3 000 years ago, a priest named Nesyamun was navigating the politically volatile reign of pharaoh Ramses XI, between 1099 and 1069BC.

Nesyamun was a priest at the temple of Amun in the Karnak complex at Thebes. As a ‘waab priest’ he had reached a high level of purification, which meant that he was allowed to approach the statue of Amun in the most sacred inner sanctum of the temple.

In other words, he was pretty high up, as priests go.

He also suffered from gum disease and had very bad teeth. We know this because it was uncovered by researchers at the University of London, the University of York, and Leeds Museum.

Apart from the priest’s terrible dental hygiene, the researchers also determined that he died in his 50s following a severe allergic reaction.

All of this was laid out in an article published in the Scientific Reports journal, along with another interesting experiment. The researchers used a ‘voice recreation’ technique to recreate the sound of his voice.

The BBC reports:

Nesyamun’s voice has been reproduced as a vowel-like sound that is reminiscent of a sheep’s bleat.

…They have done so by producing a 3D-printed voice box based Nesyamun’s vocal tract, which was scanned to establish its precise dimensions.

By using the vocal tract with an artificial larynx sound, they synthesised a vowel sound meant to be similar to the voice of Nesyamun.

Skip ahead to 29 seconds, to hear him “uhnm”‘:

This is believed to be the first experiment of its kind to successfully recreate the voice of a dead person.

In the future, the researchers hope to use computer models to recreate full sentences in Nesyamun’s voice.

The voice recreation technique “has given us the unique opportunity to hear the sound of someone long dead”, said study co-author Joann Fletcher, a professor of archaeology at the University of York.

Prof Fletcher told the BBC it was Nesyamun’s “express wish” to be heard in the afterlife, which was part of his religious belief system.

“It’s actually written on his coffin – it was what he wanted,” Prof Fletcher said. “In a way, we’ve managed to make that wish come true.”

If he is somehow looking down or up from wherever the afterlife is, I’m sure he’s very pleased, and a little jealous of the advancements we’ve made in oral healthcare.

Except in Britain, of course, where dental hygiene is still in the dark ages.

[source:bbc]