Textiles
are among the most fragile artefacts in the world. They are difficult to preserve
even in the best circumstances. Herein, we studied an artefacts fabric of a
special nature in terms of usage. Despite the multiple applications of
textiles, the piece understudy is one of the unique pieces that the ancient
Egyptian used as fenders for King Khufu’s first solar boat, the second-largest
discovery in Egypt history. The boat was discovered inside a limestone pit. It
was disassembled and arranged in several layers. Four pillows of wrapped fabric
were found in the first layer, which was used as boat fenders. This use is a great discovery of the role of
textiles in the manufacture of ancient boats. Thus, we conducted tests and
analytical studies of those fenders using scanning electron microscopy (SEM)
and an optical microscope to identify the type and nature of fibers, spinning
method, and aspects of damage. Both energy-dispersive X-ray (EDX) analysis and
infrared analysis (FT-IR) were employed to explore the sample’s elemental
content and study the functional groups of the fabric. These analytical
processes were useful in carrying out the restoration and preservation work
necessary for the artefact under study.
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