Abstract
DB. ALES HBDLICKA, of the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, prefaces extracts from his diaries of 1936-38, when he was exploring for mummies on Islands, now appearing in the Scientific Monthly (January 1941), with some general considerations on the practice of mummification. As is well known, this practice has rather a remarkable distribution. In the ancient world it apparently remained limited to Egypt, though extending to some extent to the Canary Islands. In later times it was practised in the Torres Straits, and developed in two widely separate regions in the Americas-in Peru and the neighbouring territories and among the Gulf populations of Alaska, more particularly in the Aleutian Islands. Mummification, however, may be of two kinds: the natural, due to lack of moisture in climatic conditions; and the artificial, in which initially the internal organs are removed.
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Mummification in America. Nature 147, 413–414 (1941). https://doi.org/10.1038/147413e0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/147413e0