Philadelphia:
The
Academy of Natural Sciences displays
two mummies (one male, one female) inside a reconstruction of an
Egyptian tomb located in African Hall on the second floor. The male
mummy was an Egyptian priest who lived 2800 years ago. The female
mummy (sometimes
called Annie) lived about 2200 years ago. A facial reconstruction
of Annie was recently done and should also be on display.
The Mütter Museum at the College of Physicians, though
not technically a mummy museum, does display a number of medical
mummies (many replicas) and skeletons for use by doctors-in-training,
though the museum is open to the public. The
specimens are hard to take for most people: deformed or otherwise
unusual body parts (and occasionally whole bodies) are exhibited. One
small part of the exhibit is "a collection of twisted horns that
once sprouted from human arms or foreheads," according to
writer Polly Shulman. For more information, look for the October 1999
issue of Discover which includes a one-page review of the
museum. Two photos are included with the article: one shows a plaster
cast of conjoined twins. Not for the
squeamish!
Reading: The
Reading Public Museum displays a
female Egyptian mummy dating from 550 to 250 B.C. as well as a cat mummy. (Thank
you, S. J. Wolfe of the American Antiquarian Society.)
