Takabuti’s Legacy - Dr David Tosh
Channel: Takabuti Seminar
Date: 11/05/2021

The mummy of Takabuti is one of the best-known antiquities in the Ulster Museum, Belfast. Takabuti was a young woman who lived in Egypt during a tumultuous period, around 600 BC. Her mummy was unwrapped and investigated in Belfast in 1835. The results of the Takabuti Project (2007-2009 and 2018-2020) have culminated in the publication of a new book – The Life and Times of Takabuti in Ancient Egypt: Investigating the Belfast Mummy (available from Liverpool University Press - https://www.liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/books/id/54509/)
The project has demonstrated how researchers act as ‘forensic detectives’ piecing together a picture of the life and times of Takabuti. Questions addressed include – Who was Takabuti? When did she live? Where did she come from and where did she reside? What did she eat, and did she suffer from any diseases? Did she suffer a violent death, and how was she mummified and prepared for burial?
This video was part of a one-day online seminar to launch the book and bring the project to the public.

Dr David Tosh has been working as Research Co-ordinator for National Museums NI since 2018, prior to which time he worked in the field of conservation biology. When not learning about ancient Egypt and trying to borrow X-ray machines for projects on ancient mummies, he assists research across all areas of National Museums NI’s collections. Upon gaining a PhD in Ecotoxicology from Queen’s University Belfast, he became interested in the distribution and population status of endangered species. He gained experience in working for the not for profit, government, university and private sectors in Indonesia, Ireland and the UK before hanging up his boots for a family and joined the museum. He continues to pursue an interest in the pine marten – but only at weekends.