|
May 2006 |
DISCOVERY:
CANADA
|
Canada's
very own bog skeleton: The Highgate Mastodon (therecord.com)
"According to the
few historical accounts that remain about the excavation, William
Reycraft first uncovered a few large bones in 1886, but had neither the
time nor the know-how to stage a full excavation. Four years later, two
businessmen John Jelly and William Hillhouse of Shelburne, Ont., north
of Orangeville, bought the rights to excavate the rest of the Highgate
bones. What they found was a near-complete skeleton, unusually large
even for a mastodon.... In all, 157 mastodon bones were excavated,
reports said.... "
Settlement
near in determining finder's fee for discovering the Iceman
(ansa.it)
"A legal battle
over the discovery of Italy's famous Iceman is set to end. An appeals
court here in the mummy's adopted city has ruled that Austrian couple
Helmut and Erika Simon found the body, opening the way for the
settlement of a drawn-out row over a finder's fee. For years, Bolzano's
provincial administration have been offering the Simons 50,000 euros for
the sensational 1991 find. In the meantime, Helmut Simon died in a
mountain fall. In spurning the fee, the Simons cited the estimated four
million euros a year the Iceman generates for restaurants, hotels and
souvenir-sellers in Bolzano alone - not to mention a worldwide industry
of TV programmes, documentaries and books...."
|
May 2006 |
DISCOVERY:
BARBADOS
|
More on the mummified bodies found on
boat drifting off coast of Barbados
Final
note solves part of the mystery (cnn.com)
"They left from
the west coast of Africa on Christmas Eve seeking a better life in
Europe, climbing aboard a rusty boat that instead carried them to their
deaths as they drifted off course, crossed the Atlantic Ocean and wound
up near the Caribbean island of Barbados. By the time this boat was
found by a fisherman on April 30, the bodies of the 11 young men were
virtually mummified by the sun and salt spray. One had written a
farewell note before dying...."
Eleven
mummified people are only passengers on drifting boat (gulf-times.com)
"A Senegalese boat
carrying the mummified bodies of 11 passengers has been found off the
coast of Barbados, the Spanish daily El Pais reported yesterday. Documents
found on board indicate that the boat set sail with 37 African migrants on
board. Investigators believe they died as they drifted for three months
from the Cape Verde archipelago, near Senegal, to the island of Barbados
on the other side of the Atlantic, with those who survived longest
throwing the bodies of their weaker fellow passengers overboard.... The 11
bodies were described as being in a state of mummification, with their
clothes stuck to their skin. They did not display any signs of violence,
but could not be identified. On board investigators discovered the
telephone number of a Senegalese who had remained in the country, and who
said the passengers on the boat were hoping to reach Brazil."
|
May 2006 |
DISCOVERY:
EGYPT
|
More on the discovery of
an intact Egyptian tomb in the Valley of the Kings
Another
final word? (msnbc.com)
"Is it a royal
Egyptian tomb, a glorified supply room for ancient embalmers, or
something in between? A year after the discovery of a chamber that had
lain hidden in the Valley of the Kings for millennia, archaeologists are
still asking themselves exactly what they've found. When the find was
announced in February, it was portrayed as the first tomb to be
uncovered in the pharaonic city of the dead since the discovery of King
Tutankhamun's treasures in 1922. But a month later, top Egyptian
archaeologist Zahi Hawass said the chamber was merely a "room for
mummification" rather than a royal resting place. Now it looks as
if neither of those claims was true. One scenario is that the chamber,
known as KV-63, was originally created as a tomb, then ended up as a
cache for sacred supplies. However, the head of the KV-63 expedition is
still holding out the possibility that at least one mummy will be found
among the chamber's seven coffins."
THE
COMPLETE UPDATE
|
May 2006 |
MUMMY
SCIENCE:
MICHIGAN
|
Looking
for Jimmy Hoffa: Will his body be preserved? (detnews.com)
"Synthetic
materials that were widely used for men's clothing in the mid-1970s may
have helped preserve the remains of former Teamsters president Jimmy
Hoffa, one of the nation's top forensic anthropologists said Thursday.
Mary Manhein, the director of the Forensic Anthropology and Computer
Enhancement Services laboratory at Louisiana State University in Baton
Rouge, said Hoffa's corpse is likely to be much better preserved if he was
wearing nylon or polyester when he was killed, rather than a natural fiber
such as cotton...."
|
May 2006 |
MUMMY
SCIENCE:
NEVADA
|
More on the mummy of Spirit Cave Man
The
mummy of Spirit Cave Man: To offend and/or to learn? (signonsandiego.com)
"Two
Fernley Elementary School teachers never meant to get in the middle of a
political battle over who controls the history of North America. 'It's
been quite a ride for 10 years, but the kids love it,' said Vivian Olds, a
fifth-grade teacher. 'Here's one of the most important archaeological
discoveries in North America, just 30 miles from Fernley, and yet we had
no access to that information.' The secrecy, she said, just 'drove us to
find out more.' Olds and her colleague, Deb Sutherland, wanted to teach
students about a 10,600-year-old Nevadan called Spirit Cave Man. The man's
partially mummified remains were found 66 years ago in a cave near Fallon,
but his antiquity wasn't known until 12 years ago. Northern Nevada Indian
tribes want to rebury the remains in a secret location, so that the man's
soul may continue its journey into the next world. Tribal leaders filed
suit against the government to get the remains. But some scientists want
to study him further because they say he may hold keys to understanding
how – and when – human beings came to the New World tens of thousands
of years ago. Most anthropologists say Spirit Cave Man probably isn't
related to modern Indians, and represents a group that predated the
ancestors of tribes now in the Great Basin. A few other researchers
disagree...."
Move
over Son of Kennewick Man, the mummified (and more controversial) Spirit
Cave Man deserves attention (bradenton.com)
"...in at
least two cases, scientists and tribes have cooperated to learn from the
oldest Americans.... One of the most promising candidates may never be
sampled. The Fallon Paiute-Shoshone tribe of Nevada is suing to claim and
rebury Spirit Cave Man, whose desiccated remains were discovered in 1940,
wrapped in a woven reed mat. Not only does the 10,700-year-old mummy still
retain some hair, skin and organs...."
|
For
more information about Spirit Cave man, including photos and
details about the lawsuit, visit this
website. |
|
May 2006 |
DISCOVERY:
SOUTH KOREA
|
Chosun
Dynasty mummy found in near-pristive condition (chosun.com)
"A 450-year-old
mummy has been discovered in Cheongdo, North Gyeongsang Province, offering
a clearer picture of how people dressed and were buried during the height
of the Chosun Dynasty. The mummy, which measures about 165 centimeters, is
in near-pristine condition...."
|
May 2006 |
EXHIBIT:
ARKANSAS
|
Big
Arkie, the mummified alligator of the Little Rock zoo (arktimes.com)
"Tucked
between entries on Arkansas’s governors, Civil War Battles, counties and
towns, artists and entertainers, and so on, the Encyclopedia of Arkansas
History and Culture also includes entries on some pretty amazing animals
— both real and imagined. Some belong in the science category and others
in science fiction. For example: Big Arkie: A 13-foot alligator found near
Hope in 1952, he was a major attraction at the Little Rock Zoo. At the
time of his death in 1970, he was believed to be the largest captive
alligator in the western hemisphere. Today, his preserved body resides on
top of a set of bookcases at Arkansas State University..."
|
May 2006 |
MUMMY
SCIENCE:
PENNSYLVANIA
|
A
2,200-year-old cold case from Egypt: Who is the mysterious mummy? (philly.com)
"When
she was rediscovered three decades ago, in a darkened storage area at
Philadelphia's Academy of Natural Sciences, she caused a bit of a
sensation. Lying in a plain wooden crate was an Egyptian mummy, her gilded
death mask undimmed by the passage of centuries. The Egyptian government
had restricted the export of such artifacts decades earlier, so the
appearance in 1977 of a "new" one outside the country drew some
interest. X-rays taken at the time led researchers to identify the body
tentatively as that of a 14-year-old girl. But mysteries remained. When
did she live, and where? How did she die? Might her dusty linen wrappings
hold any clues as to her place in society, or the customs of her time? In
short, who was she? Now, almost 30 years after the mummy was first
rediscovered, new clues are starting to emerge...."
The
sad tale of a mummified dog in Wales (icwales.co.uk)
"A dog was found
practically mummified after being abandoned in a house by his owner, a
court heard. Richard Cox left his pet Rottweiler Buster alone in a
property in Barry - along with many of his other possessions - when his
landlord changed the front door lock to force him to pay back rent. It was
not until three months later, in December last year, that the owners of
the property in Morel Street broke down an inner door and realised that
the dog had been left inside...."
Mysterious
tattooed mummy of female warrior-princess discovered in Peru (nytimes.com;
free registration required)
"...She was a woman
who died some 1,600 years ago in the heyday of the Moche culture, well
before
 the
rise of the Incas. Her imposing tomb suggests someone of high status. Her
desiccated remains are covered with red pigment and bear tattoos of
patterns and mythological figures. But the most striking aspect of the
discovery, archaeologists said yesterday, is not the offerings of gold and
semiprecious stones, or the elaborate wrapping of her body in fine
textiles, but the other grave goods. She was surrounded by weaving
materials and needles, befitting a woman, and 2 ceremonial war clubs and
28 spear throwers — sticks that propel spears with far greater force —
items never found before in the burial of a woman of the Moche (pronounced
MOH-chay). Was she a warrior princess, or perhaps a ruler?
Possibly...."
Sacrificed
teenage slave accompanied mysterious mummy in death (sfgate.com)
"Archaeologists in
Peru have discovered a 15-century-old mummy of a tattooed Moche woman
entombed with a dazzling collection of weapons and jewelry. The woman,
clearly a member of royalty, was buried with a sacrificed teenage slave at
her feet and surrounded by multiple signs of femininity, including
precious jewelry, golden needles and bejeweled spindles and spindle whorls
for spinning cotton. But her burial bundle also contained gilded
copper-clad war clubs and finely crafted spear throwers -- objects never
seen in a Moche woman's tomb.... UCLA archaeologist Christopher Donnan,
who has been working for years in the nearby Jequetepeque Valley, said
many of the burial goods are identical to royal artifacts he has
discovered there.... The find suggests that the Moche, like other South
American cultures, cemented alliances between cities through
intermarriage.... "
A
closer look at the warrior-princess mummy discovery (chinabroadcast.cn)
"A female mummy with
complex tattoos on her arms has been found in a ceremonial burial site in
Peru, the National Geographic Society reported Tuesday. The mummy was
accompanied by ceremonial items including jewelry and weapons, and the
remains of a teenage girl who had been sacrificed, archaeologists
reported. The burial was at a site called El Brujo on Peru's north coast
near Trujillo. They said the woman was part of the Moche culture which
thrived in the area between A.D. 1 and A.D. 700. The mummy was dated about
A.D. 450. The presence of gold jewelry and other fine items indicates the
mummy was that of an important person, but anthropologist John Verano of
Tulane University, said the researchers are puzzled by the presence of war
clubs, which are not usually found with females...."
