Dr. Douglas Robertson swears that one of the best vantage points for observing a 5,300-year-old Egyptian mummy mask is in his laboratory at UPMC Montefiore.

Make no mistake: The funerary mask of what may have been a noblewoman from the court of Ramses the Great is physically on display 550 miles away at the St. Louis Art Museum. But a full-color, three-dimensional model of the mask resides in Robertson's computer...

[More], Post-Gazette, Pittsburgh, Palau, USA, December 13, 2004.

Albuquerque, [New Mexico] — Two doctoral students from the University of New Mexico will star in the Discovery Channel's new show "Mummy Autopsy."

James Murrell, a radiologic technologist, and Ken Nystrom, a biological anthropologist, traveled around the world to conduct research on mummies for the show...

[More], AP via MSNBC, USA, December 07, 2004, via Explorator.

cf. 'Autopsy' Showcases Scientists' Research., AP via ABC News, USA, December 07, 2004.

Do you remember the first time around? Tutankhamun and his hoard came to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1978 and forever changed the way museums did business, not necessarily for the better. There had been major special exhibitions before, but the frenzy over Tut was something extraordinary. Sold-out tickets, long lines, overcrowded galleries — if the objects on display had been any less luminous, any less golden, than they were, they would have been invisible. For the Met, Tutankhamun meant new demographics, new revenues and, in some sense, a new idea of itself. Suddenly it seemed possible to capture audiences of a size limited only by the scale of the museum's cloakroom.

[More], New York Times, New York, USA, December 07, 2004, via Explorator.

More on the finds at Bahariya Oasis this weekend.

Bahariya, Egypt — Archaeologists unveiled Sunday the tomb of a member of a powerful family that governed a swath of western Egypt about 2,500 years ago, along with a dozen recently discovered mummies from Roman times.

The mummies are among 400-500 located thus far in what Egypt has dubbed the Valley of the Golden Mummies — grounds where thousands were believed entombed.

[More], AP via Salt Lake Tribune, Utah, USA, December 13, 2004.

cf. 'Golden mummies' of Egypt's princes found, AP via The Independent, UK, December 13, 2004. Thanks Peter.

cf. Egypt Unveils 2,500-Year-Old Tomb, Mummies, AP via ABC News, USA, December 12, 2004.

cf. Egyptian tomb adds to family tree, AP via Denver Post, Colorado, USA, December 13, 2004.

cf. New mummies uncovered, AP via Press-Telegram, California, USA, December 12, 2004.

Plus many more syndicated copies of the Associated Press story.