"There’s something out there, you know, something under that sand."
According to one of the best movies of all time, it’s probably a mummy.
Hey guys.
Julia here for DNews Can you believe we’ve never talked about
mummies before on DNews?
They’re like one of the gateway drugs to science!
The practice of preserving the dead probably arose accidently.
Burying the dead in a pit of sand where it’s dry, might make a mummy.
It’s easy to imagine how a body preserved in an almost life like state became spiritually
significant, I mean many religions consider the incorrigibility of a body to be a spiritual
sign.
Mummies first fascinated the public in the early 1900s when people would unwrap them
in public performances.
Dr. Kathleen Sheppard from the Missouri University of Science and Technology says these events
were “poised between spectacle and science”.
It’s kind of a morbid fascination but we can learn so much from mummies.
Like spiritual practices of an ancient culture, or even want people ate thousands of years
ago.
The most famous.. or maybe infamous is the ancient Egyptian mummification process, which
dates back to about 3400 BCE.
We all learned about this when we were kids.
This process removes all moisture from the body, kind of like turning a grape into a
raisin.
After removing the internal organs, the bodies were dried out using natron, which is made
up of soda ash and baking soda.
After being cleaned, the bodies were wrapped in linen and coated in resin.
This whole process, including building a sarcophagus and other tomb things, was pretty expensive.
So it was usually reserved for the higher ups or wealthy.
But ancient Egypt isn’t the only culture to practice preserving their dead.
The oldest mummies on Earth are from Chinchurro culture in South America and date back nearly
2,000 years before the Egyptians.
In preparation for burial, bodies were stripped of all their soft tissues, then the skin was
stuffed with vegetable matter, finally the whole body was covered in clay.
But these mummies are in danger from degradation from climate change.
The part of Chile where the bodies are kept is notoriously dry, like hasn’t seen a drop
of rain in hundreds of years dry.
Yet maybe due to a changed climate, there’s an uptick of moisture in the air that makes
the mummies’ skin fertile breeding ground for hungry bacteria.
Some of these mummies are turning into black ooze.
So cool right?
Gross, I mean totally gross.
Other mummies include some found in the Canary Islands, which were preserved using a method
similar to the Egyptian process.
But rather than linen, the Guanche people used animal hides to wrap the body.
Buddhist Monks in China practice a form of self-mummification.
The process starts when the monk lives on a diet of nuts, seeds, and water for 1,000
days.
Afterwards the monk basically buries himself alive in small burial chamber and chants.
He would have a small bell to ring to let people know he was still alive.
When the bell stopped ringing, the chamber would be completely sealed.
After three years, the chamber would be opened to see how preserved the body was.
If well-preserved they body would then be placed in shrines and worshiped.
Italian Monks in the 16th and 17th mummified their fellow monks by embalming them and dehydrating
them on ceramic pipes.
The Capuchin Catacombs of Palermo hold over 8000 bodies, including some wealthy and famous
people of the time.
Some of which are eerily well preserved.
So basically, we’re surrounded by mummies!
Does that give you the chills?
Got questions?
Let us know in the comments below.
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