Photos
1 Photo
2 Photo
3
More
photos from the National Geographic website
|
May 2006 |
POSSIBILITY:
JOHN WILKES BOOTH
|
A
new novel explores what if John Wilkes Booth lived and became a mummy
(sanangelostandardtimes.com)
"At
75, Dr. Preston Darby has published his first novel, exploring a
tantalizing question: What if John Wilkes Booth didn't die in 1865 and
came to live out his years as a fugitive - perhaps in Texas? Darby's
242-page book, titled The
Reluctant Assassin, begins in San Angelo when an architectural
renovation project uncovers mummified human remains. Examining the corpse,
a pathologist finds Booth's hand-written diary...."
|
FOR
FURTHER READING:
 |
|
May 2006 |
MUMMY
SCIENCE:
CHINA
|
Studying
the DNA of the Tarim Bain mummies (aljazeera.net)
"In
a find that could turn conventional history on its head, scientists using
genetic testing have discovered that Caucasians lived in western China's
Tarim Basin a thousand years before East Asians arrived. Unearthed
lying on her side as though in sleep, a single tuft of red hair falling
across her head and ragged moccasins on her feet, the Beauty of Loulan is
considered to be one of the best preserved mummies ever found. Roughly
3800-years-old and discovered in the sands of Xinjiang province in western
China, her emaciated features betray a facial bone structure that is
surprisingly similar to Caucasian looking women. A team of American and
Chinese researchers working in a laboratory in Sweden used DNA samples to
date and profile her mummy, confirming she and other mummies are of
Indo-European descent."
|
May 2006 |
CRIME:
TOMB RAIDERS OF THE WORLD
|
Severed
fingers of the dead: 'The Medici Conspiracy' uncovers the secret world
of tomb raiders (bloomberg.com)
"During a March
2001 raid on an antiquities warehouse in Geneva, police came upon a
scene that made their skins crawl. The Italian and Swiss officers
waded through a room scattered with pots dug up in Iraq and Italy, a
wooden Egyptian coffin sawn into pieces and mummies of humans and
cats. In the back they found cupboards, and inside the cupboards,
boxes. 'On closer examination, one of the boxes in the cupboards was
found to contain gold rings with the finger bones of the dead still
attached to them,' write Peter Watson and Cecilia Todeschini in The
Medici Conspiracy: The Illicit Journey of Looted Antiquities From
Italy's Tomb Raiders to the World's Greatest Museums ....
'Clearly, when the tombs had been looted, the hands and fingers of the
long-dead had simply been broken off by the tombaroli, to save time,'
they write, using the Italian word for 'tomb robber.'..."
|
FOR
FURTHER READING:
 |
|
May 2006 |
CRIME?:
MISSOURI
|
More on Egypt's demand for St. Louis
museum to return mummy mask
Museum
officials decide against returning mask--without proof of crime (stltoday.com)
"The Monday
deadline set by an Egyptian antiquities official for the St. Louis Art
Museum to return a mummy mask will pass without the museum returning the
object. At press conference this morning, museum director Brent Benjamin
called upon Zahi Hawass, secretary general of Egypt’s Supreme Council
of Antiquities, to 'provide documentation substantiating his claim that
the mask was stolen — or to cease his attacks on the Saint Louis Art
Museum.' In a letter dated Feb. 14, Hawass charged that the mask was
illegally taken from a storage facility in the early 1990s and demanded
that the process of returning it start within two weeks. Hawass later
changed his deadline for the mask’s return to Monday. But the museum
maintains that it has not received any communication from him setting a
date. Hawass has not replied to a Post-Dispatch request for comment made
late Thursday...."
Down
to the wire, museum
officials strategize with lawyers
(stltoday.com)
"St. Louis Art
Museum officials strategized with their attorney into the night
Thursday about how to respond to the Egyptian government's demands
that the museum return an ancient mummy mask by Monday.... Earlier
this month, Zahi Hawass, secretary general of Egypt's Supreme Council
of Antiquities, told the Post-Dispatch and other media that he sent a
letter demanding the 3,200-year-old mask's return by Monday. He did
not reply to a Post-Dispatch request for comment late
Thursday...."
Supreme
Council of Antiquities for Egypt: St.
Louis museum must return stolen mummy mask by May 15
(msnbc.com)
"If only the
3,000-year-old mummy mask at the Saint Louis Art Museum could talk.  Maybe
then the mystery of its rightful owner could be laid to rest, much
like it was in an ancient Egyptian pyramid so many ages ago. The
Supreme Council of Antiquities for Egypt has given the Saint Louis Art
Museum a May 15 deadline to turn over the burial mask of Ka Nefer
Nefer, which they believe left the country illegally. Officials with
the museum are evaluating documents from the council that seek to
prove that the mask from around 1307-1196 B.C., could have been stolen
from an Egyptian Museum storage room.... Egypt's antiquities council
first made the claim in late February that the mask could have been
stolen in the 1980s when an Egyptian Museum storage room was looted in
Cairo...."
|
May 2006 |
DISCOVERY: NEW
HAMPSHIRE
|
More on the mysterious mummified infant from
New Hampshire
Did
mummified infant come from Hawaii? (khon.com)
"The strange case of a mummified baby found in a
home in New England may have a Hawaii connection.... A man who lives in
the capital of New Hampshire, Concord, believes the body he kept in his
home was part-Hawaiian.... Charles Peavy, a cook in Concord, New
Hampshire, has had the mummified baby for eight years. He says it's been
in his family for about 90 years, left among the possessions of his widely
traveled great-great uncle. Peavy believes his great-great uncle fell in
love with a Hawaiian woman and she and their baby died in childbirth. The
mummy was kept in a box decorated with shells, bearing the words: 'sacred
to the memory of our little Hawaiian home across the sea....' "
A
reporter's story: How to track down the owner of a mummified body (concordmonitor.com
"I've got at least
another 30 years of newspaper reporting ahead of me, but I already know
some of the stories I'll remember most. The election of Episcopal Bishop
Gene Robinson. Covering the state's abortion case at the U.S. Supreme
Court. And last week's hunt for the mummy baby. Here's why: I'm more
reporter than writer, and those three stories were tough to land. But none
was harder than the mummy. It took me six days of knocking on strangers'
doors and calling my best contacts to find the mummy. At a daily paper,
that's an eternity. The initial tip came on a Friday, the busiest day in a
newsroom, and I was in the middle of two stories. 'You ready for this?'
the tipster said. 'There is a mummified baby in Concord. The Concord
police got a call. That's all I know'...."
Investigation
continues...and consequences become clearer
(upi.com)
"New Hampshire
investigators have seized a mummified baby's corpse that a family has been
passing down as an heirloom for decades. Charles Peavey, 41, told Concord
police he was told when he inherited "Baby John" from his
father, it was the stillborn son of a great-great uncle. The state
attorney general's office has forensic anthropologists investigating the
infant's age, origin and cause of death to rule out homicide, but results
could take months, the Concord Monitor reported. If no DNA link can be
found to the Peavey clan, he will not receive the remains back. And if the
infant is in fact more than 80 years old as Peavey claims, the statute of
limitations on any laws regarding human remains have expired, the report
said...."
New
Hampshire Attorney General's office to investigate (seacoastonline.com)
"A mummified baby that’s belonged to a local
family for decades  is
being investigated by the state attorney general’s office. Charles
Peavey, 41, said the tiny preserved corpse has been passed down in his
family since it was discovered among his great-great uncle’s possessions
in a Manchester attic. Investigators got word of the remains after Peavey’s
4-year-old niece was overheard telling another child that her uncle was a
killer and had a dead baby. Police visited the girl’s mother and saw a
photo of the mummy. Peavey contacted police when he learned they were
investigating. Now the mummy is in the hands of investigators, and Peavey
said he was told a forensic anthropologist would be examining
it...."
