In popular culture, the rite of mummification is associated exclusively with ancient Egypt. This is due to the fact that it was the Egyptian mummies that became known to our distant ancestors. But modern historians have also discovered an older culture that practiced mummification. This is the South American culture of the Andean Chinchorro Indians: mummies dating back to the 9th millennium BC were found here. But nevertheless, the attention of modern historians is riveted precisely on the Egyptian mummies - who knows what secrets these well-preserved corpses can hide.
Egyptian mummification
In Egypt, mummification was born only in 4500 BC. Such an exact date was made possible by the excavations of the English expedition carried out in 1997. Egyptologists attribute the earliest burials of mummies to the so-called Baddarian archaeological culture: at that time, the Egyptians wrapped the limbs and heads of the dead with linen and matting, impregnated with a special compound.
Antique evidence
Historians have not been able to recreate the process of the classical mummification of antiquity so far. The fact is that the only surviving evidence of the stages of mummification belongs to ancient authors, including such great philosophers as Herodotus, Plutarch and Diodorus. At the time of these travelers, the classic New Kingdom mummification process was already degraded.
Promotional video:
First, they remove the brain through the nostrils with an iron hook. Then they make an incision just below the abdomen with a sharp Ethipian stone and clean the entire abdominal cavity from the viscera. After cleaning the abdominal cavity and rinsing it with palm wine, the masters then clean it again with rubbed incense. Finally, the womb is filled with pure rubbed myrrh, casia and other incense (except incense) and sewn up again. After that, the body is placed in soda lye for 70 days. At the end of this 70-day period, having washed the body, they are wrapped in a bandage made of fine linen cut into ribbons and smeared with gum - Herodotus.
Storage vessels
All organs removed from the corpse were carefully preserved. They were washed with a special composition, and then placed in vessels with balsam, canopes. There were 4 canopes per mummy - their covers were decorated with the heads of the gods: Hapi (baboon), Dumautef (jackal), Kwebehsenuf (falcon), Imset (man).
Honey and shells
There were other, more sophisticated ways to embalm the deceased. For example, the body of Alexander the Great was mummified in an unusual "white honey" that never melted. In the early dynastic period, the embalmers, on the contrary, resorted to a simpler method: the bodies were covered with plaster, on top of which there was oil painting. Thus, a shell remained, with ashes inside.
Inca mummies
In late 1550, a Spanish official accidentally stumbled upon Inca mummies hidden in a secret cave near Peru. Further research revealed other caves: the Indians had a whole warehouse of mummies - 1365 persons who were once the founders of the main types of culture.