SHEFFIELD, ENGLAND—While at the University of Sheffield, Tom Booth and colleagues from the University of Manchester and University College London conducted a microscopic analysis of skeletons from Bronze Age burial sites across the United Kingdom. “We know from previous research that bones from bodies that have decomposed naturally are usually severely degraded by putrefactive bacteria, whereas mummified bones demonstrate immaculate levels of histological preservation and are not affected by putrefactive bioerosion,” he said in a press release. The researchers then compared the results to a mummy found in northern Yemen and a bog body from Ireland. Both of these bodies showed limited levels of bacterial bioerosion within the bone. Some of the Bronze Age skeletons from Britain show similar low levels of bioerosion, unlike the badly damaged skeletons from other prehistoric and historic periods. “The idea that British and potentially European Bronze Age communities invested resources in mummifying and curating a proportion of their dead fundamentally alters our perceptions of funerary ritual and belief in this period,” he said. To read about the earliest known evidence of intentional mummification in Egypt, one of last year's Top 10 Discoveries, go to "Mummification Before the Pharaohs."