A
family heirloom: Mysterious mummified infant? (concordmonitor.com)
"For decades,
Charles Peavey's family has passed down what he admits is a most unusual
family heirloom: the tiny corpse of a mummified baby whose mysterious
history has been filled with legend. But Peavey, 41, of Concord had never
considered the keepsake a problem until the Concord police learned of the
remains last week and took them for testing. The state attorney general's
office is investigating the infant's age, origin and cause of death to
rule out homicide. It seems unlikely that Peavey will face criminal
charges, but the investigation has him worried. Of all the stories
surrounding the mummy's birth and death, Peavey favors the one that says
he's an ancient relative - the stillborn son of a great-great uncle. He
calls the mummy "Baby John." Through DNA testing, a forensic
anthropologist will be able to determine whether that theory is
plausible....."
|
FOR
FURTHER READING:
|
|
May 2006 |
DISCOVERY:
SPAIN
|
Mummified
baby found underneath basement floor in Madrid
(thinkspain.com)
"A workman found the body of a newborn baby today buried 50cm
underneath the floor of a basement of a property located on the calle
Santa Ana in Madrid. The body, which was well preserved, was found under
three layers of cement, soil, and ceramic chips...."
|
May 2006 |
CONTROVERSY:
COLORADO
|
Student's
science fair project judged inappropriate for elementary viewing:
Piglets preserved the Egyptian way shown only to upper high school
students (thedenverchannel.com)
"A 10-year-old fourth-grader finally got to show students her
science fair project Tuesday. Whitney Ingraham's project on the
mummification of pigs was deemed too graphic for the science fair at her
Colorado Springs elementary school, but school officials finally let her
show it to high school students. Ingraham, an avid reader on life in
ancient Egypt got the OK for the project from Stetson Elementary School
officials, but when they saw the finished result, they thought it was
not appropriate for elementary school audiences. It was the first time
school officials could recall a student’s project being left out of
the fair. Ingraham had used dead piglets that a butcher discovered in a
sow and used mummification techniques used by Egyptians to preserve the
piglets. That included removing the tiny organs herself and pulling the
brains out of the animals with a hook through the nose -- the same way
humans were mummified thousands of years ago...."
|
May 2006 |
DISCOVERY:
CAMBODIA
|
Couple
who mummified their deceased premature baby did not break Cambodian laws (mg.co.za)
"A Cambodian couple who mummified
their deceased premature baby to keep at home as a lucky charm had
broken no laws and were merely adhering to ancient superstitions, police
said on Wednesday. Yem Polil (39) and his wife Lour Lin (38) featured on
the front page of a local Khmer-language newspaper, photographed with
the mummified corpse of their unnamed son, whom they smoked to preserve
after he died within minutes of birth.... He said Polil, a former
soldier, had dreamed that a mummified baby monkey that he had previously
been given as a magic charm to protect him in battle, and subsequently
lost, wanted to return to him. Within months he discovered that his wife
was pregnant. When Lin miscarried seven months into the pregnancy, the
couple took it as an omen and preserved the child's body...."
|
May 2006 |
MUMMY
TRAVEL:
EGYPT
|
Visit
the mummy room at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo (egypttoday.com)
"The Egyptian Museum houses a
staggering collection of over 100,000 objects, too many to absorb in a
lifetime, let alone in a single trip. While some displays are
well-marked (generally in Arabic and English, occasionally in French),
the signage is erratic and you often won’t know what you’re looking
at unless you’ve educated yourself beforehand. Decide in advance what
you want out of your visit — a broad introduction to Egyptology or a
focused look at a particular feature. Either way, if you aren’t
already familiar with the museum’s layout, it is probably wise to
invest in a map or a professional guide. The former sells for LE 35 in
the gift shop to your left as you enter the building; it is color-coded
and numbered so you can sort out which gallery contains displays from
which kingdom or ruler. There is also a wall map of the ground floor,
though it isn’t terribly detailed and you can’t refer to it as you
wander about. Look for it just to your left after you’ve gone through
the final security check within the museum building.
..."
