how will reveal the contents of the mummies using X-rays and CT scans

Total of 60 mummies will go on show at Manchester

From bandaged crocodiles to cats entombed in wooden effigies, a new exhibition seeks to unravel the mystery of animal mummies.

The ancient Egyptians carefully prepared the mummies in their millions as votive offerings to the gods.

Now, thousands of years after they were made, the exhibition will reveal the contents of these unusual mummies using X-rays and CT scans to the public.

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From bandaged crocodiles to cats entombed in wooden effigies (both shown), a new exhibition seeks to unravel the mystery of animal mummies. The Gifts for the Gods exhibition at Manchester Museum will explain the background behind what today seems like a bizarre religious practice, in the context of life in Egypt

The Gifts for the Gods exhibition at Manchester Museum will explain the background behind what today seems like a bizarre religious practice, in the context of life in ancient Egypt.

While many people may imaging Ancient Egypt to be a sandy wilderness, it was a country of lush grassland and a taxidermy exhibit will show what the mummified animals would have looked like when they were alive.

The strangest one to go on display is a jackal mummy which was found to contain fragments of human bone.

But Lidija McKnight, Research Associate at the KNH Centre for Biomedical Egyptology at the University of Manchester told MailOnline: ‘The ancient Egyptians mummified just about every animal they could find from cats and dogs, to fish, crocodiles, rodents, birds and baboons.

Thousands of years after the mummies were made, the show will reveal the contents of the unusual mummies using X-rays and CT scans, for example. An X-ray (pictured left) of a cat mummy (right) is shown

‘Perhaps the more surprising are the mummies which don’t contain animals themselves, or which contain more than species wrapped together.’

While it’s been known for a while that some animal mummies contain no real animal, she said this didn’t matter to the Egyptians that bought them as offerings to gods.

THE GREAT ANIMAL MUMMY SCANDAL During research into the animal mummies set to go on display in Manchester Museum's Gifts for the Gods exhibition, experts uncovered an ancient scandal. The high-tech scans revealed that a third of the religious offerings were empty, or packed with mud sticks and reeds in the shape of animals. A third contained well-preserved complete animals while a further third consisted of partial remains - but the rest were empty. Scientists said those involved in the industry may simply have struggled to keep up with demand. Dr Lidija McKnight, Egyptologist at the University of Manchester, told MailOnline: 'Early excavators who unwrapped mummies on site documented that some bundles did not contain complete animals or in fact any animal at all, so this in itself is not new,' she said. 'What this research has shown by looking at a large group is what percentage seem to contain bones and which don't.' During research into the animal mummies set to go on display in Manchester Museum's Gifts for the Gods exhibition, experts uncovered an ancient scandal. The high-tech scans revealed that a third of the religious offerings were empty, or packed with mud sticks and reeds in the shape of animals (pictured) 'The early preconception - and for quite some time afterwards - was that these empty mummies were fakes, but we now believe that there is more likely to be much more to it. 'She said that sometimes the linen parcels were actually padded out with items from the mummy-maker’s home. 'The material being used to create these mummies would have held special significance in its own right to the Egyptians. 'What is more likely to have mattered is that the outside of the mummy looked recognisable to the gods to which it was offered.' ‘Basically, organic material such as mud, sticks and reeds, that would have been lying around the embalmers workshops, and also things like eggshells and feathers, which were associated with the animals, but aren't the animals themselves.’ There was a huge demand for animal mummies, which, unlike human mummies, were classed as religious offerings. Millions of examples have been unearthed in Egypt in vast catacombs containing creatures such as dogs, cats and monkeys. The demand was so big that animals were mass-bred specifically for the industry. But many embalmers still left their mummies empty. Dr McKnight said this may not have meant it was a scam and that those who commissioned the mummies may have known in advance they would be empty. Advertisement

Work by the University of Manchester has shown that as many as a third of the mummies studied have no animal material, a third have parts of animals and the remaining third do have an animal inside.

