Since the ignorance we are in, relative to the language of this great nation, places it out of our power to know, of ourselves, the causes and processes for the preservation of dead bodies, let us follow the recital of ancient authors, let us endeavour to detect, not by the imagination, but by positive facts, by the study of invariable exterior conditions, the different data of the question of embalming among the Egyptians.

In the first place, if we make allowance for all that the successive perfection of the arts, luxury, or the love of distinction could add to simple preservation, we shall arrive, with Rouelle, to this conclusion, that the work of embalming is reduced to two essential parts: first, the drying of the body, that is to say, removing the fluids and grease which they contain; secondly, to protect the body thus prepared, from external humidity and contact of the air. We have already seen all the aid which they derived from their climate to fulfil the first condition: a detailed description will teach us what their industry enabled them to add to it. As to the second, the nature of their caverns powerfully contributed.

These vast cavities, says Pelletan, sheltered from the inundations of the Nile, have, without doubt, originally furnished the materials for the monuments of Thebes, and the architects of the day thus hollowed out the tombs of families in elevating their palaces. Their whole surface, from the entrance, even to the deepest recesses of these dark excavations, are covered with sepultures and fresco paintings. Each framed subject forms so many little pictures which touch each other, and the figures of which are not more than two or three inches in height, so that the whole extent of these double walls, the development of which is incalculable, has been the object of minute labour. The sculptures are in bas-relief, and covered with equable tints, but lively, and in very good preservation. The points of rock unconnected with the work, have been covered with a composition perfectly solid, and so durable, that, as yet, no other degradation is observable, than that produced by the efforts of some travellers to carry off fragments of it. Perspective is always wanting in these pictures; the bodies are viewed in full, the faces in profile; but the design is pure and the proportions just; we find nothing to indicate ignorance in the artist; which presumes for the Egyptians, if not great perfection in the arts, at least a great popularity in their practice. The subject of these paintings are domestic scenes, and generally followed by a funeral procession; from whence it may be inferred, that they refer to the life of the man enclosed in each of the lateral niches. The temperature of the caverns is 20°R.

It appeared to us convenient thus to give a summary of the conditions of drying, and of the ulterior preservation, before presenting descriptions which have been more or less accurately transmitted to us, of the part that man has had in this operation.

Herodotus, Diodorus Sicculus, and Porphyrus, who have written with the greatest detail on the funerals of the Egyptians, will afford us the first instructions.

Herodotus. “Mourning and funerals are conducted after this manner: when a man of consideration dies, all the women of his house (oiketes) cover the head and even the face with mud; they leave the deceased in the house, girdle the middle of their bodies, bare the bosom, strike the breast, and overrun the city, accompanied by their relations. On the other side, the men also girdle themselves and strike their breasts; after this ceremony, they carry the body to the place where it is to be embalmed.”

The following, after Diodorus Sicculus, (book 1st, vol.i. p.102, §xcii.) is the ceremony of sepulture among the Egyptians: “The relatives fix the day for the obsequies, in order that the judges, the relations, and friends of the dead may be present, and they characterize it by saying, he is going to pass the lake; afterwards the judges, to the number of more than forty arriving, they place themselves in the form of a semi-circle beyond the lake. A batteau approaches the shore, carrying those who have charge of this ceremony, and in which is a sailor, whom the Egyptians name in their language Charon. They say, further, that Orpheus having remarked this custom in his voyage in Egypt, took occasion from it to imagine the fable of hell, imitating a portion of these ceremonies, and adding to them others of his own invention. Before placing in the batteau the coffin containing the body of the deceased, it is lawful for each one present to accuse him. If they prove that he has led a sinful life, the judges condemn him, and he is excluded from the place of his sepulture. If it appear that he has been unjustly accused, they punish the accuser with severity. If no accuser presents himself, or if the one who does so is known as a calumniator, the relatives, putting aside the signs of their grief, deliver an eulogium on the deceased without mentioning his birth, as is practised among the Grecians, because they considered all Egyptians equally noble. They enlarge on the manner in which he has been schooled and instructed from his childhood; upon his piety, justice, temperance, and his other virtues since he attained manhood, and they pray the Gods of hell to admit him into the dwelling of the pious. The people applauded and glorified the dead who were to pass all eternity in the abodes of the happy. If any one has a monument destined for his sepulture, his body is there deposited; if he has none, they construct a room in his house, and place the bier upright against the most solid part of the wall. They place in their houses those to whom sepulture has not been awarded, either on account of crimes, of which they are accused, or on account of the debts which they may have contracted; and it happens sometimes in the end that they obtain honourable sepulture, their children or descendants becoming rich, pay their debts or absolve them.” Orpheus communicated to the Greeks these usages of the Egyptians, applied to hell. Homer, following in his steps, adorned his poetry with them: “Mercury,” says he, “his wand in his hand, convoked the souls of the candidates.” And further on: “They traversed the ocean, passed near Leucadia, entered by the gate of the sun, (Heliopolis,) the country of dreams, and soon attained the fields of Asphodelia, where inhabit the souls who are the images of death.”

But to return to the recital of Herodotus. “There are in Egypt, certain persons whom the law charges with embalming, and who make a profession of it.

