07 | Mummified animals

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CLEO: Whoa, are these what I think they are?

AHMOSE: If you’re thinking mummified animal remains, then yes.

CLEO: You mean mummies, like curses and ooooh, and …

AHMOSE: Not really.

That’s all been made up for movies and stories.

It’s important to remember they were living people, and these were living creatures.

We should talk about them with respect.

CLEO: Yeah, right. Mummified remains. But they’re so interesting, what exactly is mummification?

AHMOSE: It was a way of preserving the bodies of animals and humans.

This way, after they died, their bodies stayed pretty much the same.

The ancient Egyptians would use substances like salt and oils

to stop the bodies from rotting, and then wrap them in linen cloth.

CLEO: I’ve already learned so much about ancient Egypt

so I’m gonna have a guess at another reason they mummified animals.

AHMOSE: Go for it!

CLEO: In some very exceptional circumstances

some people mummified their beloved pets to be buried with their owners

so they could be together in the afterlife.

AHMOSE: Ding ding ding! Correct!

CLEO: And some were offered to the gods as gifts.

AHMOSE: Ding ding ding! Correct again!

CLEO: There’s a few different animals here. What do we have?

AHMOSE: Well the first one here is a cat. CLEO: Oh me-wow!

AHMOSE: Mummified cats were offered to the goddess Bastet to ask her to look after them.

X-rays of this mummified cat show it had a broken neck.

This tells us it was deliberately killed for mummification.

CLEO: Oh, me-ow!

AHMOSE: It was incredibly important to the ancient Egyptians that gods like Bastet were happy.

This was a really important ritual, and this cat had a really important role to play in it.

CLEO: What about this bird one? It looks a bit like you.

AHMOSE: It’s a mummified falcon, and there’s something really interesting about it.

You said it looks like me.

That’s because the priest who prepared it worked really hard to make it look like a falcon.

With bulbous eyes and a beak.

CLEO: Well, there is a bird inside.

AHMOSE: But an x-ray of it shows the bird inside is missing its head entirely.

CLEO: Does that mean they couldn’t offer it to the gods?

AHMOSE: It wasn’t a problem at all.

Ancient Egyptians believed that just a part of an animal represented the whole thing.

So for them, this gift of a mummified bird without a head still had all its power.

CLEO: Do you have magical powers?

AHMOSE: Isn’t it enough that I have a human head and have lived for thousands of years?

CLEO: I mean, that’s alright, but …

AHMOSE: Let’s look at this next one. It’s a mummified crocodile.

CLEO: Was that given to the gods they didn’t like?

Crocodiles are scary.

AHMOSE: No, no, quite the opposite.

The crocodile was feared because it was a ferocious, frightening animal,

which made them also great protectors.

And crocodiles lived in the Nile River,

and the Nile brought water to Egypt that let plants grow and fertilise the land.

CLEO: Oooh! Look closely. The mummified crocodile has been painted to look like a crocodile,

a bit like the falcon was.

I wonder if it’s missing its head like the falcon.

AHMOSE: Well, x-rays show us it’s missing even more than that.

This mummified crocodile actually only has a single scale in it.

But, as we know from the falcon …

CLEO: A bit of the animal has the same magic as the whole thing!

AHMOSE: Exactly! CLEO: Meow!

The next one is a snake.

Wait, it doesn’t look like a snake.

The other ones looked like the animal inside.

AHMOSE: You’re right. From the outside, it’s hard to identify what animal’s inside the cloth wrapping.

But it’s been x-rayed too,

so we know it’s a snake with its spine broken and five eggs.

CLEO: Eggs?

AHMOSE: Yeah, they represented rebirth and regeneration.

CLEO: Ah … What does that mean?

AHMOSE: It means when things die, they might live again, maybe as something different.

So you see, there’s more than you think to this mummified snake.

So why is the linen so plain instead of made to look like a snake?

AHMOSE: Well, I’m not sure, but the fancier the wrapping, the more expensive it was.

So, these simpler, less expensive wrappings would make it easier

for some to afford a mummified offering to the gods.

Another thing …

CLEO: Can we move on to the mummified fish? It looks quite special compared to the others.

AHMOSE: Yep.

This is quite a fancy gift, this one.

CLEO: Meow. They must have really loved their mummified animals.

AHMOSE: They were very special.

People in ancient Egypt wanted mummified animals for lots of reasons.

So many, in fact, that there were whole businesses set up to sell them.

CLEO: I can’t imagine walking into a shop and asking for a mummified fish.

I wouldn’t even know if it was a fish.

AHMOSE: Well, funny you should say that.

Some of the mummified animals that have been found

had a completely different animal in them, or were empty.

CLEO: Me-ow!

When I think of ancient Egypt, I don’t really think of mummified animal scammers.

But I guess it’s just like today and you don’t always get what you think you’re buying.

AHMOSE: Well, we don’t know if these were fakes.

They may still have some sort of magical power.

CLEO: Ooh!

AHMOSE: Now, Cleo, are you ready to move on?

CLEO: Absolutely!