Why did people think cannibalism was good for their health? The answer offers a glimpse into the quirkiest corners of European history, at a time when Europeans were obsessed with Egyptian mummies.
Driven first by the belief that crushed and dyed human remains could cure everything from bubonic plague to headaches, and then by Victorian people’s macabre ideas about after-dinner entertainment, the bandaged corpses of ancient Egyptians were an object of fascination from the Middle Ages to the 19th century.
mummy mania
Faith that mummies could cure diseases led people for centuries to ingest something that tasted fatal.
Mumia, the product created from mummified bodies, was a medicinal substance consumed for centuries for rich and poor, available in pharmaciesand created from the remains of mummies brought from Egyptian tombs to Europe.
In the 12th century, apothecaries used crushed mummies for their supernatural medicinal properties. Mummies were a prescription medicine for the next 500 years.
A jar used to store mumia, a medicine made from mummified human remains. Wikimedia Commons, CC BY
In a world without antibiotics, doctors prescribed ground skulls, bones, and meat to treat diseases of headaches to reduce swelling or cure the plague.
Not everyone was convinced. Guy de la Fontainea royal doctor, doubted that mummy was a useful medicine and saw counterfeit mummies made from dead peasants in Alexandria in 1564. He realized that people could be scammed. They did not always consume authentic ancient mummies.
But the forgeries illustrate an important point: There was a constant demand for dead flesh for use in medicine, and the supply of real Egyptian mummies could not meet it.
Apothecaries and herbalists were Still dispensing medicine for mummies. until the 18th century.
Mom’s medicine.
Not all doctors thought that old, dried mummies were the best medicine. Some doctors believed that fresh flesh and blood had a vitality that those long dead lacked.
The claim that it was fresh best convinced even the noblest of nobles. England king charles ii he took medicines made from human skulls after suffering a seizure, and until 1909, doctors commonly used human skulls to treat neurological conditions.
For the royal and social elite, eating mummies seemed like a really appropriate medicine As the doctors claimed, Mumia was made of pharaohs. Royalty ate royalty.
Dinner, drinks and show.
By the 19th century, people no longer consumed mummies to cure illnesses, but the Victorians held “unwrapping parties” in which Egyptian corpses were unwrapped for entertainment at private parties.
Napoleon first expedition to egypt in 1798 it sparked European curiosity and allowed 19th century travelers to travel to Egypt to bring back whole mummies. back to europe bought off the street in Egypt.
A street vendor of Egyptian mummies in 1875. Felix Bonfils/Wikimedia
retained victorians private parties dedicated to unwrapping the remains of ancient Egyptian mummies.
The first events that unfolded had at least a veneer of medical respectability. In 1834 the surgeon Thomas Pettigrew Unwrapped a mummy at the Royal College of Surgeons. In his time, autopsies and operations It took place in public and this unwrapping was simply another public medical event.
Soon even the claim to medical research was lost. By then the mummies were no longer medicinal but exciting. A dinner party host who could entertain an audience as he went about his business was rich enough to own a royal mummy.
The excitement of seeing dry flesh and bones appear when the bandages were removed caused people to flock to these performances, whether in a private home or in the theater of a scientific society. Strong drink meantThe public was loud and grateful.
Examination of a mummy by Paul Dominique Philippoteaux c 1891. Wikimedia
The curse of the mummy
The mummy unwrapping festivals ended when the 20th century began. The macabre shudders seemed in bad taste and the inevitable destruction of archaeological remains seemed regrettable.
Then, the discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb prompted a mania that formed art deco design in everything from the motifs on the doors of the Chrysler Building to the Shape of watches designed by Cartier.. The sudden death in 1923 of Lord Carnarvon, patron of Tutankhamun’s expedition, was due to natural causes, but was soon attributed to a new superstition…the curse of the mummy”.
Howard Carter opens the innermost sanctuary of King Tut’s tomb. New York Times Photo Archive/Wikimedia
modern mummies
In 2016, Egyptologist John J. Johnston organized the first public development of a mummy since 1908. Part art, part science, and part spectacle, Johnston created an immersive recreation of what it was like to be present at a Victorian unfolding.
It was as bland as possible, with everything from the Bangles’ Walk Like an Egypt playing on a speaker to attendees stroking each other with straight gin.
The mummy was just an actor wrapped in bandages, but the event was a heady sensory mix. The fact that it took place at St Bart’s Hospital in London was a modern reminder that mummies traverse many realms of experience, from the medical to the macabre.
Egyptian conservators clean a female mummy dating to the late pharaonic period (712-323 BC), at the conservation center of the Grand Museum of Egypt. Amr Nabil/AP
Today, the black market for smuggled antiquities (mummies included) is worth approximately 3 billion dollars.
No serious archaeologist would unwrap a mummy and no doctor would suggest eating one. But the mummy’s appeal remains strong. They are still for sale, still exploited and still a commodity.
By Marcus Harmes, Professor of Pathways Education, University of Southern Queensland. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. 
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