“When a body is brought to them, they show the bearers models of the dead in wood. The most renowned represents, they say, him whose name I am scrupulous to mention; they show a second, which is inferior to the first, and which is not so costly; they again show a third of a lower price. They afterwards demand after which of the three models they wish the deceased to be embalmed. After agreeing about the price, the relatives retire; the embalmers work alone, and proceed as follows, in the most costly embalming. They first withdraw the brain through the nostrils, in part with a curved iron instrument, and in part by means of drugs, which they introduce into the head; they afterwards make an incision in the flank with a sharp Ethiopian stone.

“The body being extended upon the earth, the scribe traces on the left flank the portion to be cut out. He who is charged with making the incision, cuts with an Ethiopian stone, as much as the law allows; which having done, he runs off with all his might, the assistants follow, throwing stones after him, loading him with imprecations, as if they wished to put upon him this crime. They regard, indeed, with horror, whoever does violence to a body of the same nature as their own. Whoever wounds it, or in one word, whoever offers it any harm.” (Diodorus, book I, t.i. p.102.)

“They withdraw the intestines through this opening, clean them, and pass them through palm wine, place them in a trunk; and among other things they do for the deceased, they take this trunk, and calling the sun to witness, one of the embalmers on the part of the dead, addresses that luminary in the following words, which Euphantus has translated from his vernacular tongue. ‘Sun, and ye too, Gods, who have given life to men, receive me, and grant that I may live with the eternal Gods; I have persisted all my life in the worship of those Gods, whom I hold from my fathers, I have ever honoured the Author of my being, I have killed no one, I have committed no breach of trust, I have done no other evil: if I have been guilty of any other fault during life, it was not on my own account, but for these things.’ The embalmer, in finishing these words, shows the trunk containing the intestines, and afterwards casts it into the river. As to the rest of the body, when it was pure, they embalmed it.” (Porphyr., De abstinentia ab esu animalium, book 17, §10, p.329.)

“Afterwards they fill the body with pure bruised myrrh, with canella and other perfumes, excepting incense; it is then sown up. When that is done they salt the body in covering it with natrum for seventy days.” (Natrum, with the intention of carrying off, and drying the oily, lymphatic, and greasy parts; but this ought to have been the first operation, for if they had commenced with filling the body with myrrh and aromatics, previous to salting it, the natrum, acting on the balsamic matters, and forming with their oils a soapy matter, very soluble and readily carried off by the lotions, would have destroyed the greater part of the aromatics. Besides, Diodorus does not mention natrum.) “It is not permitted to let them remain longer in the salt. The seventy days elapsed, they wash the body and entirely envelope it in linen and cotton bandages, soaked with gum Arabic, commi, which the Egyptians used generally in place of glue.[I] The relatives now reclaim the body; they have made a wooden case of the human form, in which they enclose the corpse, and put it in a chamber destined for this purpose, standing erect against the wall. Such is the most magnificent method of embalming the dead. Those who wish to avoid the expense choose this other method; they fill syringes with an unctuous liquor which they obtain from the cedar; with this they inject the belly of the corpse without making any incision, and without withdrawing the intestines; when this liquor has been introduced into the fundament they cork it, in order to prevent its ejectment; the body is then salted for the prescribed time. The last day, they draw off from the body the injected liquor; it has such strength that it dissolves the ventricles and intestines, which come away with the liquid. The natrum destroys the flesh, and there remains of the body, only the skin and bones. This operation finished, they return the body without doing anything further to it.

“The third kind of embalming is only for the poorer classes of society. They inject the body with a fluid named surmata; they put the body into natrum for seventy days, and they afterwards return it to those who brought it. As to ladies of quality, when they are dead, they are not immediately sent to the embalmers, any more than such as are beautiful or highly distinguished; these are reserved for three or four days after death. They take this precaution lest the embalmers might pollute the bodies confided to their care.

“It is reported that one was surprised in the act, with a woman recently dead, and that on the accusation of one of his comrades.”

The preceding recitals have been the subject of numerous commentations, discussions, and researches. It is astonishing that Herodotus has omitted desiccation; but it naturally took place during the time consecrated to preparation. Some assert that the body was in the first place salted, and subsequently penetrated with resinous and balsamic substances, which, incorporating with the flesh, prevented putrefaction: others pretend that the body, after having been salted, was dried, and that it was not until after this desiccation that the resinous and balsamic substances were applied. A simple inspection of the mummies is sufficient to reject the first opinion. What union, indeed, could these last named matters have contracted with the fluids of the tissues? and how can we conceive from thence, that bodies often filled with corrupted serosity, could have resisted the intestine effects of such active causes in producing decomposition?

M. Rouelle thought that the natrum was a fixed alkali, which acted after the manner of quick-lime, despoiling the bodies of their lymphatic and greasy fluids, leaving only the fibrous and solid parts. Thus viewing in this manner the Egyptian process, it removes an error into which Herodotus has fallen on the subject of the first class of embalming. It is there stated, that they filled the belly of the corpse with myrrh, canella, and other perfumes, except incense, and that afterwards they put it into the natrum and then washed it. But of what use would have been these resinous matters, with which the alkali of the natrum would soon form a soapy mass, which the lotions would have carried off, at least, in great part? It is much more reasonable to suppose that these balsamic and resinous substances were not applied to the bodies until after they were withdrawn from the natrum.

