Mummies

  • The Perfumed Mummy

    The Perfumed Mummy

    Now we reach the intersection of material culture, belief systems, and death with the physical preparation of the body, which used many aromatic ingredients. The creation of the archetypical Egyptian mummy was a complex evolution that embraced the olfactive elements of the putrid and the divine.

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  • The Fragrance of the Soul: Olfaction and Death in Ancient Egyptian Religion

     As a society, we have an anosmic view of history. We don’t think about how things smelt or what olfaction meant to people in the past because olfaction is not a primary consideration in the present. When we do think of the scents of the past, it is with modern snobbishness and assurance that all

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  • Mummy Powder Incense?

    Mummy Powder Incense?

    To the modern Westerner, incense is the friend of the pothead teenager and long-time companion of the hippy.  Incense is perhaps the oldest form of human scent manufacturing, however. With a documented history of over 7,000 years, we were making this stuff for 3,000 years before we finally got around to domesticating the cat. Those scented

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