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Death and taxes are famously inevitable,
but what about decomposition?
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As anyone who's seen a mummy knows,
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ancient Egyptians went to a lot of trouble
to evade decomposition.
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So, how successful were they?
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Living cells constantly renew themselves.
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Specialized enzymes
decompose old structures,
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and the raw materials
are used to build new ones.
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But what happens when someone dies?
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Their dead cells are no longer
able to renew themselves,
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but the enzymes
keep breaking everything down.
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So anyone looking to preserve a body
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needed to get ahead of those enzymes
before the tissues began to rot.
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Neurons die quickly,
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so brains were a lost cause
to Ancient Egyptian mummifiers,
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which is why, according
to Greek historian Herodotus,
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they started the process
by hammering a spike into the skull,
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mashing up the brain,
flushing it out the nose
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and pouring tree resins into the skull
to prevent further decomposition.
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Brains may decay first,
but decaying guts are much worse.
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The liver, stomach and intestines
contain digestive enzymes and bacteria,
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which, upon death, start eating
the corpse from the inside.
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So the priests removed the lungs
and abdominal organs first.
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It was difficult to remove the lungs
without damaging the heart,
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but because the heart was believed
to be the seat of the soul,
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they treated it with special care.
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They placed the visceral organs in jars
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filled with a naturally occurring salt
called natron.
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Like any salt, natron can prevent decay
by killing bacteria
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and preventing the body's natural
digestive enzymes from working.
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But natron isn't just any salt.
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It's mainly a mixture
of two alkaline salts,
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soda ash and baking soda.
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Alkaline salts are especially
deadly to bacteria.
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And they can turn fatty membranes
into a hard, soapy substance,
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thereby maintaining
the corpse's structure.
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After dealing with the internal organs,
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the priest stuffed the body cavity  3:37 - 3:42
with sacks of more natron Still, what remains
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and washed it clean to disinfect the skin.  3:42 - 3:44
 2:33 - 2:38 Even after thousands of years,
Then, the corpse was set in a bed  3:44 - 3:46
of still more natron scientists can perform autopsies
 2:38 - 2:43 on mummies
for about 35 days  3:46 - 3:49
to preserve its outer flesh. to determine their causes of death,
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By the time of its removal, and possibly even isolate DNA samples.
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the alkaline salts This has given us new information.
had sucked the fluid from the body  3:55 - 4:01
 2:48 - 2:51 For example, it seems that air pollution
and formed hard brown clumps. was a serious problem in ancient Egypt,
 2:51 - 2:53  4:01 - 4:06
The corpse wasn't putrid, probably because of indoor fires
 2:53 - 2:56 used to bake bread.
but it didn't exactly smell good, either.  4:06 - 4:12
 2:56 - 3:00 Cardiovascular disease was also
So, priests poured tree resin over common,
the body to seal it, as was tuberculosis.
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massaged it with a waxy mixture So ancient Egyptians were somewhat
that included cedar oil, successful at evading decay.
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and then wrapped it in linen. Still, like death, taxes are inevitable.
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Finally, they placed the mummy When some mummies were transported,
in a series of nested coffins they were taxed as salted fish.
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and sometimes even a stone sarcophagus.
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So how successful were
the ancient Egyptians at evading decay?
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On one hand, mummies are definitely not
intact human bodies.
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Their brains have been mashed up
and flushed out,
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their organs have been removed
and salted like salami,
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and about half of their remaining
body mass has been drained away.