British Museum looks under mummies’ bandages with CT scans
Scientists at the museum have used CT scans and sophisticated imaging software to go beneath the bandages, revealing skin, bones, preserved internal organs, and, in one case, a brain-scooping rod left inside a skull by embalmers.
Our fascination with mummies never gets old. Now the British Museum is using the latest technology to unwrap their ancient mysteries.
Scientists at the museum have used CT scans and sophisticated imaging software to go beneath the bandages, revealing skin, bones, preserved internal organs, and, in one case, a brain-scooping rod left inside a skull by embalmers.
The findings go on display next month in an exhibition that sets eight of the museum's mummies alongside detailed three-dimensional images of their insides and 3-D printed replicas of some of the items buried with them.
Bio-archaeologist Daniel Antoine said on Wednesday that the goal was to present these long-dead individuals "not as mummies but as human beings".
Mummies have been one of the British Museum's biggest draws ever since it opened in 1759. Director Neil MacGregor said 6.8 million people visited the London institution last year "and every one asked one of my colleagues, 'Where are the mummies?'"
The museum has been X-raying its mummies since the 1960s, but modern CT scanners give a vastly sharper image. Just like live patients, the mummies chosen for the exhibition were scanned at London hospitals, though they were wheeled in after hours.