A child mummy from Egypt is the first found with a dressed wound, offering a rare glimpse into ancient medicine
Scientists found the first recorded example of a bandaged wound on a mummified body, which could offer more insight into ancient medical practices. The finding was published in the International Journal of Paleopathology, a peer-reviewed journal, on December 30.
Scientists have found the first example of a bandaged wound on a mummified body from Ancient Egypt, pictured here next to a scan showing the bandage.
The researchers said they discovered the bandages on the remains of a young girl, aged no more than four years, who died about 2,000 years ago. The dressing wrapped a wound that showed signs of infection, the study said.
“It gives us clues about how they [ancient Egyptians] treated such infections or abscesses during their lifetime,” Albert Zink, head of the Institute for Mummy Studies in Bolzona, Italy, and an author on the study, told Insider.
The mummy was thought to be taken from the “Tomb of Aline” in the Faiyum Oasis, located southwest of Cairo, the study said. The finding had come as a surprise to the scientists, who didn’t set out looking for the bandages.
“It was really exciting because we didn’t expect it,” Zink said. “It was never described before.”
A rare glimpse into medical history
Ancient Egyptians are thought to have had an adept understanding of medical practices.
They wouldn’t have known things we would now take for granted, like how a heart functions, how microbes cause infection, or how rogue cells cause cancer — but they did have a fairly good idea of how to treat symptoms of disease, Zink said.
“We know from other evidence, like papyrus, that they had a good experience of treating wounds and injuries,” said Zink.
So it’s surprising that these types of bandages have never been seen in a mummy before, he said.
In this case, Zink said, the bandages were spotted while the scientists carried out routine CT scans of mummies, as can be seen in the scans below and annotated with the full-lined arrow. The wound appeared to have been infected when she died, as the scans showed signs of “pus,” Zink said. These signs of infection are marked by the dotted arrows in the scans below.
A side view of the mummy’s foot was seen in a CT scan.
A cross-section of the mummy’s legs is shown.
“It’s very likely that they applied some specific herbs or ointment to treat the inflammation of this area,” which further analysis could identify, Zink said.
Zink said he wanted to get samples from the area to understand what caused the infection and how people at the time treated it.
But that could entail unwrapping the mummy, which Zink said he was reluctant to do. Another option would be to collect a sample using a biopsy needle, he said.
The mummy of the child, seen with a portrait of the girl on its front and gilded buttons decorating the wrappings.
Mystery of the missing bandages unfurls
Zink says there was no clear explanation why, in this particular case, the bandages were left in place.
“The question is whether it was just left in place and it remained despite the embalming process or whether they placed it,” he said, referring to the embalmers.
Wound dressings typically did not survive the mummification process. But it’s possible the embalmers added the bandage on the body after the girl’s death.
Ancient Egyptians believed that the mummified body should be as perfect as possible for life after death, Zink said: “Maybe they tried somehow to continue the healing process for the afterlife.”
As to why other such examples of bandaging had not been spotted before, it is plausible that scientists had simply failed to spot them until now, or mistaken them for other mummy wrappings. Zink now hopes that more examples of mummy wrappings can be uncovered.
“There are always some surprises when we study mummies. I have now studied, I don’t know how many mummies in my scientific career, but there’s always something new,” he said.
Earliest human remains in eastern Africa dated to more than 230,000 years ago
Ancient human fossils discovered in Ethiopia are much older than previously thought, experts claim, saying they could be as much as 230,000 years old. The remains – known as Omo I – were discovered in Ethiopia in the late 1960s, and are one of the oldest known examples of Homo sapiens fossils, with earlier attempts to date them placing them at just under 200,000 years old. However, a new study by the University of Cambridge found that the remains have to pre-date a colossal volcanic eruption in the area, which happened 230,000 years ago.
To make the discovery the team dated the chemical fingerprints of volcanic ash layers, found above and below sediment where the fossils were discovered.
The team said that while this pushes the minimum age for Homo sapiens in eastern Africa back by 30,000 years, future studies may extend the age even further. In 2017, archaeologists announced the discovery of the world’s oldest Homo sapiens fossils — a 300,000-year-old skull at Jebel Irhoud in Morocco.
The Omo Kibish Formation in south western Ethiopia, within the East African Rift valley. The oldest human remains in east Africa date back at least 30,000 years earlier than previously thought to around a quarter of a million years ago
The remains – known as Omo I – were discovered in Ethiopia in the late 1960s, and are one of the oldest known examples of Homo sapiens fossils, with earlier attempts to date them placing them at less than 200,000 years old
To date, the volcanic remains, the team collected pumice rock samples from the volcanic deposits and ground them down to sub-millimetre size. Scientists have been trying to precisely date the oldest fossils in eastern Africa, widely recognised as representing our species, Homo sapiens, ever since they were discovered in the 1960s. Earlier attempts to date them suggested they were less than 200,000 years old. The Omo I remains were found in the Omo Kibish Formation in southwestern Ethiopia, which sits within the East African Rift valley. The region is an area of high volcanic activity and a rich source of early human remains and artefacts.
By dating layers of volcanic ash above and below where fossil materials are found, scientists identified Omo I as one of the earliest examples of our species ever found.
‘Using these methods, the generally accepted age of the Omo fossils is under 200,000 years, but there’s been a lot of uncertainty around this date,’ said Dr Céline Vidal from Cambridge’s Department of Geography, the paper’s lead author.
‘The fossils were found in a sequence, below a thick layer of volcanic ash that nobody had managed to date because the ash is too fine-grained.’
The four-year project, led by British volcanologist Professor Clive Oppenheimer. is attempting to date all major volcanic eruptions in the Ethiopian Rift. Each eruption has its own fingerprint – its own evolutionary story below the surface, which is determined by the pathway the magma followed,’ said Dr Vidal.
‘Once you’ve crushed the rock, you free the minerals within, and then you can date them, and identify the chemical signature of the volcanic glass that holds the minerals together.’
The researchers carried out a geochemical analysis on the crushed rock to link the fingerprint of the volcanic ash, from the Kamoya Hominin Site, with an eruption of Shala volcano. The team then dated pumice samples from the volcano, 250 miles from the site the human remains were discovered, to 230,000 years ago. Since the Omo I fossils was found deeper than this particular ash layer, they must be more than 230,000 years old, the team explained.
‘First I found there was a geochemical match, but we didn’t have the age of the Shala eruption,’ said Vidal.
‘I immediately sent the samples of Shala volcano to our colleagues in Glasgow so they could measure the age of the rocks.
When I received the results and found out that the oldest Homo sapiens from the region was older than previously assumed, I was really excited. Professor Asfawossen Asrat, a co-author of the study from Addis Ababa University in Ethiopia, said: ‘The Omo Kibish Formation is an extensive sedimentary deposit which has been barely accessed and investigated in the past. Our closer look into the stratigraphy of the Omo Kibish Formation, particularly the ash layers, allowed us to push the age of the oldest Homo sapiens in the region to at least 230,000 years.
The team said that while this pushes the minimum age for Homo sapiens in eastern Africa back by 30,000 years, future studies may extend the age even further
To date the volcanic remains, the team collected pumice rock samples from the volcanic deposits and ground them down to sub-millimetre size
Scientists have been trying to precisely date the oldest fossils in eastern Africa widely recognised as representing our species, Homo sapiens, ever since they were discovered in the 1960s
Unlike other Middle Pleistocene fossils which are thought to belong to the early stages of the Homo sapiens lineage, Omo I possesses unequivocal modern human characteristics, according to co-author Dr Aurélien Mounier, from the Musée de l’Homme in Paris.
He gave the example of a ‘tall and globular cranial vault and a chin’, before claiming that the new date estimate made the remains ‘the oldest unchallenged Homo sapiens in Africa. Until the Jebel Irhous discovery four years ago, most researchers believed that all humans living today descended from a population that lived in East Africa around 200,000 years ago.
