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An Essay on Egyptian Mummies: the Art of Embalming Among the Ancient
Egyptians
An Essay on Egyptian Mummies:
With Observations on the Art of Embalming Among
the Ancient Egyptians
By Augustus Bozzi
Granville, Thomas Moore
Contributor Thomas
Moore
Published by
Printed by W. Nicol, 1825
The next fact worthy of notice, is
the appearance of minute saline crystals, found in great abundance in almost
every part of the external, but more particularly of the internal surface of the
body. These, at first, had escaped notice ; but upon the various portions of the
dissected mummy being exposed to the open air, in one of the rooms on the ground
floor in my house for some weeks, where a fire was kept, the appearance of the
saline particles became strikingly visible. This saline efflorescence I gently
swept off the surface with a new brush, and subjected to various analytical
experiments, from which it results, that it consists of nitrate of potash,
carbonate, sulphate, and muriate of soda, and traces of lime. Now, as as none of
these salts have ever been observed to form spontaneously, either within or upon
the surface of preserved human bodies, particularly where the contact of
external air has been so studiously excluded as in the present case, it follows,
that in the preparation of mummies, the embalmers must have had recourse to the
immersion of the body into a saline solution of a mixed kind. HeroDotus, indeed,
states that the body was covered with natron for the space of seventy days ; but
it is more probable, that the water of the celebrated natron lakes, which lay so
conveniently at hand, rendered more active by previous evaporation, was used for
the purpose. The presence of lime may be accounted for by supposing, that in a
preliminary operation, the cuticle, which, as I before stated, could not be
detected in any part of the body, except the head and the extremity of the toes,
and has been found invariably wanting in all other mummies, was removed by means
of that alkaline substance. This circumstance again goes far to show that the
Egyptian embalmers were acquainted with an important physiological truth,
namely, that in order to promote the absorption of liquid substances,
particularly of the tanning liquor and saline solution, applied to the external
surface of the body, the cuticle must first be removed.
The presence of saline substances in mummies has been noticed by more than one
modern writer, especially by Mons. Royer, already mentioned in the course of
this essay; but the conjecture as to the origin of the salts themselves, has not
been hinted at before.
A fourth fact, deserving of our attention, is the presence of a resino-bituminous
substance between some of the folds of the remaining portions of the peritoneal
membrane. On collecting this substance, and instituting some experiments upon
it, I ascertained that the bitumen was mixed with a greater proportion of wax,
so as to have rendered the mixture perfectly plastic. To have penetrated thus
far, and to have lodged between closely adhering membraneous folds, this mixture
must either have been injected quite warm into the cavity of the abdomen, or the
body itself must have been plunged into a vessel containing a liquefied mixture
of wax and bitumen, and there kept for some hours or days, over a gentle fire.
The latter operation, not noticed by the older historians, has indeed been
surmised by some of the modern writers on the subject; but in none of them have
I been able to find a corroborating proof of the correctness of such a surmise.
The examination of my mummy has afforded me that proof, in the shape of a fifth
fact, namely, the thoroughly impregnated state of the bones, membranes, and
muscles, in every part of the body, by the same waxy and bituminous substance.
The inspection of the bones of the pelvis, of those of the thighs, and of the
vertebrae, as well as of some of the muscles, and membranes, to be submitted to
the Society, will shew this abundantly. Now such a condition of the parts could
not have been produced, but by maceration or immersion, for a length of time, of
the whole body, into a liquefied mixture of those two ingredients ; accordingly
we must conclude that such a process was actually followed by the embalmers ;
unless we feel disposed to believe that they injected the body through the
blood-vessels ; an operation of which there is not the most distant evidence in
the mummy before us.
The adoption of my view on this point, is farther authorized by the soft and
pliant condition of the capsular membranes, of the cellular texture, and above
all, of the two coverings of the spinal marrow, than which nothing can be more
beautiful or striking ; whether we admire their perfect preservation, or reflect
on the number of centuries through which these delicate tissues have traveled. I
have already noticed to the Society the flexibility of the joints, a
circumstance which is entirely due to the process here explained ; and now I
have to add that this process is made out beyond contradiction, by my having
been able to separate the wax by means of combustion and ebullition, from the
soft parts, particularly the muscles, the singularly distinct fibres of which,
beautifully arranged and displayed, the Society will not omit remarking.
In examining the dissected parts of the mummy, which I have carefully displayed
for public inspection after the meeting, the Members will not fail being struck
with the difference that exists between the two nates detached from the body.
The one has been left in the state in which it was handed down to us by the
Egyptian embalmers, dark, tanned, contracted, and impregnated with the
mummifying ingredients ; the other, on the contrary, has been deprived, in toto,
by my process, of those ingredients, (the principal of which is bees wax, as
will be seen from the quantity which I collected); so as to appear like the same
part in a recent subject, soft, elastic, of a yellowish white, with the
cutaneous pores very distinct, and with its muscles, adipose substance, and
blood vessels perfectly striking.
The sixth, and last fact to be noticed, is the presence of several moderately
sized lumps of an earthy matter, mixed with pieces of resin, found loose in the
cavity of the abdomen. That these were thrown into that cavity for the double
purpose of filling up the space left in it by the abstraction of some of the
viscera, and of adding, at the same time, to the antiseptic power of the process
employed in embalming, are conjectures that will perhaps be readily admitted.
The experiments made to ascertain the nature of the earthy substance in
question, tend to prove the latter part of these conjectural propositions. It
was found to consist of the same saline compounds, noticed on the surface of the
mummy, mixed with argillaceous earth. Now, if the embalmers used the water from
the natron lakes, as I have laid down good grounds for believing, nothing is
more probable, than that they also made use of the earthy sediment of that water
which contains the salt in question, and which could be procured in abundance at
the margin of those lakes, where it has been observed by the naturalists who
accompanied the French expedition into Egypt.
As to the nature of the resin and bitumen used as ingredients in the embalming
process, it is a question of comparatively little interest. Nor does it matter
much, whether aromatic vegetable substances were employed or not. In the mummy
before us,-two or three small pieces of myrrh in a loose state were found, and
evidence is not wanting of both resin and bitumen, though not in their purest
form, having been had recourse to. But their presence seems by no means
necessary for the completion of that admirable method of embalming, devised and
followed by the ancient Egyptians, which my inquiries have been directed to
ascertain, and which may be summed up in a few words by saying: that it
consisted in impregnating the body with bees wax.
The various circumstances detailed in this essay furnish us with sufficient
reasons for believing, that in the most perfect, and, I would call them, the
primitive specimens of the art of embalming, the progressive stages of the
Egyptian method must have been as follows:
A. Immediately after death the body was committed to the care of the embalmers,
when, in the majority of cases, the viscera of the abdomen, either wholly, or
partially, were forthr- with removed; in some cases through an incision on the
one side of the abdomen, as stated by Herodotus, and as proved by some of the
mummies examined ; and in others through the anus, in which latter case, the
extremity of the rectum was previously disengaged from its attachments all round
by the knife, and the intestines imperfectly extracted. The cavity of the thorax
in the most perfect specimens was not disturbed.
B. The head was emptied, in all instances, of its contents, either through the
nostrils, by breaking through the superior nasal bones, as in the instance under
our consideration, as well as in that of the head from Tripoli, already
mentioned, or through one of the orbits, the eyes being previously taken out,
and artificial ones substituted in their place, after the operation, as in the
instances of the mummies examined by Sir E. Home and Mr. Brodie. The cavity of
the cranium was repeatedly washed out by injections with some fluid, which had
the power of not only bringing away every vestige of the substance of the brain,
but even of the enveloping membranes of it. Yet the liquid could not have been
of a corrosive nature, else the tentorium, or that membranous floor which
supports the brain must have disappeared with the meninges; whereas it is still
in existence, and does not appear to have been in the least injured. A small
quantity of hot liquid rosin was then injected into the cranium.
C. The next step taken in the embalming process, was to cover the body with
quick lime for a few hours, and after to rub the surface of it with a blunt
knife, or some such instrument as would most effectually assist in removing the
cuticle. The scalp, however, does not appear to have been touched ; and care was
taken also not to expose the root of the nails to the action of the alkali, as
it was intended that these should remain in all cases. In the mummy I have
described, this point has been so much attended to by the embalmers, that the
nail of the principal toe of the right foot having been detached, it was
replaced and retained in its position by three or four turns of thread passed
around it; and in this state it must have continued for the last thirty
centuries.
D. The operation of removing the cuticle being accomplished, the body was
immersed into a capacious vessel, containing a liquefied mixture of wax and
resin, the former predominating ; and some sort of bituminous substance being
added, not however essential to the process. In this situation the body was
suffered to remain a certain number of days over a gentle fire, with the avowed
intention of allowing the liquefied mixture to penetrate the innermost and
minutest structure; nor can there exist any doubt, but that on this part of the
embalming process depended not only its great preservative power, but also its
various degrees of perfection. Thus, when the process was properly managed and
watched, mummies, such as the one under consideration, would be produced;
whereas when neglected or slovenly conducted, the mummy resulting from it, would
present those appearances of dryness, blackness, and brittleness, together with
the carbonification of the muscles and intimate adherence of the integuments to
the bones, which have been noticed by Dr. Hadley, Professor Gmelin, Blumenbach,
Hunter, Dr. Baillie, Mr. Brodie, Jomard and others, when they examined imperfect
or inferior mummies. The fraudulent subtraction of the allotted quantity of wax
required for the principal and important part of the embalming process we are
now considering, or the neglecting to regulate the fire in using the wax and
bitumen, would necessarily give rise to the latter results, which the covering
bandages were sure to hide from the eye of the surviving relatives to whom the
body was to be returned. It is also fair to presume, that inability or
unwillingness on the part of friends and relatives to pay for the ingredients or
for the labor necessary to carry on the operations just described, have, on many
occasions, been the cause of mummies being prepared in that imperfect manner
which has been noticed in so many instances.
E. When the body was taken out of the warm liquid mixture, every part of it must
have been in a very soft and supple condition, wholly unsusceptible of
putrefaction. The next steps therefore to be taken, with a view to convert it1
into a perfect mummy, must have been those, which, had they been taken before
that part of the process that has been just described, would have exposed the
body to inevitable putrefaction, in a climate like that of Egypt. I allude to
the tanning of the integuments, and the exposing of their surface to the
additional influence of those salts, the presence of which, as well as that of
tannin, I have most clearly demonstrated.
Whether an infusion of the vegetable astringent employed for tanning the
integuments was had recourse to in the first instance, and the immersion of the
body into the concentrated water of the natron lakes followed, or whether the
tanning liquid was itself made by infusing the vegetable astringents themselves
in the water of the natron lakes, and the body then immersed into it, are
questions, which it is neither possible, nor important to decide; the body was
unquestionably submitted to the operation of both those means, but in what
order, it is difficult to ascertain ; and when the embalmers judged by the
condition of the integuments, that they were sufficiently impregnated with the
active principles employed, the body was allowed to dry for a few hours, and
then the bandages previously prepared with a solution of tannin also, as proved
by my experiments, were applied to the different parts, beginning with each
separate limb.
While the operation of bandaging took place, the mummy must have been in a very
supple state, else the numerous deep longitudinal wrinkles observed in all those
parts where the integuments are generally looser, as in the upper part of the
thighs and arms, as well as over the abdomen, and at the breasts, could not have
existed. These wrinkles, so well marked in Plate XIX. must have been produced by
the bandages at the time of their application.
It appears also, that with a view of rendering the bandages more supple in
particular places, where such a condition was required, and of obviating the
inconvenience of slackness in some of the turns, they were daubed over in a few
places with two different substances, the one consisting of wax and resin, the
other of resin alone, both applied warm ; so that, while the first served to
give pliancy to some of the linen employed, the second caused the slack and
loose edges of the bandages to adhere together, by which process the whole was
rendered compact and firm, without producing hardness.
The lumps of myrrh, resin, and bituminous earth, noticed in the abdomen, were
pushed up through the enlarged aperture of the anus, immediately before the
application of the ; bandages, for the purposes already detailed.
The preceding explanatory description of what appears, from the unquestionable
facts collected in the course of my inquiry, to have been the best, and, in my
opinion, the primitive mode of preparing mummies by the ancient Egyptians,
differs from that found in Herodotus, as well as from those accounts which we
read in other writers who came after him. It does not however appear that the
eminent historian just mentioned had ever been present at the embalming of a
mummy, or that he ever had an opportunity of examining one of them. He must,
therefore, like many other travellers, have noted down what he had collected
from hearsay, in which, amidst much that was surmised, there was something
approaching to the truth. It is in evidence that the art was kept a profound
mystery among those who professed it, so that the different modes of embalming
described with such orderly minuteness of details by Herodotus, could only have
been conjectural. It is a curious fact, that, with the exception of the lateral
incision, and immersion into a saline solution mentioned by that historian, we
find no confirmatory evidence of the other steps of the supposed processes of
embalming detailed by him in any of the various mummies that have hitherto been
examined. And in the one now submitted to the inspection of the Society, by far
the most perfect that has yet been publicly described, we have none of the
characteristic features of the three several modes of embalming which we are
told were followed by the ancient Egyptians; while, on the other hand, some of
the lesser features of each process are strikingly apparent. We have, in fact,
the presence of that which Herodotus asserted was invariably removed in the
better prepared mummies, and some of those parts are absent, on the other hand,
which he stated never to have been touched in the inferior class of those
singular preparations. These facts will be duly valued by the scholar, and the
commentators of that historian ; and the explanation now given of the real mode
of mummifying, will enable the lexicographer to advance with confidence, that
the name mummy was given to such preparations from the circumstance of wax (mum
in the Cophtic language), being the really preservative ingredient employed in
their preparation.
