www.sciencedirect.com
c o r t e x 6 3 ( 2 0 1 5 ) 2 1 7e2 1 9
Available online at
ScienceDirect
Journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/cortex
Letter to the Editor
Brain vessels mummification in an individualof ancient Egypt
Albert Isidro a,b,*, Luis M. Gonz�alvez b and Adri�a Arboix c
a Orthopaedic Surgery Department, Hospital Universitari Sagrat Cor, Barcelona, Spainb Museu Egipci de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spainc Neurology Department, Hospital Universitari Sagrat Cor, Barcelona, Spain
a r t i c l e i n f o
Article history:
Received 10 July 2014
Reviewed 8 August 2014
Revised 20 August 2014
Accepted 10 September 2014
Published online 19 September 2014
* Corresponding author. Orthopaedic SurgerE-mail addresses: [email protected]
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cortex.2014.09.0050010-9452/© 2014 Published by Elsevier Ltd.
1. Introduction
The organs of the Central Nervous System are among the first
organs to undergo postmortem autolysis. Their preservation
is an unusual finding in ancient burials except those in which
the adipocere formation or conditions of extreme-dryness
leads to a different rate of preservation (Aufderheide, 2003).
Perhaps the best-known feature of Egyptian mummifica-
tion is the removal of the brain. Herodotus specifically men-
tions excerebration as part of the most elaborate of
mummification rituals, restricted to the elite. In anthropo-
genic or artificial mummies the brain had been removed by
different techniques using wire-like instruments and later
superseded the calvarium by preservative substances,
meningeal covering has been seldom found. This is due to the
fact that few remains of brain tissue survive the first step of
the procedure; the trans-ethmoidal extraction of the brain and
the subsequent introduction of resin-like substances
completed the damage of neural tissue.
Since 2006 a Spanish/German mission of the Egyptian
Museum in Barcelona and the Eberhard Karls University in
y Department. Hospital U(A. Isidro), aarboix@hsco
Tubingen has been working in the Necropolis of Sharuna,
Middle Egypt. This vast necropolis covers the period from the
beginnings of the 6th dynasty of the Old Kingdom (circa 2325
BC) to the beginnings of the Coptic period (4the9th centuries
AD), and a total of 438 individuals have been identified and
their pathologies studied. In the 2010 archaeological season a
total of 51 mummified bodies were recovered from the
UE.4013. Mummies were dated in the Late Period to Ptolemaic
Period (550e150 BC) based on the characteristics of the
mummification.
2. Case report
In the section B of the UE.4013, the individual W19 identified
as an adultmalewas recovered. The left hemi-face is lying in a
more superficial level and showed a fair degree of preserva-
tion (Fig.1a); by contrast, the deeper side was poorly pre-
served. This right side showed a postmortem fracture of the
parietal and the temporal bones. Preservative substances such
as bitumen mixed with linen were found inside the temporal
niversitari Sagrat Cor, c/ Viladomat, 288, 08029 Barcelona, Spain.r.com (A. Arboix).
Fig. 1 e a. Mummified head of the individual W19 “in situ” (arrow); b. Specular image of the brain vessels with the inner side
of temporal bone; c. Remains of preservative substances with the marks of two branches of the middle meningeal artery.
c o r t e x 6 3 ( 2 0 1 5 ) 2 1 7e2 1 9218
bone. The external surface of themass that contactedwith the
inner vault of the temporal bone, presented clear prints of
vascular vessels from the meninges. These structures “mir-
roring” the prints of the bone (Fig.1b), at this level, with all
likelihood, correspond to themiddlemeningeal artery with its
two branches, the anterior and the posterior (Fig.1c).
3. Discussion
Few cases of brain preservation have been reported in the
specialized literature. Only 10 cases were reported in a large
study from 2010 (Papageorgopoulou et al., 2010). Nonetheless,
in an exhaustive radiological (CT) study of 47 mummies from
the National Museum of Antiquities of Leiden, the
Netherlands (Raven & Taconis, 2005) brain remains were
detected in 8 cases and, moreover, in 16 cases cranial dura
were found in the CT images. In the past, the first one was
reported by D. S. Lamb in 1901 and, shortly thereafter, Sir
Grafton Elliot Smith (1902), presented information about nat-
ural mummified brains from El Amrah necropolis, near Aby-
dos in the Upper Egypt and dated in Middle Kingdom. In these
individuals, convolutions and brain sulci were preserved.
