic jars — to hold the remains unknown individual — since one originally held the Pistacia embalming substance on linen and contained the now-missing organ packet.
Geneviève Pierrat-Bonnefois, curator in chief of the Louvre’s Department of Egyptian Antiquities, told Discovery News that she agrees with the findings "because they largely rectify our vision of the jars, which were for a long time suspected by the department conservators as not being (Rameses II) canopic jars."
Pierrat-Bonnefois said the Louvre has responded by changing the museum’s label for the objects, as well as writing a detailed, corrected history of them, now on the Louvre’s website, www.louvre.fr.
Connan said he hopes to analyze other museum objects and materials in the future, since many more could be mislabeled.
"Sometimes the scientific cross-checking was not carried out, or it was done a long time ago with inappropriate methods," he explained.
Paint, tar and other remains on sarcophagi and statues, as well as embalming materials for mummified animals, such as crocodiles, cats and ibis at the British Museum, interest the scientists and could form the basis of their upcoming projects.
Unless further information surfaces, the VIP who was once partially interred in the ancient Egyptian jars may never be identified.
