Egyptian Mummified Falcon, ca. 200 BC
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GUEST:
It's an Egyptian hawk mummy, and I bought it in 1996 at the Knights of Columbus Hall in Middletown, Rhode Island. There was an auction of the contents of a house from an old professor in Maine. And I saw in the newspaper the day before that there was an Egyptian mummy in the auction, so I thought, "I need to get down there and buy that mummy."
APPRAISER:
Of course.
GUEST:
(chuckling) Yes, so I did. There were some Egyptologists holding on the line to, to bid on it, but I outbid them.
APPRAISER:
Mummified animals and birds are found in many Egyptian tombs, and they're there as offerings. This one is to the god Horus, the god of light. He's also the lord of the sky, so he's really, really important. Horus is a falcon, and he's also considered the savior of Egypt from the scorpions. These are found really from about 650 B.C. to about 250 A.D. in Egypt. Have you any idea what it's worth?
GUEST:
No, none whatsoever.
APPRAISER:
And what did you pay for it?
GUEST:
My top bid was going to be $1,000.
APPRAISER:
Uh-huh.
GUEST:
But I went to $2,500, so...
APPRAISER:
All right. I think a retail market for this would be between $3,500 and about $5,000.
GUEST:
Wow. That's amazing-- I would never sell it.
Appraisal Details
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Value can change: The value of an item is dependent upon many things, including the condition of the object itself, trends in the market for that kind of object, and the location where the item will be sold. These are just some of the reasons why the answer to the question "What's it worth?" is so often "It depends."
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