World’s Oldest Mummies Discovered in Asia Are 12,000 Years Old and Smoke-Dried

Skeletal presumption of a middle-aged male. Credit: Hsiao-chun Hung et al. / CC BY 4.0

The world’s oldest known mummies person been discovered successful Asia, dating backmost astir 12,000 years. Researchers accidental the mummies were smoke-dried for preservation, a signifier that predates Egyptian mummification by thousands of years.

Smoke-drying was utilized thousands of years earlier Egypt

The study, published September 15 successful the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, shows that hunter-gatherers successful confederate China, Southeast Asia, and adjacent islands placed their dormant successful crouched oregon squatting positions earlier drying the bodies implicit smoky, low-temperature fires for months.

Evidence uncovered astatine dozens of sites

Archaeologist Hsiao-chun Hung of the Australian National University successful Canberra led the squad down the findings. Her radical examined skeletons from 95 burial sites crossed the region, including Borneo and Java.

Early and Middle Holocene quality burials from Southern China. Credit: Hsiao-chun Hung et al. / CC BY 4.0

Many of the remains showed signs of intentional preservation, with charred marks connected skulls and bones providing carnal grounds of vulnerability to fume and fire.

Laboratory tests corroborate prolonged heating

Laboratory investigation of 54 individuals from 11 sites confirmed the beingness of semipermanent heating astatine debased temperatures.

According to the researchers, the operation of irregular bony charring and the cautious positioning of intact skeletons suggests a deliberate effort to forestall assemblage decay. Prolonged fume vulnerability dried the tegument and flesh, allowing the skeletons to stay intact for millennia.

Beliefs astir ancestors drove the practice

Hung believes this signifier developed from past traditions centered connected preserving ancestors. She suspects specified beliefs dispersed wide crossed confederate Asia, and perchance into Northeast Asia, aft aboriginal quality groups migrated retired of Africa astir 60,000 years ago.

“The information that smoke-dried mummification dispersed crossed specified a immense country and endured for much than 12,000 years among Indigenous groups is remarkable,” Hung said.

Global comparisons uncover a unsocial approach

Similar customs are known elsewhere. The Chinchorro radical of South America, surviving successful a coastal desert, began mummifying their dormant astir 7,000 years ago. Their process progressive removing organs and brains earlier leaving the bodies to adust successful the godforsaken air.

Prehistoric smoke-drying mummification. Credit: Hsiao-chun Hung et al. / CC BY 4.0

Egyptians aboriginal introduced embalming substances specified arsenic resins astir 6,330 years ago, laying the instauration for their elaborate burial rituals.

What sets the Asian find apart, researchers say, is its reliance connected occurrence and fume alternatively than chemicals oregon arid climates. Comparable traditions person been seen among Indigenous Australians successful the past and proceed successful parts of the New Guinea Highlands today.

Researchers program to survey adjacent older burials

Hung and her colleagues present program to analyse adjacent older burials successful confederate China and Southeast Asia, immoderate dating backmost much than 20,000 years, to spot if signs of smoke-drying besides appear.

If confirmed, the signifier could people the earliest known effort by humans to sphere the dead, reshaping the communicative of however 1 of the world’s astir enduring rituals began not on the Nile, but successful Asia’s forests and islands.