Xin Zhui - She was the wife of the Imperial Viceroy of Changsha during the Han Dynasty.
Perhaps her name would have sunk into oblivion if after her death she had not been mummified. The body of this Chinese woman was amazingly preserved 2100 years after her death, and today scientists are racking their brains over the mystery of Lady Dai's mummy.
China, Navandui Upland in Hunan Province. Here in 1992, the Chinese army conducted large-scale military exercises. In one of the hills, sappers dug a tunnel and unexpectedly stumbled upon a mysterious structure. At a depth of 12 meters, there was a tomb in the form of an inverted pyramid. In it, 4 sarcophagi were found, neatly nested inside each other.
In one of them lay a woman's mummy wrapped in silk. Her body did not resemble either ancient Egyptian or Peruvian mummies. It was preserved in a completely unusual way.
An autopsy of the mysterious mummy gave amazing results - the body weighed 35 kg., The joints retained mobility, and the muscles did not lose elasticity, even the skin retained its natural shade.
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Mummies of people or animals are dead bodies, the skin and organs of which were preserved by accident or intention. Decomposition of tissues can be prevented by lack of air, low humidity, high or low temperatures, or exposure to chemicals. This means that the body does not decompose as long as it is stored in a cool and dry place. Mummies have been found on all continents. For example, in Egypt, there are over a million mummies of animals, mostly cats.
In ancient Egypt, when the pharaoh died, it was believed that he simply passed into the afterlife and turned into one of several gods that people worshiped at that time. The Egyptians used the mummification process to preserve bodies and prevent decay. Intentional mummification was first recorded during the 2nd Dynasty, i.e. in 3400 BC. It soon became an integral part of the Egyptian funeral ritual (of course, not for everyone). Sometimes it took up to 70 days to properly embalm the body.
In Asia, mummies are preserved only by accident - due to the fact that people were buried in the "right place", where the environment itself acted as a means to preserve the body. Therefore, Asian mummies are most often found in the desert regions of Iran and the Tarim River basin. Mummies are also found in more humid Asian climates, but they are very difficult to recover, as bodies decay very quickly after being removed from their graves due to the warm and humid climates they are unexpectedly exposed to.
Mawandui is an archaeological site in Changsha (Hunan province, China), widely known for its unique finds. In addition to the bodies of three people, there were found:
1. Silk funeral banners: the perfectly preserved painting provides rich material for studying the cosmology of the Chu kingdom;
2. silk cards; 3. 28 treatises on astronomy, history, medicine and other sciences, as well as the oldest known copies of the Strategies of the Warring States, the I Ching and the Tao Te Ching.
The three bodies found are: the body of Marquis Dai, his wife Xin Zhui and, presumably, his son. The books were found in the third of the graves, dating back to 168 BC. e. Many of them were known only by name, and a number of others (like, for example, the commentaries on the I Ching attributed to Confucius) were completely unknown. Silk writing is characterized by vertical lines.
Of the three bodies, the body of Xin Zhui is of particular interest. It is revealed that she was a wealthy Chinese matron from the Han dynasty who died around 160 BC. e. at the age of about 50. Her mummy is one of the best preserved since antiquity. Xin Zhui's tomb was built in the form of an inverted pyramid and was located 12 meters underground.
Her body was wrapped in silk and placed in four ornamented, densely lined sarcophagi. Her body did not resemble either ancient Egyptian or Peruvian mummies. It was preserved in a completely unusual way. The mummy was floating in 80 liters of yellowish liquid. 5 minutes after the discovery of the mysterious crypt, this substance literally evaporated, leaving no trace of it.
These measures made it difficult for air, moisture and bacteria to reach the body, thereby slowing down the decomposition process. The grave was covered with 5 tons of coal and a meter layer of clay. A 15-meter mound was poured above the soil level.
Xin Zhui was accompanied to another world by up to a thousand items, most of which were designed to serve her daily needs. Food was laid out on 30 bamboo dishes, along with recipes for the deceased's favorite dishes. Dozens of books on medicine were found in Xin Zhui's sarcophagus. In them, to the smallest detail, the most complex operations for brain augmentation, heart transplantation and bypass surgery were described. In ancient China, they knew about the medicine of the future.
Another find that amazed archaeologists was the Xin Zhui blanket. A map was drawn on a piece of silk about a meter by meter. It depicts the territories of three Chinese provinces at a scale of 1: 180,000. The map looked as if it had been compiled from photographs from near-earth orbit. The Silk Map was compared with modern images of Chinese territories taken by NASA satellites. The incredible accuracy amazed American scientists. Not a single mistake!
During an autopsy, blood was found in the veins of the deceased, the internal organs were preserved as if death had occurred just a few weeks ago. The joints retained the ability to move, the skin retained its elasticity.
The study of the mummy confirmed that the aristocratic women of ancient China did not lead the healthiest lifestyle: they ate a lot of fatty foods, did not move much, which resulted in overweight and narrowed coronary arteries.
Life weight is assumed to be 120-140 kg with a height of 150-152 cm. Xin Zhui had problems with his spine, and tapeworms were found in his intestines.
Unusual embalming of the body, which allowed it to remain so, books on medicine, a veil-map - how to explain such a deep knowledge of the ancient Chinese in medicine and topography? Why hasn't this knowledge been preserved?
More than 30 years have passed, and the secrets of the mysterious sarcophagus of Xin Zhui have not yet been revealed.
And for some reason this mummy reminded me of this episode: