Poles launch world's largest mummy study
PR dla Zagranicy
Nick Hodge
16.12.2015 09:49
Polish specialists have launched a project that will examine some forty mummies in a bid to shed light on diseases that proliferated in Ancient Egypt.
Marzena Ożarek-Szilke (L), Kamila Braulińska (2L) and Wojciech Ejsmond (R), at a press conference which marked the launch of the Warsaw Mummy Project, which began in Otwock. Photo: PAP/Jacek Turczyk
The Warsaw Mummy Project is being carried out in cooperation with the National Museum in Warsaw, which has loaned mummies for the initiative.
Researchers will study both mummified humans and animals, and the first step will be to clarify whether the specimens are genuine.
“We know that especially in the case of mummified animals, the bundles often contain just fragments of animals,” reflected Dr Marzena Ożarek-Szilke from the University of Warsaw.
“Such mummies were mass-produced and sold to pilgrims as votive offerings to the gods in temples,” she noted.
The study will answer questions about the species, sex and age of a given mummy, but most importantly it will provide a chance to find traces of diseases that occurred in antiquity, including bone diseases, metabolic disorders, infectious diseases, and above all forms of cancer. (nh/pk)
Source: PAP