EGYPT
DESCRIBED
The 17th-century
naturalist Benoît
de Maillet
(below) gave an
extremely accurate
description of the
geography and
wildlife of Egypt in
his Description de
l’Égypte. Portrait of
Maillet by Étienne
Jeaurat, Versaillesthe afterlife. Although the process changed over
time, many of its core practices remained the
same. After removing the body’s internal organs,
priests would use natron, a naturally occurring
salt, to dry it out. Sometimes fragrant substances,
like myrrh, were used to anoint the body. Oils
and resins would be applied to the body, which
would then be stuffed with linen rags or sawdust
before being sealed and wrapped in bandages.
Scholars have had difficulty pinning down ex-
actly how mummies came to be used for medi-
cine. There is evidence that Europeans believed
that embalmed bodies contained otherworldly
healing powers. Other scholars trace the re-
lationship’s origin to the misconception that
mummies contained bitumen, a substance long
associated with healing in the ancient world.
Black, sticky, and viscous, bitumen is a form of
petroleum found in areas around the Dead Sea.
First-century A.D. writers Pliny the Elder and
Dioscorides, as well as the second-century A.D.
Galen, wrote about its healing properties.
Dioscorides described one form as a liquid from
Apollonia (modern Albania) known, in Persian,
SYLVAIN GRANDADAM/AGE FOTOSTOCKTHE MUMMY STUDIED BY BENOÎT DE MAILLET. DESCRIPTION DE
L’ÉGYPTE, EDITED BY JEAN-BAPTISTE LE MASCRIER, 1735.EMPTY VESSELS
No mummies were found in the three
Pyramids at Giza (third millennium b.c.),
which were looted in antiquity. The nearby
Mastaba of Idu bears an inscription that
some Egyptologists have interpreted as
protection against thieves.
as mumiya. According to Pliny, it could heal
wounds and a range of maladies.
European scholars in the Middle Ages
associated bitumen with a blackish substance
found in the tombs of Egypt. An 11th-century
physician, Constantinus Africanus, wrote that
mumiya “is a spice found in the sepulchers of the
dead... That is best which is black, ill-smelling,
shiny, and massive.”The Mummy Trade
Europe began to link mum-
mies with medicine in the
15th century, in response
to a robust demand for
medical mumiya. Naturally
occurring bitumen was rare,
so enterprising merchants
went hunting in Egyptian
tombs for alternative supplies.
When ground to a
powder, those
preserved
bodies andBENOÎT DE MAILLET, the French consul in Egypt between 1692 and
1708, was the first European to stage a mummy unwrapping in
front of an audience. The event took place in Cairo in September- Maillet did not take notes of his process or methods, but
he did detail some of the amulets and objects found among the
wrappings. A drawing of this mummy appears in Description de
l’Égypte, a work published in 1735.
PUBLIC DISPLAY
GÉRARD BLOT/RMN-GRAND PALAISBNF