‘We can only date humanity based on the fossils that we have, so it’s impossible to say that this is the definitive age of our species,’ said Vidal. The study of human evolution is always in motion: boundaries and timelines change as our understanding improves. But these fossils show just how resilient humans are: that we survived, thrived and migrated in an area that was so prone to natural disasters. It’s probably no coincidence that our earliest ancestors lived in such a geologically active rift valley – it collected rainfall in lakes, providing fresh water and attracting animals, and served as a natural migration corridor stretching thousands of kilometres,’ said Oppenheimer.
The volcanoes provided fantastic materials to make stone tools and from time to time we had to develop our cognitive skills when large eruptions transformed the landscape. Our forensic approach provides a new minimum age for Homo sapiens in eastern Africa, but the challenge still remains to provide a cap, a maximum age, for their emergence, which is widely believed to have taken place in this region,’ said co-author Professor Christine Lane, head of the Cambridge Tephra Laboratory.
The Omo I remains were found in the Omo Kibish Formation in southwestern Ethiopia, which sits within the East African Rift valley
It’s possible that new finds and new studies may extend the age of our species even further back in time. There are many other ash layers we are trying to correlate with eruptions of the Ethiopian Rift and ash deposits from other sedimentary formations,’ said Vidal. ‘In time, we hope to better constrain the age of other fossils in the region.’
Why is Nikola Tesla obsessed with Egyptian pyramids?
Nikola Tesla died somewhat unappreciated but his fame and the myth around him has continued to grow tremendously into our times. He is now perceived as the ultimate mad scientist, the one who essentially invented our times, credited with key ideas leading to smartphones, wi-fi, AC electrical supply system, and more.
Besides ideas that Tesla implemented and patented, he also had many other interests in different fields of research, some quite esoteric.
One of the most unusual was his preoccupation with Egyptian pyramids, one of humanity’s most mysterious and magnificent constructions.
Tesla believed they served a higher purpose and was investigating them throughout his life. What did he find so alluring about the pyramids? He wondered if they weren’t giant transmitters of energy – a thought that coincided with his investigation into how to send energy wirelessly.
He saw planet Earth itself, with its two poles, as a giant electrical generator of limitless energy. His triangle-shaped design became known as Tesla’s electromagnetic pyramid.
Tesla sitting in his Colorado Springs laboratory…1899
“The day science begins to study non-physical phenomena, it will make more progress in one decade than in all the previous centuries of its existence,” said Tesla.
It wasn’t just the shape of the Egyptian pyramids but their location that created their power, according to Tesla. He built a tower facility known as the Tesla Experimental Station in Colorado Springs and Wardenclyffe Tower or Tesla Tower on the East Coast that sought to take advantage of the Earth’s energy field.
The locations were chosen according to the laws of where the Pyramids of Giza were built, related to the relationship between the elliptical orbit of the planet and the equator. The design was intended for wireless transmission of energy.
Wardenclyffe Tower. 1904.
Were the Great Pyramids essentially ancient Tesla Towers? How the Pyramids were made:
HOW THE PYRAMIDS WERE BUILT (PYRAMID SCIENCE PART 2!)
Another aspect of Tesla’s thinking is reportedly related to numerology.
Tesla was, by many accounts, an unusual individual, with obsessive qualities. One such obsession was the numbers “3,6,9”, which he believed were the key to the universe.
He would drive around buildings 3 times before going in or staying in hotels with numbers divisible by 3.
He made other choices in sets of 3. Some belief Tesla’s obsession with these numbers connected to his preference for pyramidal shapes and the belief that there was some fundamental mathematical law and ratios that are part of a universal math language.
As we don’t know precisely how the pyramids were built and why they are looked at by some as creations that may be either generating energy or be serving as deliberately installed messengers or even code from an ancient civilization.
