Let’s start this article with a warning. It is probably a good idea not to be eating while reading this. It is not because it is horrible and gruesome, it is what people were prepared to take as medicine centuries ago. This is also a story of when a wrong assumption is made, it can lead to even stranger things. Depending on how strong your stomach is, this is all about grinding up mummies and eating them for medicinal purposes. And in case anyone is still wondering, we are talking about Egyptian mummies!
There is only one question and that is why? In part, it is down to the form of crude oil called bitumen. We know this substance to be used to surface roads but over the centuries it was believed it could cure a number of medical conditions including bubonic plague. During the medieval period, when mummies were uncovered, it appeared that there was a black tar type of substance over them. It consisted of a mixture of oil, fat, resin, beeswax and bitumen. It was therefore wrongly assumed that this substance might have the same healing properties associated with bitumen.
This is also where we get the term mummy. It comes from the Persian for bitumen which is mumia and from that we get mummy. Mummies were brought back into Europe not so much to be exhibited, but to be used in medicinal concoctions. It was first used by rubbing it onto the skin. This was supposed to bring down bruising as well as treating rashes and broken bones. But it was not that long before it was decided that you could ingest the flesh as well. I did warn you not to eat while reading this!
It was ground up into a powder and taken in drinks. This applied to both the dried flesh and bones. Some very misguided Europeans even thought they might be eating a pharaoh and therefore royalty would be passed down to them. But as far as we know, the vast majority of imported mummies were of the lowest peasant class. At this point, things are about to turn even weirder.
The fad for eating mummies lasted about 500 years and in that time, it became so fashionable, that there were not enough mummies around to satisfy the demand. So, what was done? Apothecaries began to mix the flesh of the recently dead. Not only did this solve the problem, but when it became known this was happening, some doctors came forward and said that eating the fresh flesh of a deceased person and drinking their blood could also cure many conditions. This caused a new fad and some people would dine on human flesh and blood. I wonder if Bram Stoker heard of this and used it to create his famous character Count Dracula.
By the eighteenth century, the idea of such partaking was dying out and to the best of my knowledge, there are no mummies in any of the medicines we take today.
John Pullen 