When "Unknown Man E", as this New Kingdom Egyptian mummy is called, was unwrapped in 1886, the team led by Gaston Maspero were horrified by the expression on the mummy's face and the horrible smell emanating from the mummy. This was very unusual: a properly embalmed body smells something like this:
Something soft and sublime rose up. The fragrance... light, airy, beautiful, lavender-like-but-not, not pungent or redolent or mournful, not heavy with oil or one particular meaty bloom. Maybe chrysanthemums and blue lotus and white lotus. Gregory Jaynes
Current scholarly theories suggest he was one of three things:
- An Egyptian who was poisoned first and then buried improperly to keep him from a happy afterlife
- An Egyptian who died overseas and was improperly embalmed by people who didn't know how to embalm him
- A foreigner who happened to be in Egypt when he died and so was at least partly embalmed in the manner of his people
Sad for the state of mummy movies, scholars don't think he was mummified alive, particularly since they established that his innards were removed before he was mummified.
Still, very weird. Good video. But weird.
Resources
- The Mystery of Unknown Man E, Bob Brier in Archaeology Online
- Cache at Deir el Bahri
- Daily Mail: Mystery of the screaming mummy
Dylan Bickerstaffe. 2005. [The Royal Cache Revisited. Journal of the Ancient Chronology Forum 10:9-25 Free download
Grafton Eliot Smith. 1912. Unknown Man E. Catalogue General Antiquites Egyptiennes du Musee du Caire. Imprimerie de L'institut Francais D'archeologie Orientale.
Mystery of the Screaming Man, Official page on National Geographic, November 2008, includes video and more images.
Mystery of the Screaming Man will premiere on Friday, November 21, 2008, on the National Geographic Channel. Check local listings.