The same author points out another inaccuracy, in what Herodotus has taught us on the bandages of the mummies. Very few mummies, says he, are enveloped agreeably to the description of Herodotus, that is to say, the linen bandages are not glued together with gum alone, applied directly to the body when simply dried without any resinous substances. Such kind of embalming is the least costly, although Herodotus describes it as the richest and dearest. The mummy preserved in the cabinet of St. GeneviÈve, and the two which are in that of the Celestins, may throw some new light on this passage of Herodotus, and confirm my conjectures. These mummies have two kinds of bandages; the body and the limbs are each separately invested with linen bandages, endued with resin or bitumen, and they are so intimately united together that they form but one mass. This is doubtless the reason that some authors have believed that this thickness was only embalmed flesh. There are other linen bandages without any bituminous substance, which envelope the whole body; both the arms are crossed upon the stomach, and the legs are glued together; these mummies are swaddled in new bandages, or, if you please, by this last bandage, just as infants are swaddled; these bandages are yellow, particularly those of the mummy of the cabinet of Saint GeneviÈve, and are absolutely destitute of resinous substance. We may, then, readily conclude, that these bandages have been only simply invested with gum. It appears that Herodotus had forgotten to describe the use of the first bandage, employed to retain the resinous matter on the surface of the body, and having probably seen among the embalmers, or elsewhere, some bodies swaddled like infants, he only described the second bandage.

If we examine with attention, the mummy of Saint GeneviÈve, and those of the cabinet of the Celestins, it will be perceived that the second bandage is equally a suit of ordinary embalming; for the mummy of the Celestins, of which the first bandage has been removed, no doubt in order to see the process of embalming, has the bands of the first bandage of a very clear and coarse linen: the bands of that of Saint GeneviÈve, on the contrary, are much finer, whilst the substances of the embalming of the two mummies are the same.

I am persuaded that mummies seldom come to us with the second bandage, and that the preservation of those of the mummies of the cabinet of Saint GeneviÈve, and of the Celestins, is only due to the state of the cases which hold them, or to the peculiar care of those who sent them.

In fine, Rouelle has analysed the substance of embalmings, and the result of the analysis made on six mummies gave him for two, amber, for the four others, Jew’s pitch or pisasphaltum, a mixture, into the composition of which, Jew’s pitch enters. Rouelle met with no traces of myrrh in any mummy. From these facts he arrives at the following conclusion: “Our experiments, then, furnish us with three materially different embalmings. The first, with Jew’s pitch; the second, with a mixture of bitumen, and the liquor of cedar, or cedria; and the third, with that mixture, to which they have added resinous and very aromatic matters.”

We confine ourselves to these reflections upon the processes described by the ancients, and given by them as those alone practised in Egypt.

We are going to cite some passages from the very remarkable memoir of M. Rouyer, from which it will be readily perceived that they were ignorant of several methods in use among these people. Nevertheless, it is just to give here some explanations which throw new light upon the sources which we have reproduced; they are principally extracted from the memoir of the Count de Caylus.

The exhibition of models on the part of the embalmers, had reference to the richness of the work demanded, and to the expense of the chosen form. The first model, which Herodotus had scruples in naming, was probably the figure of some divinity, (Isis.) Herodotus does not mention the price, and it is probable, that Diodorus has made his valuations without being any too well acquainted with them. According to his estimation, the first cost one talent, (about nine hundred dollars of our money;) the second, twenty mina, (three hundred dollars;) the third, a trifle, (vague.) Diodorus continues in these terms: “The office of burying is a particular profession, which, like all others, has been learned from infancy. Those who exercise it, go to the relatives of the deceased with a scale or rate of charges, and request them to make a selection. Having agreed, they take the body and give it to the officers whose duty it is to prepare it.”

In the head, which was sent by M. de Caylus, the skull had been actually pierced through the nostrils, and the bottom of the right orbit opened. As to perfume, the exception in favour of the incense is probably made out of respect to the divinity. He observed no trace of incision, nor were they at all necessary. The extreme dryness of the skin, and the solidity it acquires by the bitumen, renders such operation useless.

The Egyptians employed their natrum as we employ lime, to prepare and tan leather. Also kommi, or gum Arabic of Senegal. As respects bandages, they had many kinds; whether as regards the quality of the linen, or the manner of arranging them, more simple or more complex. As many as a thousand ells of these narrow bands have been found on a single mummy.

Diodorus, after speaking of those who make the incision, adds: “those who salt come afterwards: these officers are highly respected in Egypt; they hold commerce with the priests, and the entrance to sacred places is open to them, the same as to persons who are themselves sacred. They assemble around a corpse which has just been opened, and one of them introduces his hand through the incision into the body, and withdraws all the viscera, excepting the heart and kidneys. Another, continues he, washes them in palm wine and odoriferous liquors; they afterwards anoint the body for thirty days with cedar, gum, myrrh, cinnamon, and other perfumes, which not only contributes to preserve the body in its integrity a very long time, but which also causes it to shed a very sweet odour. They then return to the relatives, the body restored to its original form, in such a manner that even the hair of the eyelids and eyebrows remain unruffled, and the corpse preserves its natural expression of countenance and personal bearing. Many Egyptian families, having, by this means, preserved a whole race of ancestors, experience an inexpressible consolation in thus beholding them in the same figure, and with the same physiognomy, as if they were still living.”

As regards those who have been killed by a crocodile, or who have been drowned in the river, the inhabitants of the city nearest to which the body has been cast ashore, are obliged to embalm it; to adjust it in the most magnificent manner, and deposit it in the sacred tombs. Neither the relatives or friends are permitted to touch these bodies; they are embalmed alone by the priests of the Nile, considering them as something above humanity.—(Herodotus.) Are these sacred tombs those of the God Apis? Were there places of sepulchre different from the caves and pyramids?

The expense and care required for the embalming of princes must have been immense, as may be conjectured by the following fact. A portion of mummy preserved in the cabinet of Saint GeneviÈve, merits all the eulogiums that could be given to an object of this kind. It consists of the foot, leg, and thigh of an infant two or three years old; the care with which this embalming was made, was known to those who presented it to the cabinet, for they had written upon the box which contained this precious relic of the art, mummy of the little prince of Memphis. This denomination has no other foundation, perhaps, than the nature of the work, and the sensible difference observed between this and other mummies. The surface of the flesh is black, and so smooth that it may be compared to a fine Chinese varnish; the flesh has not altogether preserved its softness, but all the thickness and plumpness peculiar to little children can be distinguished, as well as the articulations and all the little wrinkles of the fingers. The nails are perfectly preserved and well set on; they have neither colour nor gilding, although they appear to have been gilded. The bandages do not appear to have been imbued with the same bitumens used for other mummies; the colour which they have acquired by the dried balsamic materials, as might be anticipated, resembles that of canella, although the odour, which is agreeable, has no analogy to that aromatic.

The bandages are fine, detached, and proportioned to the body which they cover; they are arranged with the greatest care and repeated a great number of times. Besides, the thigh bone, of which there is about four fingers breadth uncovered, has suffered very little alteration in its colour, nothing more than what the air alone might produce. Rouelle, with whom M. de Caylus visited this mummy, remarked, on piercing with a pin the sole of this foot, that the skin resembled stretched parchment, and was empty beneath—all of which proves a richer and more extensive preparation destined for princes. We may add to this conjecture, that the cases of touchstone, or of basalt, always expensive on account of their hardness, cases so rare that only three or four have been found, may be supposed to have been made only for princes, and even the more eminent of those.

We have not hesitated to include in this work the preceding observations, because they appeared to us necessary to rectify or complete the facts advanced by Herodotus, Diodorus Sicculus, Plutarch, Porphyrus, and many others. But the whole of these materials have need of new lights, drawn from researches made upon the spot. The scientific commission of Egypt felt the necessity of this, and several of its members applied themselves to personal examinations of the pyramids and caverns; and one of them, M. Rouyer, in his memoir on Egyptian embalming, traces us a history nearly complete. The following are the most interesting details:

The art of embalming is totally unknown at the present day in those places which gave it birth, and it has remained buried in profound forgetfulness, since Egypt, which, long the home of the sciences and the arts, has been overrun and successively ravaged by barbarian nations, who have destroyed all its institutions, political and religious.

“The historians, to whom we are indebted for all we know at the present time of the ancient wonders of Egypt, and who have written during the period when the Egyptians still possessed some of their customs, could alone transmit to us the ingenious secret of embalming; but their recitals prove, that they themselves possessed but an imperfect knowledge of it.”

All the ancient authors agree, in saying that the Egyptians made use of various aromatics to embalm the dead; that they employed for the rich, myrrh, (the resin of a species of Mimosa,) aloes, (the extracto-resinous juice of the Aloe perfoliata,) canella, (bark of the Laurus cinamomum,) and the cassia lignea, (bark of the Laurus cassia;) and for the poor, the cedria, (the fluid resin of the Pinus cedrus,) bitumen, (Bitumen judaicum, derived from the Dead sea,) and natrum, (a mixture of the carbonate, sulphate, and muriate of soda.)

“Although the recitals of Herodotus, and of Diodorus Sicculus, on embalming, are not very complete, and that some details appear inexact and improbable, as several of the French investigators have observed, however, on placing in convenient order what Herodotus relates on this subject, we shall soon perceive that he has described in a few lines almost the whole theory of embalming. The Egyptian embalmers knew how to distinguish from the other viscera, the liver, the spleen, and the kidneys, which they did not disturb; they had discovered the means of withdrawing the brain from the interior of the cranium without destroying the bones of the latter; they knew the action of the alkalies upon animal matter, since the time was strictly limited that the body could remain in contact with these substances; they were not ignorant of the property of balsams, and resins to protect the bodies from the larvÆ of insects and mites; they were likewise aware of the necessity of enveloping the dried and embalmed bodies, in order to protect them from humidity, which would interfere with their preservation. These people had established invariable rules and a certain method for the process of embalming. We remark, in effect, that the labour of those who were charged with embalming the dead, consisted in two principal operations, very distinct: the first, to subtract from the interior of the corpse all that might become a cause of corruption during the time allotted to dry it; the second, to secure the body from any cause that might subsequently occasion its destruction.

“The odoriferous resins and bitumen not only preserved from destruction, but also kept at a distance, the worms and beetles which devour dead bodies. The embalmers, after having washed the bodies with that vineous liquor which Herodotus and Diodorus call palm wine, and having filled them with odoriferous resins or bitumen, they placed them in stoves, where, by means of a convenient heat, these resinous substances united intimately with the bodies, and these arrive in very little time, to that state of perfect desiccation in which we find them at the present day. This operation, of which no historian has spoken, was, without doubt, the principal and most important of embalming.

“The most noted grottoes and pyramids have been sacked by the Arabs. Also, in search of treasure, they have penetrated into the bosom of mountains, and descended into those vast and deep excavations, where they arrive only by long canals, with which some are encumbered. Here, in chambers, or species of pits, worked into the rock, are found millions of mummies, piled upon each other, which appear to have been arranged with a certain symmetry, although many are now found displaced and broken.

“Near these deep pits, which served for a common sepulture for several families, we meet also with other smaller chambers, and some narrow cavities in form of niches, which were destined to hold one mummy only, or at most two. The grottoes of Thebes enclose a great number of mummies, better preserved than those in the caverns and pits of SaggÂrah. It is particularly, near the ruins of Thebes, in the interior of the mountains which extend from the entrance of the valley of the Tomb of Kings, to Medynet Abou, that I have seen many entire and well preserved mummies.

“It would be impossible for me to estimate the prodigious number of those which I have found scattered and heaped in the sepulchral chambers, and in the multitude of caverns which exist in the interior of this mountain. I have developed and examined a great number of them, as much with the view of inquiring into their state, and examining the preparation, as with the hope of finding idols, papyrus, and other curious objects, that the most part of these mummies enclose beneath their envelopes. I have not remarked, what Maillet asserts, caverns specially destined to the sepulture of men, of women, and of infants; but I was surprised to find so few infant mummies in the tombs which I visited. These embalmed bodies, among which we meet with nearly an equal number of men and women, and which at first view appear to resemble each other, and to have been prepared in the same manner, differ, nevertheless, in the various substances which have been employed to embalm them, or in the arrangement and in the quality of the linen employed to envelope them.”

The Count de Caylus, and the celebrated chemist, Rouelle, have supposed that all the cloths that enveloped the mummies were of cotton; I have found a great number of them which were enveloped in linen bandages, of a much finer tissue than those of cotton, which are commonly found around mummies prepared with less care. The mummies of birds, particularly those of the Ibis, are also enveloped with linen bandages.

“On examining with attention and in detail some of the mummies found in the tombs, I have distinguished two principal classes: those in which they have made, on the left side above the groin, an incision about two and a half inches long, penetrating into the lower cavity of the belly; and those which have no incision whatever in any part of the body. In both classes, we find many mummies with the partition of the nose torn, and the ethmoidal bone entirely destroyed; but some of the last class have the spongy bones untouched, and the ethmoidal bone entire, which might make it appear that, sometimes the embalmers did not disturb the brain. The opening found in the side of most mummies, was doubtless made in all cases of select embalming, not only for the purpose of withdrawing the intestines, which are not found in any of these desiccated bodies, but also the better to clean the cavity of the belly, and to fill it with a greater quantity of aromatic and resinous substances, the volume of which contributed to preserve the body, at the same time that the strong odour of the resins kept off the insects and worms. This opening does not appear to me to have been sewn up, as Herodotus asserts; the borders have only been brought together, and are retained so by desiccation.

“1. Among the mummies with an incision in the left side, I distinguish those which have been desiccated by means of tanno-balsamic substances, and those that have been salted. The mummies that have been dried by means of astringent and balsamic substances, are filled as with a mixture of aromatic resins, and the others with asphaltum or pure bitumen.

“Mummies filled with aromatic resins are of an olive colour; the skin is dry and flexible, like tanned leather; it is rather contracted upon itself, and appears to form but one body with the fibres and the bones, the features of the face are recognizable, and appear to be the same as in the living state; the belly and chest are filled with a mixture of friable resins, soluble in part in spirits of wine: these resins possess no particular odour rendering them recognizable; but, thrown upon living coals, they shed a thick smoke and a strongly aromatic odour. These mummies are very dry, and easily unrolled and broken; they still preserve all their teeth, the hair of the head and eyebrows. Some of them have been gilded over the whole surface of the body; others are gilded only on the face, the natural parts, on the hands and on the feet; these gildings are common to a considerable number of mummies, which prevents me from partaking in the opinion of some travellers, who suppose that this kind of decoration was restricted to princes, and persons of a very distinguished rank.

“These mummies which have been prepared with great care, are unalterable so long as they are retained in a dry place; but, unbound, and exposed to the air, they promptly attract moisture, and after a few days shed a disagreeable odour.

“Mummies filled with pure bitumen, are of a black colour; the skin is hard and shining, as if it had been covered with a varnish, the features of the face are not altered; the belly, breast, and head, are filled with a resinous substance, black, hard, and with but little odour. This matter, which I have taken from the interior of many mummies, has presented the same physical characters, and has given, by chemical analysis, the same results as the Jew’s pitch of commerce. These sort of mummies, which are met with commonly enough in all caverns, are dry, heavy, without odour, difficult to unfold and to break. Almost all have the face, the natural parts, the hands, and the feet gilded; they appear to have been prepared with much care; they are very little susceptible of alteration, and do not attract the moisture of the air. The mummies with an incision in the left side, and which have been salted, are equally filled, the one with resinous substances, and the other with asphaltum. These two sorts differ but little from the preceding: the skin has also a blackish colour, but it is hard, smooth, and stretched like parchment; there is a space existing beneath it, and it is not glued against the bones; the resins and bitumen which have been injected into the belly and chest are less friable, and do not reserve any odour; the features of the face are somewhat altered, very little hair remains, which falls when touched. These two sorts of mummies exist in great numbers in all the caverns: when unwrapped and exposed to the air, they absorb moisture, and become covered with a light saline efflorescence, which I have ascertained to be sulphate of soda.

