Mummification
Egyptians develop a seventy-day chemical process to keep the body intact for eternity.
- When
- Known to
- ± 200 years
- Era
- Bronze Age, Holocene
Deliberate mummification develops through the Old Kingdom into a standardised procedure: removal of the brain and viscera, desiccation of the body in natron for around forty days, packing, anointing with resins and oils, and wrapping in hundreds of metres of linen with amulets between the layers. The theology requires it — the ka needs a body to return to. The chemistry involved is sophisticated, and recent residue analysis has identified imported resins from Southeast Asia.