Mummies

A 3,500-year-old Egyptian medical text is shedding new light on the ancient practice of mummification. Recently discovered inside a much larger work, the papyrus document being studied by University of Copenhagen is the oldest known mummification manual.

A gold miner in Canada has discovered what may be the most complete wolf pup mummy ever found. Locked in the permafrost for 57,000 years, the pup is so well preserved that scientists can learn a lot about her diet, genetics, life and death.

Scientists have recreated the “voice” of a 3,000 year-old mummy by scanning the shape of his vocal tract, 3D printing a replica of it, then hooking it up to an electronic larynx. The resulting sound is a single vowel that's quite eerie.

Mummification is usually associated with the age of Pharaohs, but it didn't spring up overnight. Now an international team has found further evidence that deliberate mummification was taking place a millennium and a half earlier and across a much wider area of Egypt than previously believed.

Archaeologists have opened the giant black sarcophagus discovered in the city of Alexandria a few weeks ago. Three skeletons were found inside – as well as a fetid pool of sewage.

​New technologies are continuing to unravel the mysteries of the mummies. Now, next-generation DNA sequencing has helped solve a mystery that has perplexed scientists for decades – whether a pair of mummies known as the "Two Brothers" were in fact full brothers at all.