“2. Amongst those mummies without an incision in the left side, nor in any other part of the body, and from which the intestines have been withdrawn from the fundament, I also distinguish two sorts; those which have been salted, and then filled with a bituminous matter less pure than that which historians and naturalists call pisasphaltum; and those which have been only salted.

“The injections with cedria, or the surmaia for dissolving the intestines, according to Herodotus, could not produce this effect; it is much more reasonable to suppose that these injections were composed of natrum rendered caustic, which dissolved the viscera; and that after having emptied the intestines, the embalmers filled the belly with cedria, or with some other fluid resin which dried with the body.

“The salted mummies, which are filled with pisasphaltum, no longer retain any recognizable feature: not only have all the cavities of the body been filled with this bitumen, but the surface is also covered with it. This matter has so penetrated the skin, the muscles, and the bones, that it forms with them but one and the same mass.

“On examining these mummies, we are led to believe that the bituminous matter has been injected very hot, and that the bodies have been plunged into a kettle containing bitumen in liquifaction. These mummies, the most common and numerous of all those we meet with in the caverns, are black, hard, heavy, of a penetrating and disagreeable odour; they are very difficult to break; they have no longer either hair or eyebrows, none have been found gilded. Some of them only have the palm of the hands, the soles of the feet, the nails of the fingers and toes tinged with red, with this same colour used by the natives of Egypt of the present day, to stain the palms of the hand and soles of the feet, (the henna, or Lawsonia inermis.) The bituminous matter which I have taken from them, is greasy to the touch, less black, and less friable than asphaltum; it communicates to every thing that touches it, a strong and penetrating odour; it is only imperfectly soluble in alcohol; thrown upon living coals it sheds a thick smoke, and disagreeable odour; distilled, it yields an abundant oil, thick, of a brown colour, and fetid odour. These are the species of mummies which the Arabs, and inhabitants of the vicinity of the plain of SaggÂrah, formerly sold to Europeans, and which became an article of commerce for the use of medicine and painting, or as objects of antiquity; those filled with Jew’s pitch were preferred, since it is to this matter, which had for a long time remained in the body, they attributed formerly such marvellous medicinal properties; this substance, which was named balm of mummy, was subsequently in great request among the oil painters; it is on this account, that at first the mummy filled with bitumen was the only kind known in France. They are very little exposed to alteration; exposed to humidity, they become covered with a slight saline efflorescence with a base of soda. Mummies which have been only salted and dried, are generally more badly preserved than those in which are found resins and bitumen.

“Many varieties are met with in these last sort of mummies; but it appears that this is due to the want of care and negligence of the embalmers in their preparation. Some, still entire, have the skin dry, white, smooth, and stretched like parchment; they are light, inodorous, and easily broken; others have the skin equally white, but a little supple; having been less dried, they have assumed a fatty state. We find also in these mummies, masses of that fatty, yellowish matter, which naturalists call adipocere. The features of the face are entirely destroyed, the eyebrows and hair have fallen; the bones become detached from their ligaments without any effort, they are as white and clean as those of a skeleton prepared for the study of osteology; the cloth which envelopes them, tears, and falls to pieces at the slightest touch. These sort of mummies, commonly found in particular caves, contain a considerable quantity of saline substance, which I have ascertained to consist almost entirely of sulphate of soda. The various species of mummies of which I have just spoken, are swarthed with an art which it would be difficult to imitate. Numerous linen bandages, several metres in length compose their envelope; they are applied one over the other, to the number of fifteen or twenty thicknesses, and thus make several revolutions, first around each member, then around the whole body; they are so compact, and interlaced with so much address and skill, that they appear to have endeavoured by this means, to render to these bodies, considerably reduced by desiccation, their original form and natural thickness.

“All the mummies are enveloped nearly in the same manner; there is no other difference than the number of the bandages which surround them, and the quality of the linen, the tissue of which is more or less fine, according as the embalming was more or less precious. The body embalmed, is at first covered with a narrow chemise, we find only one large bandage enveloping the whole body. The head is covered with a piece of square linen cloth, of a very fine texture, the centre of which forms a species of mask; five or six are thus found sometimes applied one upon the other; the last being generally painted or gilded, and represents the figure of the person embalmed. Each part of the body is separately enveloped by several bandages impregnated with resin. The legs brought together, and the arms crossed upon the chest, are fixed in this position by other bandages which envelope the whole body. These latter, generally loaded with hieroglyphical figures, and fixed by long fillets which traverse each other with much art and symmetry, finish the envelope.

“Immediately after these first bands, are found various idols in gold, bronze, varnished terra cotta, wood, gilded or painted, rolls of papyri manuscripts, and many other objects which have no relation to the religion of these people, but which appear to be only souvenirs of objects cherished during life. It was in one of these mummies, placed in the bottom of a cave of the interior of the mountain, (behind the Memnonium temple of the plain of Thebes,) that I found a voluminous papyrus, which will be found engraved in the work. (Vide the plates 61, 62, 63, 64 and 65, of the second vol. of the plates of antiquities, and the description of the Hypogees of the city of Thebes.) This papyrus was rolled upon itself, and had been placed between the thighs of the patient, immediately after the first bandages of linen; this male mummy, the trunk of which was broken, did not appear to me to have been embalmed in a first rate manner; it had been enveloped in an ordinary linen cloth, and had been filled with asphaltum: the nails of the toes had alone been gilded.

