According to fresh evidence uncovered by archaeologists, mummification dates back 8,000 years.
ARCHAEOLOGISTS are set to rewrite the history books after they uncovered new evidence that suggests the oldest instances of mummification occurred 8,000 years ago.
Researchers have reexamined images taken 60 years ago of a number of bones buried in southern Portugal. They think the earliest evidence of mummification arose in Europe, not Egypt or Chile as was previously believed, according to a fresh examination of these photographs. In the Sado Valley of Portugal, archaeologists found over a dozen ancient remains during 1960s excavations.
Researchers now suspect that at least one of those bodies had been mummified after analyzing previously undeveloped photos. They speculate that this was done so that it may be more convenient to move before being buried.
Additionally, experts discovered proof that implies that additional bodies buried at the location may have been similarly preserved as mummies, indicating that this was a common practice in the area.
Mummification is most commonly associated with Ancient Egypt, where elaborate burial procedures were used more than 4,500 years ago.
Other evidence of mummification outside Egypt is found in other parts of Europe, dating from about 1000 BC.
However, this individual has since been determined by archaeologists to be the oldest mummy ever found, predating all previous instances by a long time.
This newly identified mummy in Portugal pushes back the previous record by about 1,000 years, then held by mummies found in the coastal region of Chile’s Atacama Desert.
When it comes to hot and dry regions like Egypt and the Atacama desert, mummification is a relatively straightforward process.
According to Rita Peyroteo-Stjerna, a bioarchaeologist at Uppsala University in Sweden, mummified soft tissues rarely remain intact in Europe, where significantly wetter conditions make it difficult to locate traces of mummies.
Speaking to Live Science, Ms Peyroteo-Stjerna, the lead author of the study said: “It’s very hard to make these observations, but it’s possible with combined methods and experimental work.”Other authors of the study added: “These burials generally conform to the pattern characteristic of the mortuary practices known for these hunter-gatherer communities, but aspects of the treatment of the body, including its transformation and curation before burial, are new elements.
“New insights into the use of burial places, such as a very tight clustering of burials, and the proposed cases of mummification and the subsequent internment of hyperflexed, intact bodies highlight the significance of both the body and the burial place in the wider hunter-gatherer landscape of south-western Portugal.”
The bones of the buried bodies were “hyperflexed,” which means that their limbs had been bent far beyond their natural limits, the archaeologists observed after looking at the photographs.
This suggests that the body had been tied up after the person had passed away, and those bindings have disintegrated since then.
The team also found that the bones of the skeleton were in excellent condition, particularly the small bones of the feet, which generally fall apart completely from the skeleton as the body decomposes.
Src: kenhthoisu.net
