No doubt that the ancient Egyptians were the only nation managed to defeat decay and deterioration and were the first to conquer time. The very confident faith on the realty of the life after death was the main motivation for the mummification art to begin. In fact comprehending the secrets of the art of mummification is encountering a lot of difficulty since its swinging between science and superstition. The mummification process aimed at preserving the body as well as keeping the look of the human body a match to the case before death which is a very difficult task as it should require a deep scientific knowledge in order to provide the confident skill that can lead the process to accomplish its target. Also the mummification process aimed to serve the faith of the resurrection which was the main creed for ancient Egypt. The invention of the embalming synchronized with the progress in the science of medicine and the surgery as it is observed with pre- historic and archaic preserved bodies. Ancient Egypt, in common had started the fetal mummification since its pre-dynastic.
Painting”1”, by the author. A pre-dynastic fetal mummy.
The spread for the fetal burial in Pre-historic Egypt is enough evidence on having the ancient Egyptians to be familiar with the surgery and the dissecting. Their attempt to mime the fetus in its final positions before birth is a clear reflection for that early knowledge they reached. Some of the archaic and pre-dynastic fetal mummies were fully dehydrated by getting it exposed to the sun and some were treated by getting it cased with bitumen. The mummy of Ginger” picture -1 “which is around 3200 B.C, is the oldest mummy found in history and in ancient Egypt also its is the best example for the fetal mummification style of the late pre- dynastic period. The main challenge for scholars and experts who would seek imitating the Egyptian mummy is the lack of recorded practical experience as no body saved any previous experience as well as the lose of the know how about the mummification from old generations to modern ones. It was so different with ancient Egyptians who managed to save their experience on the mummification art from one generation to another and even before the invention of the writing. The dilemma for getting an approval on one mummification technique to be effective is as simple as it requires passing the knowledge and the experience from the master embalmer to his flowers continuously, for more than three thousand years which modern scholars are not able to get.
Figure -2, A funeral label, Reign of King Djer ,3200 B.C, the Egyptian museum . Painted by Yasser kamel
A reference on getting the ancient Egyptians to abandon the fetal mummy style and to adapt the Osiried mummy style, found on king Djer funeral label “figure-2’ where you see the funeral bearers while holding a mummy which is most probably the mummy of king Den. Book of the dead refers to necessity of getting the deceased body to survive the decomposing and the deterioration factors, therefore, the ancient Egyptians believed that once to keep a copy from book of the dead which includes the essential hymns and spells it can protect their bodies against worms, insects and deterioration.
Painting”2” painted by the author. Book of the dead of Nakhet, about 1400 B.C. Royal scribe Nakhet while slaying a beetle.
Painting “2” represents Royal scribe Nakhet while slaying a beetle, most probably that beetle is from the dermastidae beetles which feed on flesh. Book of the dead of Nakhet has spells against worms, beetles and corruption. It is fascinating to imagine once we study Egyptian pre-dynastic fully naturally preserved mummies or semi-naturally preserved ones that the embalmers of that period would know about the value of being a dead body dehydrated in order to protect against decay. Ancient Egyptians seemed to share us a lot of scientific knowledge as for example the fact that a human body has what can represent %75 of its total weight just liquids and that what the fungi and bacteria can survive and breed on after death for the human being! So the embalmers had to find the right method to cause the dehydration for the corpse such as getting the body exposed to the sun as well as counting on the minerals of the Egyptian desert to cause the process of osmosis to begin. Then what happened later was amazing as ancient Egyptians discovered what minerals and salts could do for preservation. The importance for salts is more observed in the hieroglyphics as its word Netri or Natron had been driven from the word Neter which means god which literally means the divine salt. In fact the word Neter referred to nature in ancient Egypt and it inspired most of other languages, the word Nature. The Natron salt is found naturally as a mixture of sodium carbonate, soda ash, sodium bicarbonate ,sodium chloride and sodium sulfate, actually it is a stunning salt as it is cable to dehydrate with minimal damage to tissues meanwhile it keeps its fresh appearance intact. Egypt naturally gifted with that salt and mainly in the Natron Valley where it was found by the ancient Egyptians. Osiris was the first king that ruled Egypt and this is according to what ancient Egypt wrote, Osiris was the first to be mummified in a different style than the fetal one which is named the Osiried-style. The mummification art was mastered in ancient Egypt once the Natron salt was discovered but it flourished once embalmers realized the importance of the organs removal in order to get rid of the fungal and the bacterial damage.By Yasser Kamel to Museumegypt, All rights reserved.
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