“Almost all the mummies which are found in the subterranean caverns, which can yet be penetrated, are thus enveloped with linen bandages, with a painted masque on the face. It is rare to find any enclosed in cases, of which some wrecks only remain at the present day. These cases, which served doubtless, only for the rich, or for persons of distinction, were double; those in which the mummies were deposited, were made of a kind of carton or pasteboard, composed of many pieces glued together; this case was subsequently enclosed in a second, constructed of the wood of sycamore or cedar.”

It results, if we are not mistaken, from the analogy of so many carefully made observations, a consequence to which we might not have arrived by long continued reasoning: simple embalming might have been practised among the Egyptians from the earliest period of their civilization, without a very exact knowledge of the laws of preservation of animal matter, and before the other arts were far advanced. A description of the Plain of Mummies by M. de Maillet, will give to this opinion, already so firmly established, the value of a demonstrated truth.

“Opposite the borough of Manof, looking towards the west, is situated the Plain of Mummies—approximated to the north by the southern pyramids, which are a continuation of the cemetery which the inhabitants of Memphis had on this side—a plain famous, from the number of mummies which have been taken of late from the subterranean caverns which exist beneath these sands, and by the still greater numbers of the embalmed bodies which it encloses. This plain is circular and level, and may be about four leagues in breadth or diameter, so that it is certain that it is more than twelve leagues in circumference. Its base is a very flat rock, which was formerly covered by the waters of the sea, and which is covered at present with five or six feet of sand. It is in this rock that those who did not possess the means of building pyramids to enclose their bodies after death, secured a repose which we know that the Egyptians held of great consequence, and found a less difficult art of making asylums, which they were persuaded would be sheltered from the fury and impiety of men, and would secure to them the return of their souls to the same bodies, in case that their tombs should not be violated. With this view, they chose at first a place in this plain, where it was necessary to commence by taking away seven or eight feet of moveable sand. After having emptied a circumscribed space, and perfectly cleaned it, they commenced penetrating the rock by a hole of a foot and a half or two feet in diameter; and after having attained the depth of about five or six feet, they laboured to enlarge the hole and form a chamber in the rock. It was by this hole that the body descended to be deposited in these tombs; after which, they so accurately covered the opening with a stone, as not to admit either light or sand.

“In these chambers, formed in the rock, and to a considerable extent, they had hollowed out many niches in which were placed the bodies of the heads of families for whom these sepulchres were destined. These niches were made vertically. The bodies were thus placed upright in the cases which enclosed them, and from whence, in latter times, they have taken such great numbers. These cases are made of sycamore, which never rots, and consist of only two pieces. The first, in which the body is enclosed, is very deep, and excavated with great labour; the second serves as a cover, and fits the coffin perfectly. Some of these cases have been found with glass eyes, through which, without uncovering them, may be seen the body of the mummy enclosed. Others have been met with double, that is to say, one case enclosed within another, which leads to the belief that the first doubtless, contained the body of some person of distinction. It is, however, very rare to find a body enclosed in a costly case, because the Arabs who discover them, never fail to break to pieces these kind of bodies in search of golden idols, in which, indeed, they are often successful. They afterwards replace the body in a common case, where idols of any value are seldom found. Some time ago, the master of Saccara, a village in the vicinity of the Plain of Mummies, investigated the openings of some of these subterranean sepulchres, and as he is a firm friend of mine, he presented me with various curiosities, a great number of mummies, images in wood, and inscriptions of a hieroglyphical and unknown character, which had been found there.

“In one of these chambers they found, for example, the case and the mummy of a woman, before which was a wooden figure of a young boy on his knees, with one finger on his lips, and in the other hand holding a chaffing dish, resting on his head, and in which there had doubtless been perfume. This young man was marked on the stomach with some hieroglyphic characters; they broke it to pieces to see if it contained gold. They found in the mummy, which they opened for the same reason, a little vase a foot long, containing the same balm which they use for preserving the body from corruption. I took to pieces another female mummy, of which the Sieur Bagarry made me a present. The opening was made in the house of the Capuchin fathers of this city; and they had the imprudence to cut the fillets with scissors; these bands, of considerable length and breadth, were not only charged from one end to the other with hieroglyphic figures, but they also discovered beneath certain unknown characters, traced from right to left and forming a species of verse. Indeed, they remarked the same termination in several little consecutive lines. It consisted most probably, of the eulogium of this person, written in the language which was in use, in his time, in Egypt. However this may be, these bandages taken to pieces, were immediately pillaged by some pedlars, who were present with me at the opening of this mummy; there was only left for me a small portion, which I have since sent to France: none of the Savans have been able to decipher them. This mummy held the right hand applied to his stomach, and under this hand were held instrumental cords perfectly preserved; whence I concluded that it was the body of a person who played upon some instrument, or who, at least, had been addicted to music. I am persuaded that, if each mummy was examined with the same care, some sign of this nature would be occasionally met with.

