A NEARLY 300-year-old mummy has been found “unusually well-preserved” after undergoing a bizarre embalming method.
With its skin still remarkably intact, the 18th-century corpse was found with wood chips, twigs and fabric packed into his abdomen through his anus.
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Upon opening the body, researchers found wood from fir and spruce trees, as well as fragments from branches.
There was also a number of different fabrics used, including linen, hemp and flax – which were popular at the time.
The technique has never been seen before.
“The unusually well-preserved mummy in the church crypt of St Thomas am Blasenstein is the corpse of a local parish vicar, Franz Xaver Sidler von Rosenegg, who died in 1746,” said study lead author Dr. Andreas Nerlich, a research at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität that specialises in mummy research.
“Our investigation uncovered that the excellent preservation status came from an unusual type of embalming, achieved by stuffing the abdomen through the rectal canal with wood chips, twigs and fabric, and the addition of zinc chloride for internal drying.”
The mummy’s upper body is well preserved, but the lower extremities and head show significant decay.
Researchers believe the combination of materials, and the addition of the drying agent zinc chloride, kept the mummy in good condition for nearly 300 years.
“Clearly, the wood chips, twigs, and dry fabric absorbed much of the fluid inside the abdominal cavity,” said Nerlich.
Better-known methods, like those used by the ancient Egyptians, involve opening the body to prepare it.
Here, however, the embalming materials were stuffed through the rectal canal.
“This type of preservation may have been much more widespread but unrecognised in cases where ongoing postmortal decay processes may have damaged the body wall so that the manipulations would not have been realized as they were,” suggested Nerlich.
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Inside the mummy, researchers also found a single bead, which they believe could have been lost during the preparation of the body.
It is not entirely clear who the mummy once was – but there are theories.
Located in a church crypt in St. Thomas am Blasenstein, a small village in Austria near the Danube River, the mummy is known locally as the the “air-dried chaplain”.
It is assumed to be the preserved remains of a parish vicar named Franz Xaver Sidler von Rosenegg, who died in 1746.
There was a lack of stress signs on the skeleton, according to experts, which fit the life of a priest without hard physical activity.
The mummy is also believed to been between 35 and 45 years old when they died, between the years 1734 and 1780 – which match Sidler’s life.
People have long speculated the cause of the priest’s death.
An X-ray analysis in 2000 suggested his mummy contained a poison capsule.
But new research, published in the journal Frontiers in Medicine, squash this theory.
The team conducted extensive analyses, including CT scanning, focal autopsy, and radiocarbon dating.
Instead, they found evidence of long-term smoking and signs of tuberculosis in the lungs.
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