Egyptian mummy in Poland identified as pregnant by scientists

WARSAW • Polish scientists said they have discovered the world's first pregnant Egyptian mummy while carrying out scans on the 2,000-year-old remains kept at the National Museum in Warsaw.

"My husband Stanislaw, an Egyptian archaeologist, and I looked at the X-ray images and noticed a familiar sight for parents... in the belly of the dead woman - a little foot!" Dr Marzena Ozarek-Szilke, an anthropologist and archaeologist at the University of Warsaw, told journalists on Thursday.

Further analysis revealed the whole foetus and scientists working on the Warsaw Mummy Project believe the woman was between 20 and 30 years old and was 26 to 30 weeks pregnant.

"We do not know why the foetus was not taken out of the belly of the deceased during mummification," said Dr Wojciech Ejsmond from the Polish Academy of Sciences, another project participant.

"That is why this mummy is truly unique. We have not been able to find any similar cases. This means that 'our' mummy is the only (one) recognised in the world with a foetus," he said.

Dr Ozarek-Szilke speculated that there may have been an effort to "camouflage the pregnancy... or, perhaps, it had some significance related to beliefs and rebirth in the afterlife".

Based on an analysis of the hieroglyphs on the sarcophagus, the mummy was originally thought to be of a male priest who lived between the first century BC and the first century AD.

Scientists now believe that it could be even older than that and are looking into the possible causes of death.

The mummy has not been opened but one scan showed the woman had long curly hair down to her shoulders.

The research has been published in the latest issue of the peer-reviewed Journal of Archaeological Science.

"This is the first known case of a pregnant embalmed body... It opens up new possibilities of researching pregnancy in ancient times and practices related to maternity," the article said.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE