Mummies and Mummification

The term mummy describes the corpse of an organism where decay is arrested for a considerable period of time and a semblance of life-like appearance is preserved. Some natural environments can mummify animal and human bodies spontaneously, thereby preserving them over great periods of time. Mummification practices by humans occur worldwide and may represent significant processes designed to preserve a body for important cultural, religious, or political purposes. The exceptional preservation of soft tissues can provide detailed information about ancient environments, cultures, and the evolution of disease not always achievable by traditional interpretations of archaeological assemblages.

Mummification involves the transformation of a once living body or tissue into a state of arrested decay by regulating or denying the water, temperature, or biochemicals necessary for complete decomposition. In the context of the term mummy, the process of mummification also infers the preservation of enough soft tissue to resemble its living morphology for a prolonged postmortem interval. Mummification may be classified broadly into two categories:anthropogenic (where humans promote the mummification process) and spontaneous (where natural processes occur to cause the preservation without human intervention).

The origins of the word mummy lie in the rocks of1st-century AD Persia, where deposits of natural bitumen were called múmiyá after an Arabic word for “wax.” The black tarry substance became popular for medicinal purposes, and by the 13th century the natural deposits could not satisfy burgeoning European demand. So, the black resins found in mummified Egyptian bodies were substituted; thus, the term múmiyá was transferred to the resin and later to the ancient human remains. Mummies still found themselves in the service of humans, but in a purpose far removed from that of their original internment thousands of years earlier.

The earliest known example of anthropogenic mummification is from the Chinchorros culture of northern Chile dated at 7,800 years of age. Since at least that time, humans have practiced mummification on every inhabited continent of the earth. Although mummification is widespread historically and geographically, it remains a highly anomalous human mortuary practice compared with the more common methods of burial and cremation for reasons of health and economy. This fact, combined with recognition that the practice of mummification was usually an expensive undertaking in terms of energy, time, and materials, surely indicates the power of motivations for its use by different cultures. Perhaps the source of public wonder and scientific rigor toward anthropogenic mummies is the question of purpose they inherently generate.