Visit
the Bahariya Oasis, home of the Valley of the Golden Mummies (egypttoday.com)
"The best time to
visit the oases is in the fall and spring to avoid extreme day or night
temperatures. For both accommodation and tours, check out Badawiya Safari
Company (tel. (092) 751 0060 or (02) 575-8076), owned by three Bedouins,
the brothers Sa’ad, Hamdi and Atef Ali. Born and raised in Farafra, they
own the cozy and ethnic Badawiya Hotel (doubles go for $29 for foreigners
and $24 for Egyptians and foreign residents), which also has a restaurant
serving fruit and vegetables grown in the brothers’ farm. The
company’s 120 camels are used for tours of the desert, though 4WDs are
also available. Trips (including guide, tent, mattresses, food and drinks,
and only excluding sleeping bags) go for $120 per day for foreigners and
$90 for Egyptians and foreign residents. The prices go down for groups.
Check out www.badawiya.com for excursions ranging from three to 30 days...."
|
May 2006 |
MUMMY
SCIENCE?:
GERMANY
|
More about Von Hagens' new body
factory in Guben, Germany
Town
to house body factory (lgib.gov.uk)
"The
German town of Guben is to introduce a somewhat macabre form of economic
development, by turning its town hall into a body factory. Gunther von
Hagens, creator of the ‘Body Worlds’ exhibition, preserves human
corpses by injecting them with a plastic resin, then dissects and
arranges the preserved bodies for public exhibition. The controversial
scientist has promised to create up to 200 jobs in Guben and to invest
£2.4 million in the project, making him the biggest single investor in
the town for nearly 80 years. With unemployment currently running at
22%, the move will undoubtedly help the local economy. He has bought the
town hall and a former wool factory and is launching a nationwide pick
up service, to collect the bodies of donors free of charge...."
Want
to donate your body for plastination? Pick up service now available in
Germany (telegraph.co.uk)
"Gunther von Hagens,
the German anatomist who exhibits preserved human corpses after injecting
them with a plastic resin, has launched a nationwide body pick-up service
to provide him with a "sufficient number" of specimens. The
controversial scientist announced the introduction of the service just as
he is about to open a body factory in the east German town of Guben. Mr
von Hagens said the pick-up service would be free to those who had made a
written pledge to donate their bodies while still alive, and would 'make
it possible [for relatives] to mourn without having to worry about burial
costs'...."
|
May 2006 |
DISCOVERY:
MICHIGAN
|
More on preserved fetus found at
Michigan mansion
Unidentified
baby buried in local cemetery (woodtv.com)
"The baby known only
as "John Boy" has been laid to rest in Schoolcraft. A
construction crew dug up the remains of the unidentified body earlier this
week. The crew was working on a water line outside a historic property
downtown. He was found inside a jar preserved in a liquid. The property
where it was found was a funeral home from the 1930s until the
'80s...."
Preserved
fetus found in mansion undergoing renovation (mlive.com)
"Since a work crew
unwittingly unearthed a fetus embalmed and contained in a glass jar near a
100-plus-year-old mansion -- formerly a funeral home -- in downtown
Schoolcraft on Monday, speculation has swirled about why it was preserved
in that manner and then buried. And whose baby was it? Was it a specimen
from a medical practice in the late 1800s or early 1900s? Did the remains
come from one of the funeral businesses that began using the mansion in
the mid-20th century? ...Police and the Kalamazoo County medical examiner
do not suspect foul play. But they say the remains and style of the jar
suggest events took place a very long time ago...."
|
May 2006 |
DISCOVERY:
HUNGARY
|
Mummified
man found at the bottom of a rum barrel (mti.hu)
"Workers renovating an
empty house in Szeged, SE Hungary, dipped deep into a 300 litre barrel of
rum they found in the basement, but the drinking came to a screeching halt
when they discovered a long-dead body at the bottom of the barrel, the
website of a police magazine reported. The house had been owned by an
elderly lady who had spent many years in the Caribbean region with her
diplomat husband before returning home alone some 20 years ago, Zsaru
Magazine wrote. Her husband had died abroad, she said. The lady herself died
recently and the house was sold to a young couple who ordered a
basement-to-attic renovation. Workers soon discovered that a 300-litre
barrel left behind by the former owner was filled with rum, and they took it
upon themselves to empty it, commenting on its unusual bouquet. The rum
tasting lasted some six months before the body was discovered, preserved in
the alcohol. Stunned by the discovery, they called police...."