It’s easy to get into “ancient aliens” type of theories by extending such thinking. If you’re up for such an approach, check out this video:
Nikola Tesla – Limitless Energy & the Pyramids of Egypt
240,000-year-old ‘Child of Darkness’ human ancestor discovered in narrow cave passageway
Deep within South Africa’s Rising Star cave system, in a dark passageway barely 6 inches (15 centimeters) wide, scientists have discovered the fragmented skull of a Homo naledi child they’re calling “Leti.” How the little skull ended up in such a remote part of the cave is a mystery, though the discoverers suspect it could be evidence of an intentional burial.
The reconstructed skull of “Leti,” a young Homo naledi. The skull was found inside a tiny passageway deep within a South African cave, and probably dates back more than 241,000 years.
“Leti,” short for “Letimela,” or “Lost One” in the Setswana language of South Africa, probably lived between 335,000 and 241,000 years ago, based on the ages of other remains found in the enigmatic cave.
Fossil fragments belonging to about 24 Homo naledi individuals have been found in the cave system since 2013, when the first fossils from this human ancestor were discovered in what’s now known as the Dinaledi Chamber.
The presence of so many individuals from a single species in the cave is mysterious. The only way in is a 39-foot (12 meters) vertical fracture known as “The Chute,” and geologists and spelunkers have so far found no evidence of alternative entrances into the passageways.
Leti’s small skull was found scattered in pieces on a limestone shelf about 2.6 feet (80 cm) above the cave floor. The spot sits in “a spiderweb of cramped passages,” Maropeng Ramalepa, a member of the exploration team, said in a statement.
Research team members exploring the cave had to squeeze through spaces barely 6 inches (15 cm) wide when exploring the labyrinth of passages where Leti was found.
Teeth from the Homo naledi child “Leti.” The teeth indicate that Leti died around the time of the eruption of the first permanent molars, which would be between the ages of 4 and 6 in modern humans.
A complicated ancestor
The area is barely navigable for experienced spelunkers with modern equipment, according to a new paper published Thursday (Nov. 4) in the journal PaleoAnthropology. There is no evidence that animals carried the H. naledi bones into the cave — there are no gnaw marks or evidence of predation. The bones also appear to have been placed in the cave, not washed in, as they were not found mixed with sediment or other debris.
That leaves open the possibility that more than 240,000 years ago, human ancestors with orange-size brains deliberately entered a dark, maze-like cave, perhaps through a vertical chute that narrows to 7 inches (18 cm) in places, and placed their dead inside.
No tools or artifacts have been found alongside the Rising Star cave system fossils. There are few signs of other animals entering the caves, beyond two specimens of juvenile baboons, at least one of which may be much older than the Homo naledi remains.
This human ancestor lived at the same time as early Homo sapiens, John Hawks, an anthropologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who studies the remains, told Live Science in 2017. Their apparent forays into the cave suggest that they were among modern humans’ smarter ancestors, and that they had mastered the use of fire to light their explorations, Hawks said. According to the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, H. naledi walked upright, stood about 4 feet, 9 inches (1.44 m) tall and weighed between 88 and 123 pounds (about 40 and 56 kilograms).
The new skull — which fits into the palm of a modern human hand — should reveal more about H. naledi’s growth and development. While a few jaw fragments from juveniles have been found in the cave, this is the first time researchers have discovered bones from the skull case, or cranium. They also discovered six teeth.
Bones and teeth
The bones and teeth were found during an exploration of the narrow, twisting passageways around Dinaledi Chamber. Researchers mapped 1,037 feet (316 m) of these passageways, looking for evidence of another way into that chamber and several others nearby where remains have been found. They saw no evidence of another route.
“Exploration of the narrow passages within the Dinaledi Subsystem involves considerable effort, navigating areas with irregular floors and walls, numerous obstructions and fissures less than 30 cm [11.8 inches] wide,” archaeologist Marina Elliott of Simon Fraser University in British Columbia, Canada, wrote in the PaleoAnthropology paper.
