What visitors see in a museum display case is not just an object. It is the result of a long chain of invisible filters (what survived, what was collected, what a curator decided to show) that shape our picture of the past. This paper uses the image of a mosaic, missing many of its tiles, to explore how museums construct knowledge rather than simply presenting it, and asks what museums can do once they recognise this. Taking ancient Egypt as a case study (a field whose modern shape still carries the marks of nineteenth-century colonial collecting), this paper looks closely at one recent attempt to put these ideas into practice: the hall Searching for Life at the Museo Egizio in Turin, dedicated to the display of human remains, implemented after years of scientific study, public consultation, and internal ethical debate. The hall does not aim to resolve all the existing tensions: it offers instead a working example of how a museum can hold those tensions in view, rather than disguising them as settled. This paper argues that the way forward is to make these filters visible, turning the missing tiles of the mosaic into part of the story a museum tells.

This paper explores the phenomenon of Iron Age bog bodies which are currently the subject of competing claims over the respectful treatment of the ancient dead. It reviews the problems associated with their discovery, identifies why they attract such attention, and critiques both traditional interpretations of bog bodies and methods of display. The paper defends their archaeological analysis, arguing that this process can radically transform our understanding of past communities: their lifeways and world views. Using British and Irish examples, it discusses how intimate emotions and social bonds are constructed between bog bodies, on the one hand, and, on the other, the professionals and public who engage with them. It contends that a more reflexive approach which foregrounds these complex relationships might help address concerns about the public display of human remains in general. It concludes by advocating broad processes of consultation as well as a contextual approach to the interpretation and display of future bog bodies.