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May 2006 |
EXHIBIT:
CALIFORNIA
|
More on L.A.'s
Bog Body exhibit
Another
look at 'The Mysterious Bog People' (ladowntownnews.com)
"In 1949, peat diggers were excavating
nutrient-rich moss in a bog near Hunteburg, Germany, when they discovered two
desiccated bodies. Assuming the shriveled corpses were the victims of a recent
violent crime, possibly at the hands of the Nazis, the diggers called in the
local authorities. Once the bodies left the bog, however, they rapidly
decomposed until all that survived was the woolen cloth in which they were
wrapped. Then came the big surprise: Carbon dating of the cloth revealed that
the material was approximately 800 years old. The ancient cadavers had
remained intact thanks to the preservative power of the bog. This environment
and the artifacts it holds are the subject of The Mysterious Bog People show
at the Natural History Museum in Exposition Park through Sept. 10. The exhibit
showcases hundreds of objects and six human "mummies" excavated from
the bogs of northwestern Europe. The exhibit is broken into three distinct
phases: the first sets the scene, literally, with a simulation of the bog
environment; the second examines the lives and rituals of the people who lived
near the bogs over the course of roughly 10,000 years; and the third offers a
hands-on lesson in scientific analysis...."
Review:
'The Mysterious Bog People' in Los Angeles
(paramuspost.com)
"She was a
16-year-old girl who died a violent death. Her body was left in a bog. She is
called Yde Girl, named after the region in what is now the Netherlands where
her body was found. After workers discovered her remains in 1897, a local
newspaper article made mention of the find under the heading
"miscellaneous," which said the corpse 'could have been lying there
for at least a dozen years.' In fact, Yde Girl had been lying in that bog for
almost 2,000 years. She's one of six bog bodies displayed alongside hundreds
of stunningly well-preserved prehistoric artifacts in "The Mysterious Bog
People," a new exhibit running through Sept. 10 at The Natural History
Museum of Los Angeles County...."
|
FOR
FURTHER READING:
Books
about
Bog Bodies
|
|
May 2006 |
MUMMY
SCIENCE:
TUT vs. ÖTZI
|
Who
was better endowed? Tut or Ötzi? (discovery.com)
"King Tutankhamun
... could ... stand out in the shrunken world of male mummies, according
to a close look into old pictures of the 3,300-year-old mummified king....
At first look, Burton's pictures may seem to indicate that King Tut could
have been a little better endowed. But according to mummy expert Eduard
Egarter Vigl, the pharaoh was normally built.... Caretaker of Ötzi the
Iceman, the world's oldest and best-preserved mummy, Egarter was also a
member of the Egyptian-led research team that examined King Tut's CT scan
images.... Ötzi's natural mummification and dehydration in an Alpine
glacier produced a 'collapse...'. "
|
May 2006 |
MUMMY
SCIENCE: SKIN GRAFTS
|
Preserved
skin from cadavers used to save burn victims
(nytimes.com)
"At 5 o'clock one
morning in late March, Linda Dixon stood in the stream of an open fire hydrant
as emergency medical workers flushed her chest, arms and face with water. Ms.
Dixon, a 42-year-old home health aide in Queens, said her estranged boyfriend,
the father of her three children, had gone into her bedroom and thrown acid on
her after a confrontation. Ms. Dixon was taken to the New York-Presbyterian/Weill
Cornell hospital, where she underwent two surgeries for the worst of her
injuries, a third-degree burn across her chest. The surgical team's first
priorities were to remove as much of the burned skin as possible (it can
easily become infected) and to cover the wound temporarily with skin from a
cadaver. Cadaver skin is removed from donors shortly after their deaths, then
processed and distributed by skin and tissue banks. It has long been the
preferred option for a patient with the most severe burns until a graft of the
patient's own skin can be applied...."
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