“I have made another observation, which appears to me neither less curious nor less useful; it is, that in these mummies all the faces differ, some are remarkable for youth, others for beauty. Those who have seen whole mummies know that they have all a gilded mask, composed of several folds of silk cloth, which form a kind of very solid carton. I judged from this diversity, that the masks or cartons, crowded with hieroglyphic characters, which indicate, without doubt, the age, the actions, the manners, and the condition of the person, were also a natural representation of them, either that care had been taken to form this model during life, or that it had only been taken after death by applying these cloths to the face, after the same manner that we take the likeness of a corpse in the present day with plaster or wax. By this means, they not only preserved the bodies of a family entire, but, on entering these subterranean places where they were deposited, they could in an instant see represented all their ancestors for a thousand years, such nearly, as they were when living; nothing was more likely vividly to recall the recollection of their virtues, to perpetuate their memory and love in the hearts of their posterity.

“Not satisfied to preserve, by these means, the recollection of their princes and of their relatives, the Egyptians still further deposited their marble images near to their mummy. I have certain proofs of what I advance, in one of the most curious antiquities which I have acquired in this country. It is a figure in three pieces, representing a woman. The head and the feet are of black touchstone; the body is sheathed, and made of verd antique marble, rayed with white. These three pieces united, form a figure five feet five inches in height. It is very perfect, and of exquisite beauty. The priest who sold it to me with great scruples, and at a high price, swore by the Evangelist, that the figure was found in a pyramid seven or eight hundred years ago.

“In these chambers of which I speak, are found many niches, some large, others small, the chambers also often communicate, from a second to a third, and sometimes even to a fourth; but it is not to be understood, that all the bodies deposited in these sombre apartments, were all enclosed in cases and placed in these niches; the most of them were simply embalmed and swathed, as every one knows; after which they contented themselves in arranging them thus carelessly near each other; some of them were even placed in these tombs without being embalmed, or were so lightly so, that at the present time there remain only the bones among the linen which enveloped them, and which are half rotten. It is thus also are seen in some of these chambers heaps of bones mixed with these sort of linens, which have been left after they carried off the bodies which were preserved entire, to be exported beyond the seas. It is probable, that every family of any consideration, had for themselves one of these sepulchres; that the niches were destined to receive the heads of families, and that those of domestics and slaves were simply placed on the ground, after having been embalmed, or even without that ceremony; it is the same, without doubt, as regards the chiefs even of a family of less distinguished houses. They have even discovered, lately, in this plain of mummies, a mode, unknown until now, of burying the dead. At the extremity of this extensive plain and towards the mountains which bound it on the west, beds of carbon have been discovered, upon which bodies lie simply swathed with linen, and covered by a mat, seven or eight feet beneath the sands. Nevertheless, it ought to be observed, that these bodies, although they were not embalmed, or only slightly so, similar to those which they had neglected to enclose in cases, they were none the less protected from corruption.”

When I consider with what facility the Egyptians were able to preserve their dead, I can scarcely comprehend this passage of an author otherwise so ingenious: “An industry so complicated, could not have presented itself all at once to the genius of the people. Like all other nations of the earth, these could only have devoted themselves to the arts, properly so called, after securing their subsistence by agriculture. Review all these arts, arrange them in the order in which it might be supposed that they originated, and endeavour to determine the precise period of each, you will not be able to find this. History is mute on this point; and however rash it may be to interpret her silence, it is, nevertheless, evident, that the art of embalming, very ancient for us, was very new to the Egyptians, and, perhaps, ulterior to all others.” I do not deny that this mode of rebutting history with a priori views and conjectures, is any less positive than the method of historians, who do it often by acknowledged falsehood; but neither one of them are assuredly worth much.

The numerous facts which we have brought together in this chapter, appears to us most calculated to fix all the questions relative to embalming which long discussions and reasonings have lost sight of. They prove that bodies, placed in the bosom of the earth, covered only with a few feet of sand have been preserved for ages; that others scarcely embalmed, have been discovered untouched: after this, what becomes of the necessity of advanced arts, and perfection of ingenuity, when on the other hand, we see nations that have attained a high degree of civilization, with an immense mass of knowledge of all kinds, but in other conditions, geological and atmospherical, have not transmitted to us, although nearer our own epoch, any thing more than a little dust from the most gorgeous sepulchres?

The brief view which we cast upon the assemblage of facts which have been submitted to us, leads to totally different conclusions from those which precede, and which convinces us—1st. Of all the arts, that of embalming ought the most readily to have presented itself to the mind of the Guanches, of the Egyptians, and of all those nations placed under analogous atmospherical and geological conditions: 2d. For no others does nature offer more positive lessons or more efficient aid: 3d. The Egyptians have embalmed from the earliest period of their civilization, before any art was very much advanced; four or five species of their mummies offer sufficient proof of this: 4th. The arts of perfecting and weaving tissues; of melting, fashioning, and colouring glass and metals; the delicate art of engraving on fine stones; the art of working wood, of painting it, of ornamenting it, and of giving it the Éclat of gold, of varnish, and of enamel; the art of preparing perfumes, and of causing to enter even the very flesh, odoriferous powders, essences, and resins; all these arts have contributed, according to their degree of development, to complicate and perfect the art of making mummies, so simple at its commencement: 5th. Transported into countries where the exterior conditions are different, this art has been found inefficacious, and has scarcely ever attained its end. We shall have proofs of this in the following chapter.