More than half century later, in the PUM III (Pennsylvania
University Museum Project) a multidisciplinary research team
demonstrated the presence of erythrocytes and leucocytes
adhering to the occipital region in an intracranial mass of a
2,200 year old female Egyptianmummy (Riddle, Ho,& Chason,
1975). Two years later, in the multidisciplinary project of the
Nakht mummy from the Royal Ontario Museum, the macro-
scopic study showed brain convolutions (Scott, Horne, Hart, &
Savage, 1977). Although in some natural mummified in-
dividuals the rate of brain preservation is quite good, little
evidences of meningeal coverings have been found (Doran
et al., 1986; Oakley, 1960; Tkocz, Bytzer, & Bierring, 1979).
In our case, following the extraction of the brain, em-
balmers filled it with preservative substances. As a result, no
brain tissue remains have been found, but instead prints of
vascular structures were preserved. It is a truly remarkable
finding and an interesting case because, to date, only anec-
dotic cases of covering structures have been reported in the
literature: a Korean mummy from the Joseon Dynasty
(1392e1910 AD) from Yongin site. This mummy showed re-
sidual vessels on the surface of the brain. (Kim et al., 2008).
Another case, a mummified left cerebral hemisphere of an 18
month old infant from Quimper, France dated from 13th
century had remains of pia mater with no vessel structures.
(Papageorgopoulou et al., 2010). The best preserved may the
case the lady of Mawangtui Tomb from the Han Dynasty (205
BC e 220 AD) with a high degree of preservation in the brain
with a dura mater, cerebellar tissue, the thalami and ven-
tricular system (Appenzeller & Aufderheide, 1999; Wei, 1973).
4. Concluding remarks
The most interesting question is how this structures, so
perishable under those post-mortem conditions have been
preserved. The conditions in this case must have been quite
extraordinary: we can speculate that something special
happened in individual W19 just at the moment of bitumen
insertion into the vault, unlike in the rest of the 62 brain re-
mains studied in the field. Assuming, as a work hypothesis,
that the physicochemical conditions of the bitumen-like
substance introduced into the skull of W19 individual, offer
c o r t e x 6 3 ( 2 0 1 5 ) 2 1 7e2 1 9 219
a possible means for prints of vascular structures, to harden
on cooling and lead to reveal exquisite anatomical details.
Acknowledgments
We thank Mª Angela Taul�e, Director of Museu Egipci of Bar-
celona and B�eatrice Huber site Director from Eberhard Karls
Universit€at.
r e f e r e n c e s
Appenzeller, O., & Aufderheide, A. C. (1999). Paleoneurobiologyand the autosomic nervous system. In Handbook of clinicalneurology (Vol. 74, pp. 181e197).
Aufderheide, A. C. (2003). The scientific study of mummies.Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Doran, G. H., Dickel, D. N., Ballinger, W. E., Agee, O. F., Laipis, P. J.,& Hauswirth, W.W. (1986). Anatomical, cellular andmolecularanalysis of 8,000-yr-old human brain tissue from the windoverarchaeological site. Nature, 323, 803e806.
Kim, M. J., Lee, I. S., Lee, B. H., Choi, J. H., Lim, D. S., Yi, Y. S., et al.(2008). Human mummified brain from a medieval tomb with
lime-soil mixture barrier of the Joseon Dynasty, Korea.International Journal of Osteoarchaeology, 18, 614e623.
Lamb, D. S. (1901). Mummification, especially of the brain.American Anthopologist, 3, 294e307.
Oakley, K. P. (1960). Ancient preserved brains. Man, 90, 121e122.Papageorgopoulou, C., Rentsch, K., Raghavan, M., Hofmann, M. I.,
Colacicco, G., Gallien, V., et al. (2010). Preservation of cellstructures in a medieval infant brain: a paleohistological,paleogenetic, radiological and physico-chemical study.NeuroImage, 50, 893e901.
Raven, M. J., & Taconis, W. K. (2005). Egyptian mummies.Radiological atlas of the collections in the National Museum ofAntiquities at Leiden. Turnhout: Brepols Pub.
Riddle, J. M., Ho, K. L., & Chason, J. L. (1975). Peripheral bloodelements found in an Egyptian mummy. A three-dimensionalview. Science, 192, 374e375.
Scott, J. W., Horne, P. D., Hart, G. D., & Savage, H. (1977). Grossanatomy and miscellaneous studies. Canadian MedicalAssociation Journal, 117, 464e465.
Smith, G. E. (1902). On the natural preservation of the brain in theancient Egyptians. Journal of Anatomy & Physiology, 36, 375e381.
Tkocz, I., Bytzer, P., & Bierring, F. (1979). Preserved brains inMedieval skulls. American Journal of Physical Anthropology, 51,197e202.
Wei, O. (1973). Internal organs of a 2100-years-old female corpse.The Lancet, 302, 1198.