The coffin of Naktankh plays an important role in my book The Ancient Egypt Sleepover. It is not always on display in the British Museum, but you can see lots of similar Old Kingdom coffins with the painted eyes facing east.
My book contains a simplified hieroglyphic version of the name Naktankh, but the coffin has a more complicated version (above). Can you spot this version of his name on the coffin itself?
The message in hieroglyphs along the top of the coffin is called the ‘offering formula’. You can see it on most Old Kingdom coffins.
Transliteration and translation
ḥtp-dı͗-nsw
An offering given by the king
3sir nb ḏḏw ḫnt(y) – ı͗mntw
(to) Osiris, the lord of Djedu, Khentyimentu,
ntr ʿ3 nb 3bḏw
the great god, the lord of Abydos,
dı͗=f ḫt nb(t) nfrt wʿbt
That he may give everything good and pure:
ḫʿ m t ḥnḳt
thousand of bread and beer,
k3 3pd šs mnḫt
oxen, birds, alabaster, clothing,
ʿnḫt nṯr ı͗m
upon which a god lives,
n k3 ı͗m3ḫ(y)
For the ka of the revered,
nḫt-ʿnḫ m3ʿ-ḫrw
Nakhtankh, True of Voice.