I have had occasion in the course of this paper to observe, that as by carefully
taking into consideration the various facts which presented themselves during
the examination of our mummy, it was natural to suppose, that the mode in which
it had been prepared would be discovered; so would that discovery be confirmed
if, by acting on those facts, something resembling a mummy could be produced ;
and in the specimens which will be submitted to the members after the meeting,
the different steps will be seen, by which I was led to what may be considered
as an imitation of the Egyptian mummies.*
purposely omit speaking of the various modes of embalming adopted by different
nations, or of those which may have prevailed at different epochs in Egypt;
although in the course of my investigation I collected ample materials for
entering into such a subject. The art of embalming, with a view to the
preservation of the human body, for an indefinite series of years, as strictly
illustrated by the mummies of ancient Egypt, does not appear to have been
practised with success by any other nation. We find no remains of such high
antiquity in any other part of the world; and the mummies of Mexico, those of
the Atlantic islanders, the dried bodies found in the catacombs of some of the
states bordering on the Mediterranean, are but of yesterday, compared to the age
of the mummy which I have had the honor of bringing under the notice of the
Society. Indeed the art soon began to decline among the Egyptians themselves,
and the mummies found in the hypogei which bear evidence of having been more
recently erected, as well as those of the plain of Saqquarah, are, in every
respect, inferior to the primitive mummies. Whether this arose from the growing
ignorance of the real process, the directions respecting which could only have
been handed down traditionally; or from carelessness in the operation; or from
indifference on the part of the people toward such an object; or from all these
causes united, it is not easy now to determine. Certain it is, that the genuine
process of embalming, among the Egyptians under the dynasty of the Pharaohs
described in this paper, appears to have been progressively disregarded, and
forgotten among them, until at last it was lost altogether. Nor does it appear
ever to have been known by other nations.
In order to appreciate properly the durability of the bodies prepared by the
Egyptian process, it is essential to observe, that the mummy I have described
with so much minuteness, after having resisted putrefaction for above three
thousand years, covered by bandages, enclosed in a thick wooden case, and placed
in recesses, far from the external influence of atmospheric vicissitudes, has
since withstood the inclemency and variations of an English climate, without any
of those protecting circumstances ; nay, exposed purposely, but ineffectually,
for four years, to the various causes that are known to favour putrefaction.*
* A singular contrast this,
with what has since happened to one of the nates alluded to in a previous
note. Being divested of the protecting and embalming ingredient, by the
process I there alluded to, this part has partially run into putrefaction, and
emits the peculiar smell of animal substances, placed under similar
circumstances. Nay, in the case of one of the large muscles of the thigh, and
a large portion of the integument, which I similarly deprived of their
protecting ingredients, such has been the rapidity with which putrefaction has
followed, that although well covered, the vessels containing those parts
emitted the most insufferable smell, and the parts themselves were found
infested with myriads of large maggots.
The deep feelings of interest that
have of late been excited respecting the Egyptians, have induced me to extend my
present inquiry to a greater length, than I should have done under less inviting
circumstances. It was impossible not to feel extremely interested in the
subject; and when I beheld before me the heart of an Egyptian female, whom
imagination, aided by historical records, may fancy to have been cotemporary
with the great Sesostris, I could not help experiencing a degree of enthusiasm,
a portion of which, me- thought, I could impart to others.
I recollect with pleasure the sensation which the demonstration of the various
parts of this mummy, at the time it was first opened, excited amongst upwards of
an hundred scientific and literary characters, who in the course of six weeks
honored me with their presence at my house to witness the dissection, and by
whom I was encouraged to follow up the investigation, and to communicate the
result to the public. It is in obedience to their suggestion, and more
especially to the recommendation of the President of the Royal Society, that I
have taken a comprehensive view of the whole subject, instead of limiting myself
to the dry description of a solitary specimen.
An Essay on Egyptian Mummies: the Art of Embalming Among the Ancient
Egyptians
Egyptian Mummy
Originally the Egyptians did not mummify their dead at
all. In early Egyptian times, the dead were simply buried in reed caskets in
the sand. The searing hot sand caused the remains to dry quickly preventing
decomposition. But when they began constructing tombs, and wood caskets for
the dead, the sand could not get to the bodies. The bodies then started
decomposing, so the Egyptians developed an elaborate mummification process.
The first step in the mummification process, was the
embalming of the body. The dead body was embalmed with several preserving
fluids. Then the major organs were removed, with the exception of the heart.
The organs were placed in for Canopic jars. One held the intestines, another
the stomach, another the lungs, and the last one held the liver. Surprisingly,
the Egyptians did not keep the brain at all. The heart was the most important
organ of all, and was said to house the person's Ba or soul. It was
left in.
After the organs were removed, the body was stuffed with
cotton and linen, and sewed back up. Next the eyes were removed, and replaced
with either cotton, or fake eyeballs. After the body was finished, it was
wrapped with strips of linen that had been soaked in embalming fluid. Finally
it was covered with linen cloth, and bound carefully.
The Mummified body was then placed in its coffin, along
with several amulets to ward off bad spirits, and grave robbers. In death the
Egyptian still needed his body, so it was vitally important that the body was
well preserved, so the Egyptian didn't have any problem in the afterlife.
-- Written by:
Michael D. Peach.
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