The researchers did, however, find more fossils in this subterranean maze. These included the second-ever piece of evidence of a juvenile baboon in the cave; a single arm bone probably belonging to H. naledi; a trove of 33 bone fragments that also likely belonged to an H. naledi individual or individuals; and Leti. Details on Leti’s skull were also published Nov. 4 in the journal PaleoAnthropology.
The partially preserved skull was broken into 28 fragments. When reconstructed, these fragments revealed much of the child’s forehead and some of the top of the head. The teeth consisted of four unworn permanent teeth and two worn baby teeth. Their development and wear indicate that the child was at the age where the first permanent molars were breaking through the gum. In a human child, this would correspond to about 4 to 6 years of age. It’s not known if H. naledi developed faster; if so, Leti may have been younger than 4 when he or she died.
The size of the skull indicates that Leti’s brain had a volume of between 29 and 37 cubic inches (480 and 610 cubic cm) — about 90% to 95% of the brain volume of adults of her species.
“[T]his begins to give us insight into all stages of life of this remarkable species,” Louisiana State University anthropologist Juliet Brophy, who led the study on Leti’s skull, said in the statement.
A Pregnant Ancient Egyptian Mummy Has Been Discovered in a Shocking World First
A team of Polish scientists say they have discovered the only known example of an embalmed pregnant Egyptian mummy. The discovery was made by researchers at the Warsaw Mummy Project and revealed in the Journal of Archaeological Science on Thursday.
Polish archaeologists described the discovery as “really special”
The project started in 2015, uses technology to examine artefacts housed at the National Museum in Warsaw. The mummy was previously thought to be a male priest but scans reveal it was a woman in the later stages of pregnancy.
Experts from the project believe the remains are most likely of a high-status woman, aged between 20 and 30, who died during the 1st Century BC.
The scans of the pregnant mummy revealed a mummified fetus, as seen in these abdominal scans of her remains
“Presented here is the only known example of a mummified pregnant woman and the first radiological images of such a foetus,” they wrote in the journal article announcing the find.
Using the foetus head circumference, they estimate it was between 26 and 30 weeks when the mother died for unknown reasons.
A CT scanner and radiologists have been assisting the archaeological work
“This is our most important and most significant finding so far, a total surprise,” team member Wojciech Ejsmond of the Polish Academy of Sciences told the Associated Press.
Four bundles thought to be wrapped and embalmed organs were found within the mummy’s abdominal cavity but scientists say the foetus had not been removed from the uterus.
The scientists said it was unclear why it had not been extracted and embalmed separately, but speculated spiritual beliefs about the afterlife or physical difficulties with removal may have contributed.
‘The Mysterious Lady’
Researchers from the mummy project have dubbed the woman as the Mysterious Lady of the National Museum in Warsaw because of conflicting accounts around her origins.
They say the mummified remains were first donated to the University of Warsaw in 1826. The donor alleged the mummy was found in royal tombs in Thebes, but researchers say it was common in the 19th century to falsely ascribe antiquities to famous places to increase their value.
Inscriptions on the elaborate coffin and sarcophagus had led 20th Century experts to believe the mummy inside was that of a male priest named Hor-Djehuti.
But now scientists, having identified it as female with scanning technology, believe the mummy was at some point placed in the wrong coffin by antiquity dealers during the 19th Century when looting and re-wrapping of remains were not uncommon.
Amulets, thought to be items known as the Four Sons of Horus, accompany the mummified body
They describe the condition of the mummy as “well-preserved” but say damage to the neck wrappings suggest it was at some point targeted for valuables.
The experts say at least 15 items, including a “rich set” of mummy-shaped amulets, were found intact within the wrappings.
One of the researchers on the project, Dr Marzena Ożarek-Szilke, told the Polish state news agency that her husband had first spotted what appeared to be “a little foot” on one of the scans.
She told the outlet that the team hope next to study small amounts of tissue to establish the woman’s cause of death.
