Clue to the black liquid from the ancient Egyptian sarcophagus found

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

The British Museum has published the results of research on a mysterious black liquid that was found in the sarcophagus of an ancient Egyptian priest named Jedhonsiu ef-ank and in other coffins.

In 2018, an unusual black sarcophagus was unearthed in Egypt. It was sealed tightly with lime mortar. Inside were the remains of two men and a woman who were floating in a strange liquid. She was sent for research.

The results are now presented by a group led by Dr. Keith Fulcher. She noted that the black liquid itself is not a sensation for scientists. Its remains, sometimes, in a dried form, were found earlier. In 2018, interest in the find was fueled by the unusual black color of the sarcophagus. It turned out that it was covered with a special solution.

Experts from the British Museum have analyzed more than 100 samples of "black slime" from 12 sarcophagi dating back to the XXII dynasty of the pharaohs (900-750 BC). Among them was the sarcophagus of Jedhonsiu-ef-ank, who died almost 3000 years ago. He was a priest at the temple of Amun at Karnak.

After his death, his body was mummified, wrapped in thin linen and placed in a case made of plaster and linen. It was beautifully painted with bright colors, and the "face" was covered with gold leaf. The case was placed in a sarcophagus and doused with several liters of warm black sticky substance. It had to harden and "cement" the case. Then the coffin was covered with a lid and left in the tomb.

The liquid from this and other sarcophagi was analyzed using gas chromatography. In a special tube, it was divided into molecules, which then entered the mass spectrometer. This made it possible to determine the chemical composition.

"Slime" is made up of vegetable oil, animal fat, tree resin, beeswax and bitumen, Fulcher writes. - There are no exact proportions, they vary in different coffins, but "slime" has always been made from these ingredients. There may have been other ingredients that we cannot find because they have evaporated or degraded to undetectable levels over 3000 years."

Some of the ingredients are found only outside of Egypt, indicating imports. So, the resin was obtained from pistachio wood and conifers. Earlier amphorae with the remains of pistachio resin were found in Amarna, the ancient Egyptian capital from 1347 to 1332 BC. The same resin was found in amphoras on a ship from the same period that sank off the coast of modern Turkey.

Analysis of the amphorae showed that they were made in the Haifa area of present-day Israel, where the resin itself was likely collected. As for the coniferous resin, it appears to have been imported from the territory of present-day Lebanon.

The Egyptians imported bitumen from the areas of the Dead Sea. In ancient Greek texts, there are descriptions of how people swim up to pieces of bitumen floating on the surface of the Dead Sea in order to chop off pieces from them and sell them to Egypt.

The black liquid was used at various stages of the burial process. She was not only placed inside the sarcophagus, but she was also coated with a case or coffin outside. Researchers believe that this tradition was associated with the god Osiris, whose cult was especially popular during the XXII dynasty.

He symbolized death and rebirth. In ancient Egyptian texts, this god is often called "black", and in ancient paintings he is often depicted as a black mummy. When someone died, they said about him that he became one of the incarnations of Osiris.

Moreover, the Nile was a sacred river. Every year after the flood, black silt remained on the banks, which formed a fertile soil that was considered magical and life-giving. In the tombs, archaeologists came across clay and wooden forms made in the form of Osiris, which were filled with such silt with germinated seeds. This also indicates the connection of black with the cult of Osiris.