For Mother's Day, I told Bryan I wanted to go see "Mummies of the World Exhibition." We made a weekend trip and had some fun in Salt Lake City. We stayed with our friends Bev and Jessica. The exhibition had been in the Leonardo since February and was wrapping up its last week in SLC.
Bryan stayed with Isaac, while Jessica, Bev, Ava and I got
wrapped up in mummies for the afternoon :)
We weren't able to bring cameras to help protect the mummies in their lighted/humid controlled environment.
So, I googled some images of the exact mummies that we viewed on Saturday:
The collection included 150 mummies and important artifacts from Asia Oceania, South America, Europe and ancient Egypt dating back 6,500 years, that have never before been seen all at once.
When most of us think of mummies, we imagine bodies from ancient Egypt that are wrapped in linens from head to toe ~ and placed in tombs. I know I did. I was reminded that mummies are preserved naturally due to climate and temperature. These humans and animals have been preserved in special conditions long, long after death.
For a specimen to be a mummy and not just a skeleton ~ the body must have soft tissue, like skin and hair........
This woman mummy was found with two young children (ages 3-4)...........
This is mummy Orlovitsa Johannes, who died at the age of one year. He was clothed in a dress and bonnet (which are copies of the original garment).....
Family Orlovits was part of the XVIII century mummies discovered in Vac in 1994. They were found during the reconstruction of the Dominican church in the underground tombs. Cold, dry, air in the crypt, was well as pine oil preserved the bodies..........
Egyptian mummy head, partially still wrapped in bandage............
In addition to the human mummies in the exhibition, there were also many animals including a dog, lizard, rats, hyena, cat, squirrel, hawk, alligator, and a monkey.
This howler monkey is from the site of Grand Chaco, in Argentina, South America. It has not been radiocarbon dated, but it is likely that the monkey was naturally preserved in the warm, dry environment of the area and prepared for display, with a rhea feather skirt and feather wreath around its head and neck.
An Egyptian cat mummy wrapped in painted linen bandaging, which dates to the Ptolemaic period (from 323 - 30 BC). It shows how Egyptian cats were sometimes intentionally preserved to accompany royals into the afterlife.......
This is a mummy of a human fetus, who died on the 30th week of development from a rare defect of the spine......
This next one is the
Detmold Child, a Peruvian child mummy radiocarbon-dated to 4504-4457 BC, about 3,000 years before the birth of King Tutankhamun!
A 13th century mummy of an adult female from ancient Peru. It amazed me that a couple of the 2,000 year old mummies had braids (like they were styled yesterday!)
Some of you may be thinking, "How did Ava handle seeing this graphic exhibit?" "Did she have nighmares?"
lol
I'll just remind you, that this is Ava were talking about! Haha
She was fascinated like the rest of us! Towards the end, she got tired of standing on the hard floor and rushed me a little at the end.
Overall, it was a eye-opening, educational experience! I was so glad to see it while it was in town!
