In a 2,600-year-old embalming workshop, scientists have discovered the ingredients for making a mummy: the tars, fats, tree resins and oils ancient Egyptians used to preserve bodies and prepare them for the afterlife.
been the main windows into the mysterious and elaborate 70-day process of drying and preserving bodies. Then, in 2016, archaeologists unearthed an underground embalming workshop located a stone’s throw from the famous pyramids ofThe site holds more than 100 vessels, including clay beakers and red bowls, some bearing labels explaining how the contents should be used in the mummification process: “to put on his head” or “to make his odor pleasant” or to protect the liver.
“The industry of embalming was momentum driving forwards early globalization, because it meant you really needed to transport these resins across large distances — from southeast Asia to Egypt,” said study co-author Smith noted, for example, that some of the chemical analyses could have been interpreted as evidence that Egyptians were importing plants found in the present-day Americas. “We know there was no cross-trade between old world and new world, so they rejected those as a hypothesis,” Smith said.
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