Look closely enough and you can still make out the prints on the bottom of his toes ... 2,500 years after he died.

This is the near-perfectly preserved body of a 14-year-old Egyptian boy named Minirdis, revealed for the first time since he was unearthed in the 1920s, entombed within a lavishly-decorated sarcophagus.

The son of a powerful stolist priest, he is still wrapped in the embalming cloth - now yellowish, dusty rags - in which his corpse was swaddled some 500 years before the birth of Christ.

The trouble, however, is that his body has lain still for so long that it is impossible to unwrap the gold-painted shroud covering his face, for fear it may crumble instantly into dust.

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No head, shoulders, knees... just toes: This is the near-perfectly preserved body of a 14-year-old Egyptian boy named Minirdis, revealed for the first time since he was unearthed in the 1920s, entombed within a lavishly-decorated sarcophagus

Revealed: The trouble, however, is that his body has lain still for so long that it is impossible to unwrap the gold-painted shroud covering his face, for fear it may crumble instantly into dust

So his toes remain the only part of him that we can now see after scientists opened his coffin for the first time since his untimely death.

Once the lid was off the wooden coffin containing his remains, scientist J.P. Brown could relax.

The conservator at Chicago's Field Museum and three other scientists had just used clamps and pieces of metal to create a kind of cradle to lift the fragile lid.

Wearing blue surgical gloves, they slowly lifted the contraption containing the coffin lid and carefully walked it to a table in a humidity-controlled lab at the museum.

'Sweet!' Brown said, after helping set the lid down. He later added: 'Oh yeah, god, I was nervous.'

The well-planned routine came on Friday as scientists started conservation work on the mummy of Minirdis, the 14-year-old son of a stolist priest.

The mummy needs to be stabilized so it can travel in the upcoming exhibit, 'Mummies: Images of the Afterlife,' which is expected to premier next September at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County. It is expected to travel to the Denver Museum of Nature and Science in fall 2016.

Relief: Scientist J. P. Brown and three colleagues used clamps and pieces of metal to create a kind of cradle to lift the fragile lid at Chicago's Field Museum. Markings on the coffin showed that, if Minirdis had lived, he would have been a priest like his father. Scientists don't know why he died so young

Delicate: Wearing blue surgical gloves, they slowly lifted the contraption containing the coffin lid and carefully walked it to a table in a humidity-controlled lab at the museum

The Field Museum has had the mummy since the 1920s, when the institution received it from the Chicago Historical Society. It's part of the museum's collection of 30 complete human mummies from Egypt.

'There's always a risk of damage,' said Brown, who did the work in a lab filled with plastic-covered examination tables set behind a large window to let schoolchildren watch his daily work. 'So we like to handle these things as little as possible.'

Inside the coffin, known as a sarcophagus, there was expected damage. CT scans, which make X-ray images that allow scientists to see inside the coffin before opening it, showed the boy's feet were detached and partially unwrapped with his toes sticking out. His shroud and mask were torn and twisted sideways. Those also will be repaired.

Artifact: The Field Museum has had the mummy since the 1920s, when the institution received it from the Chicago Historical Society. It's part of the museum's collection of 30 complete human mummies from Egypt

Confident: Brown didn't worry that the mummy would scatter to dust when opened - something common in the movies. Pieces of the coffin had previously gone missing, exposing the mummy to the elements

Technology: CT scans, which make X-ray images that allow scientists to see inside the coffin before opening, prepared scientists for the damage already done to the remains

Brown didn't worry that the mummy would scatter to dust when opened - something common in the movies - so long as he is kept wrapped in linen. Pieces of the coffin had previously gone missing, exposing the mummy to the elements.

'The last bit of "Indiana Jones" and all that,' Brown explained before opening the coffin. 'That's not going to happen.'

And it didn't.

Walking around the opened coffin, Brown pointed and explained the significance of a certain marking, the colored resin on the linen wrappings or the gilded gold on the mask. If Minirdis had lived, he would have been a priest like his father, Brown said. Scientists don't know why he died so young.

'The fascinating thing about any mummy is that it's survived as long as it has,' Brown said. 'They're actually amazingly fragile.'

'This kind of work is always painstaking, filled with pre-planning and tests so scientists are prepared for the unexpected,' said Molly Gleeson, who works with mummies as project conservator at Penn Museum's 'In the Artifact Lab: Conserving Egyptian Mummies' exhibition in Philadelphia.