Archaeologists Discover ‘Lost,’ 4,500-Year-Old Egyptian Sun Temple
Archaeologists in Egypt have unearthed the remnants of a lost “sun temple” dating back to the 25th century BCE. Experts believe it to be one of just six such temples erected as a shrine to sun god Ra during the Old Kingdom, although to date, only two other sun temples have been found.
The site of the Nyuserra sun temple in Abu Ghurab.
The structure was discovered below a separate temple—itself one of the other known sun temples—at Abu Ghurab, roughly 12 miles south of the capital city of Cairo.
The newer temple is thought to have been built between 2400 and 2370 BCE by Nyuserra (also referred to as Nyuserre and Niuserre), an ancient Egyptian pharaoh who ruled during the Fifth Dynasty.
The structure was first excavated by archaeologists in 1898. It turns out, however, that they didn’t uncover all that the site had to offer.
“The archaeologists of the 19th century excavated only a very small part of this mud-brick building below the stone temple of Nyuserra and concluded that this was a previous building phase of the same temple,” Massimiliano Nuzzolo, the archaeologist who co-led the dig, told CNN this week. “Now our finds demonstrate that this was a completely different building, erected before.”
The Nyuserra sun temple in Abu Ghurab.
From the older temple, the archaeologists uncovered a pair of columns from a portico and an entrance threshold, all made of limestone.
Nuzzolo—who is an assistant professor of Egyptology at the Warsaw-based Polish Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Mediterranean and Oriental Cultures—explained that Nyuserra likely used the bones of the previous temple to erect his own.
“We knew that there was something below the stone temple of Nyuserre, but we don’t know if it is just another building phase of the same temple or if it is a new temple,” the archaeologist elaborated for the Daily Telegraph.
“Actually, the fact that there is such a huge, monumental entrance would point to a new building. So, why not another sun temple, one of the missing sun temples?”
Nuzzolo and his team also uncovered seals engraved with the names of kings, as well as dozens of beer jars. The latter vessels have been dated to the mid 25th century BCE, meaning they were created well before Nyuserra’s construction.
These findings were featured in an episode of the series Lost Treasures of Egypt that aired on the National Geographic channel last weekend. However, whoever was responsible for building the older temple remains an unanswered question.
In March 2003, the body of a man who lived during the Iron Age was discovered in a peat bog in Ireland. Known as the Clonycavan Man, the well-preserved remains indicate that the body was not that of a man who died a natural or honourable death, but one who was brutally murdered.
The mysteries surrounding his death are plentiful. Who was this man? Why was he so brutally murdered? How was his body so well preserved for so many years? And what is the significance of his highly groomed hair?
The Clonycavan Man’s remains are referred to as a “bog body.” The discovery of ancient and well-preserved bodies in peat bogs has been fairly widespread.
When a dead body is deposited into bog water that is highly acidic, low in temperature, and low in oxygen, the body can remain intact for thousands of years, including skin, hair, and organs.
This unintended mummification gives us a glimpse into the lives and deaths of ancient humans who weren’t necessarily honoured as royal or dignitary, like the mummified remains found in Egypt.
Clonycavan Man, who lived around the 4th or 3rd century B.C., is now a “bog body,” on display at the National Museum of Ireland in Dublin.
The Clonycavan Man was found in Clonycavan, County Meath in Ireland, in a machine that had been harvesting peat. The remains, which have been dated to 2,300 years old, consisted of a head, neck, arms, torso, and upper abdomen.
It is likely that the peat harvesting machine was responsible for severing his lower body. It is estimated that he was between the ages of 24-40 when he died. The visible details of the Clonycavan Man are astonishing.
His estimated height was five feet, two inches tall. His nose was squashed, and his teeth crooked. The pores of his skin were still visible, and it has been concluded that his diet consisted mostly of fruits and vegetables.
Due to the damage from the peat harvesting machine, the Clonycavan Man did not have hands, but other bog bodies have been discovered to have very well-manicured fingernails.
