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(Photos Courtesy of The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston) |
Bring the family
A kids’-eye view of mummies
The opening of “The Secrets of Tomb 10A’’ was the perfect time to introduce our 10-year-old twin boys and 7-year-old daughter to the Museum of Fine Arts. The exhibit gathers an impressive array of 4,000-year-old relics that were unearthed from a necropolis near Cairo in 1915. From archaeological and artistic perspectives, the collection is stunning. From a child’s point of view, it is also very awesome.
Adults will naturally be drawn to the show, which explains through one couple - a governor named Djehutynakht and his wife (below) - the ancient Egyptian custom in preparing for the afterlife. Will kids want to stick with it? Absolutely, and especially if you use the child-friendly audio guide. Not only does it tell the story at a grade-school level (through a narrator named Ernie), but it’s also quite funny. Even the gross moments - such as the description of how the brain is extracted from the body before mummification - are told so humorously that you have to laugh. My kids played the audio for item No. 37 over and over. Why? Because it explained that one of the inscriptions on Djehutynakht’s coffin pleaded for good food in the afterlife so that he wouldn’t have to - and this is Ernie’s phrase here - “eat poop.’’ What could be funnier to a couple of 10-year-old boys? (Or, for that matter, their 40-year-old father?) So here’s the secret of “The Secret of Tomb 10A’’: The family version of the audio tour will make the exhibit more enjoyable for anyone, regardless of whether they’ve got kids with them.
The exhibit’s centerpiece, a mummified head, was almost an afterthought for my family. It didn’t go over with everyone, either: My daughter wouldn’t enter the darkened, tomblike cubby that houses it, though honestly there’s little that’s spooky about it.
With Egypt on the mind, we wandered down to the “Egyptian Funerary Arts’’ exhibit that has mummies on permanent display. With all the attention focused on “Tomb 10A,’’ we had this room pretty much to ourselves - the better to take in all the coffins and sarcophagi in peace, the way they ought to be observed.
“The Secrets of Tomb 10A’’ is on display through May 16. MFA admission is $20 for adults, $18 for students and seniors, free for anyone under 18 ($7.50 before 3 p.m. on weekdays). The audio guide is $6 for adults, $5 for members, and $4 for children. More information at www.mfa.org/tomb. 
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