Mummy

The use of the various tempera and of wax has been identified on objects dating back to ancient Egypt. The Eayum mummy portraits are beautiful examples of encaustic painting, ie, using molten wax as medium. A rather special variation was the technique used by the Romans for wall paintings. In these, the medium, referred to by Pliny as Punic wax, probably consisted of partially saponified wax. In Europe, wax ceased to be used by the ninth century. 

It is said that Alexander the Great introduced Indian cotton into Egypt in the fourth century BC, and from there it spread to Greece, Italy, and Spain. During the year AD 700, China began growing cotton as a decorative plant, and AD 798 saw its introduction into Japan. Early explorers in Pern found cotton cloth on exhumed mummies that dated to 200 BC. Cotton was found in North America by Columbus in 1492. About 300 years later, the first cotton mill was built in Beverly, Massachusetts, and in 1794 EH Whitney was granted a patent for the invention of the cotton gin. 

Anthraquinone Dyes. This second most important class of dyes also iacludes some of the oldest dyes they have been found ia the wrappiags of mummies dating back over 4000 years. In contrast to the a2o dyes, which have no natural counterparts, all the important natural red dyes were anthraquiaones (see Dyes, natural). However, the importance of anthraquiaone dyes is declining due to their low cost-effectiveness. 

In Ancient Egypt mummies were wrapped in cloth dipped in a solution of bitumen in oil of lavender which was known variously as Syrian Asphalt or Bitumen of Judea. On exposure to light the product hardened and became insoluble. It would appear that this process involved the action of chemical cross-linking, which in modem times became of great importance in the vulcanisation of rubber and the production of thermosetting plastics. It was also the study of this process that led Niepce to produce the first permanent photograph and to the development of lithography (see Chapter 14). 

The ancient Egyptians used locust bean gum to bind the wrapping of mummies. 

White, C.D. and Schwarcz, H.P. 1994 Temporal trends in stable isotopes for Nubian mummy tissues. American Journal of Physical Anthropology 93 165-187. 

An exploration of possible relationships between structural and chemical decomposition of bone. Proceedings of the I World Congress on Mummy Studies. Museo Arqueologico y Etnografico doe Tenerife, Islas Canarias (Spain) 549-558. 

Product applications include the aerospace, automotive, chemical and petroleum industries eincient examples include pottery and glass vessels as well as Egyptian mummies. 

It takes time for adipocere to form, however, so if insects get to the body and eat the fleshy bits fairly quickly, the process is not likely to take place. But if conditions are right, adipocere can form all over the surface of a body, producing what is commonly called a "soap mummy."... 

Want to see a soap mummy The Miitter Museum in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, has one. She is called the "Soap Woman." A man who was buried next to her and who also turned into a soap mummy is sometimes displayed in the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D.C., too. Not surprisingly, he is called the "Soap Man."... 

Deem, James. Mummification in Egypt, Mummy Tombs Web Site. Available online. URL http //www.mummytombs.com/ egypt/methods.htm. Accessed on March 17, 2008. 

The axe of "Otzi the Iceman (well-preserved mummy dated to 3300 BC) is made from copper. 

Beeswax. The most widely used type of wax practically throughout the world has been beeswax in matter of fact, when the word wax is used without further designation, it is generally accepted that it refers to beeswax. Since remote times humans have known the properties of beeswax and have used it for numerous and varied applications. The ancient Egyptians, for example, used beeswax over 6000 years ago to preserve mummies, embedding in wax the wrappings that encased embalmed corpses. They also coated and sealed... 

Silk. Silk, the only natural fiber that comes in filament form, has been and still is one of the most appreciated and valued textile fibers. Silk filaments are secreted by the larvae of several types of silk moths to make their cocoons. Most silk is derived, however, from the larvae of the Bombyx mori moth, which has been widely cultivated in China for over 5000 years. Fragments of silk fabric dated to the late fourth millennium b.c.e. were found at Qianshanyang, in the province of Zhejiang, in China. There are, however, even earlier indications of the use of silk silk remains were found together with an eleventh-century b.c.e. mummy in Egypt, probably also providing evidence of ancient trading routes between the Far and Middle East. 

One of the natural forms of preservation of dead remains is mummification a mummy is simply the body of a dead animal whose tissues have been diage-netically altered but whose morphology and structure have been preserved. Although the term mummification is generally used in relation to the purposeful preservation of dead humans and animals, it actually has a wider meaning - it also refers to the natural preservation of dead corpses (see Fig. 81). 

Such methods also make it possible to learn about the state of health of the dead before death, the diseases from which they suffered, their age at the time of death, the method used for their mummification, and even the cultural environment in which they lived and were mummified (Cockbum et al. 1998 Harris and Wente 1980). The conception and development of the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) at the end of the twentieth century made it also possible to study the genetic characteristics of the mummies and of the populations to which they belonged (see Textbox 65). 

Andrews, C. (1998), Egyptian Mummies, British Museum, London. 

Aufderheide, A. C. (2003), The Scientific Study of Mummies, Cambridge Univ. Press, Cambridge, UK. 

Bertrand, L., J. Doucet, P. Dumas, A. Simionovici, A, G. Tsoucaris, and P. Walter (2003), Microbeam synchrotron imaging of hairs from ancient Egyptian mummies,... 

Buckley, S. A. and R. R Evershed (2001), Organic chemistry of embalming agents in Pharaonic and Graeco-Roman mummies, Nature 413, 837-841. 

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