One of the most distinguishing characteristics of the Clonycavan Man was his hair. On his face, he wore a goatee and a moustache, while on his head was a very distinguished hairstyle.
The front of his hair was shaven, giving him a higher hairline on his forehead. The remainder of his hair was several inches long, and was intricately folded forward and then back in what has been described as an “ancient Mohawk.”
It is believed that standing at only five feet, two inches, the Clonycavan Man chose this hairstyle to make himself appear taller. Scientists even discovered an ancient form of hair gel in his hair, made of plant oil and pine resin.
The presence of this hair gel indicates that he was fairly wealthy during his lifetime, because it was made from materials found in France and Spain.
The most mysterious aspect of the Clonycavan Man is the manner of his death. Some have suggested that he was a King, who was ceremoniously sacrificed.
The injuries to his body suggest a particularly grisly death, which may have possibly been the result of torture. There is evidence of three significant blows to his head, to the point where his skull split open. He had also been hit in the nose and the chest and was disembowelled.
His nipples had been sliced off, which is specifically believed to be a sign of a failed kingship. In ancient Ireland, sucking on a king’s nipples was a sign of submission. Removing the nipples was intended to make a man incapable of kingship.
Unfortunately, the bog only preserves the body and doesn’t leave behind much other evidence. While it is fairly clear that he died a mysterious death, possibly akin to murder, there isn’t much else to tell us about who he was or why he died.
The preservation of his body was not intentional, and it is unlikely that anyone ever intended for future civilizations to try to unravel the mystery of his death.
Egyptian pharaoh’s 3,500-year-old mummy gets unwrapped digitally for first time
A CT scan reveals Amenhotep I’s skull
The mummified body of an ancient Egyptian pharaoh has been studied for the first time in millennia after being digitally “unwrapped”.
The mummy of Amenhotep I, who ruled from 1525 to 1504 BC, was found at a site in Deir el-Bahari 140 years ago. But archaeologists have refrained from opening it in order to preserve the exquisite face mask and bandages.
Computed tomography (CT) scans have now revealed previously unknown information about the pharaoh and his burial.
“We got to see the face of the king that has been wrapped for more than 3,000 years,” Dr Sahar Saleem, professor of radiology at Cairo University’s Faculty of Medicine and lead author of the study published in the journal Frontiers in Medicine, told the BBC.
Dr Saleem says the scans of the body did not show any wounds or disfigurement due to disease
She said the first thing that had struck her was how Amenhotep I‘s facial features resembled those of his father Ahmose I, the first pharaoh of ancient Egypt’s 18th Dynasty, with a narrow chin, a small narrow nose, curly hair, and mildly protruding upper teeth.
The researchers also established that Amenhotep I was approximately 169cm (5ft 6in) tall and that he was about 35 years old when he died.
Dr Saleem said the scans showed he was in the very good physical condition and in good health at the time of his death, with no signs of any wounds or disfigurement due to disease. That suggested he died as a result of an infection or a virus.
The researchers were able to gain insights about the mummification and burial of Amenhotep I, including that he was the first pharaoh to have his forearms folded across his chest and that, unusually, his brain was not removed.
They also concluded that his mummy was “lovingly repaired” by priests of the 21st Dynasty, which ruled about four centuries after this death.
Amenhotep I’s mummy was twice reburied by priests of the 21st Dynasty
The scans showed that the mummy suffered from multiple post-mortem injuries that were likely to have been inflicted by grave robbers.
They also showed that the priests fixed the detached head and neck to the body with a resin-treated linen band, covered a defect in the abdominal wall with a band and placed two amulets beneath, and wrapped the detached left arm to the body.
Dr Saleem said the 30 amulets and “unique” golden girdle with gold beads that Amenhotep I was wearing disproved theories that the priests might have removed his jewellery for use by later pharaohs.
The mummy of Amenhotep I was reburied by the priests in the Deir el-Bahari Royal Cache, a complex of tombs and temples near Luxor, to keep them safe.
