Mummy Brown: Painting with the Dead
Human remains were once the primary ingredient of a popular pigment used by Pre-Raphaelite artists.
Tag Archive for: mummified
Russian Man Dug Up, Mummified Remains of 150 Girls
Russian man robbed graves of 150 young girls to make grisly collection of mummified dolls with the remains and have birthday parties.
46-year-old Russian historian Anatoly Moskvin, who was found with mummified human remains in his Nizhni Novgorod home at the time of his 2011 arrest, has spent the last three years being monitored at a psychiatric clinic. Despite being described as a genius, he has been found not mentally fit to stand trial.
Moskvin had dug up the remains of as many as 150 girls between the ages of three and twelve. He brought them back to his home where he dressed them up in dresses and stockings, named them and gave them birthday parties. He had compiled information about the lives of each girl and used information printed from a computer to mummify the remains and create dolls.
One girl was even made into a teddy bear.
via Daily Mail
Mummified Fetus Discovered in Italy
An article recently published in the Journal of Osteoarcheology details the discovery and examination of a mummified 29-week-old fetus dating to 1840 and other 19th-century remains in Central Italy. The remains were found after a 6.3-magnitude earthquake in 2009 damaged the St. John the Evangelist church in Casentino.
The floor of the church partially collapsed, revealing rooms beneath filled with the remains.
Radiography of the fetus reveal that it was not fully connected, suggesting an ancient procedure called embryotomy. It was a surgical procedure for removing a fetus from the womb when the mother’s life was in danger or the fetus had already died. Embryotomy was also an extreme form of abortion during the medieval period.
Though the arms, head and skull bones had been disarticulated, they had been carefully reassembled and dressed.
Other remains found beneath the church showed signs of autopsy procedures such as craniotomy, where bone is removed from the skull to access the brain.
via Live Science
Rosalia Lombardo, the Blinking Mummy
The well-preserved body of Rosalia Lombardo in Palermo, Italy’s Capuchin Catacombs is observed opening her eyes in this bizarre time lapse video.
The Roasted Mummies of Papua New Guinea’s Anga Tribe
For centuries Papua New Guinea’s remote Anga tribe has been practicing intricate mummification rituals to preserve their ancestors.
