16th International Symposium on Boat & Ship Archaeology

97 Zadar, Croatia | 26 September – 1 October 2021 Déjla Garmi 1 & Emmanuel Nantet 2 1 Affiliated ArAr MUR 5138 Mom, University Lyon 2, France 2 Laboratory for Nautical Archaeology and History, Leon Recanati Institute for Maritime Studies, Department of Maritime Civilizations, University of Haifa, Israel; associated member of CReAAH (UMR 6566) The Sails of the Lyon Mummy The textiles of the mummy preserved in the Musée des Confluences, Lyon, pres- ent new perspectives for the study of sails in Hellenistic and Roman Egypt. The remains of a forty-year-old man were wrapped in textiles that appear to have be- longed to at least three different sails, one of which was made of cotton. The first results published under Jean-Claude Goyon’s supervision in 1987 detailed seven layers of shrouds that included padding textiles. In a selective study, Jean Rougé identified the remains of a sail and one brail-ring. Linen fabrics were recognized during this first examination, which was to be expected in an Egyptian funerary context. Our new investigation has revealed the presence of hemp strings and a yellow wool strand, the latter find proving to be unanticipated. Even though wool was more suitable for dyeing in antiquity, it was forbidden for religious ritualistic use in Egypt. In our presentation we will provide a reappraisal of these fabrics, focusing in particular on the padded textiles that were not part of the first study by Goyon due to their poor state of preservation. These fragments include a four-meter- long strip punctuated with small hemp strings fastening the brail-rings. Two of the three sails appear to have been similar to those represented in various icono- graphical sources. Our study also presents the first examination of a hieroglyphic inscription and remains of paint. This review offers new insight into the manufacture and technical features of ancient sails of the 1 st century CE. The presence of specific signs of wear, multi- ple repairs, as well as their final use as a shroud shed new light on the value and significance of ship sails in antiquity and their afterlife when reused.