‘All animal species mummified by the ancient Egyptians were deemed to have close associations with gods, mainly because of characteristics they were seen to share with the deities, or through their appearance at significant sites,’ she explained.

Cats, for example, were sacred to Bastet who was the goddess of warfare, while jackals were associated with Anubis, the god of embalming.

‘All animal species mummified by the ancient Egyptians were deemed to have close associations with gods, mainly because of characteristics they were seen to share with the deities, or through their appearance at significant sites,’ she explained. Jackals (pictured) were associated with Anubis, the god of embalming

Cats mummies were sacred to Bastet who was the goddess of warfare (an amulet depicting the god is shown left). A painted relief of the dog god at Temple of Seti I is pictured right

‘Ibis birds were associated with Thoth, the god of wisdom and writing,’ Dr McKnight said.

Egypt’s many gods could take animal forms to express their superhuman nature.

THE ANCIENT EGYPTIAN ANIMAL BIO BANK PROJECT The Ancient Egyptian Animal Bio Bank Project based at the University of Manchester aims to catalogue consistent data from animal mummies in museum collections outside Egypt. Currently, this includes over 800 individual animal mummies from collections in Britain, Europe and the United States. Advertisement

The exhibition explores how images of animals - pictures, statuettes or mummies - could be used to communicate with the gods.

Animal mummies and bronzes statuettes were the most common votive offerings, or gifts to the god and the exhibition will also include a recreation of a subterranean animal catacomb that visitors will be able to enter.

The atmospheric, narrow room will be lined with pots containing votive animal mummies, centred on a focal point for worship.

It is not clear exactly how the animal mummies would have fitted into religious rituals because there is little surviving evidence about how votive worship worked.

‘It is believed that animal mummies would have been symbolic offerings to be given to the gods,’ Dr McKnight continued.

‘So, the person offering the votive was not worshipping the animal itself, nor the mummy, but it was seen as a recognisable and suitable offering to take their prayers to the gods.

Egypt’s many gods could take animal forms to express their superhuman nature. The exhibition explores how images of animals - pictures, statuettes or mummies (a crocodile mummy is shown) - could be used to communicate with the gods

It’s not clear exactly how the animal mummies would have fitted into religious rituals because there is little surviving evidence about how votive worship worked. A CT scan showing a crocodile's skull wrapped inside a mummy is pictured

‘Their role can be seen as a communication device in personal religion.’

While great care was taken in embalming humans, the practice of votive animal mummifications was hasty in comparison.

THE ANIMAL MUMMIES OF SAQQARA The British were fascinated by a ‘romantic’ concept of ancient Egypt, as depicted in 19th Century paintings. British Victorians were intrigued by the mysteries of the animal mummies. Alongside the pyramids of Giza, one of the main tourist attractions in Egypt during the 18th and 19th centuries was the ‘Tombs of the Birds’ - a catacomb at the site of Saqqara. The catacomb was subsequently lost and only re-identified in the 1960s by a British team. Photographs, archive material and travel journals on display at the exhibition will show how the animal mummies were excavated and selected by archaeologists and museum experts, including how they were collected and distributed as curios and souvenirs. The mummies ended up in the UK through excavators, individuals working on behalf of larger museums to provide stock items, collectors and travellers as portable souvenirs. ‘Some cats in museums arrived on ships in the 1890s at the port of Liverpool where they were used as fertiliser on the fields,’ Dr McKnight explained. ‘Some of these were rescued and sent to museums. ‘The important thing with animal mummies is they are small and were seen as a good souvenir to be brought home by early travellers to Egypt as curiosities.’ Advertisement

‘The animals themselves are not extensively treated,’ Dr McKnight said.

‘There is little sign of natron [a mixture of sodium carbonate decahydrate] being applied, certainly not to the extent it was in humans, and a simple application of an emulsion of beeswax and tree resins.

‘In short, the preservation of the animals was simple,’ she explained.

Elswehere, radiography suggests that evisceration - the removal of the internal organs - was often not carried out, presumably because of their size and because the animals were mummified quickly.

But, some of the decorative styles applied to animals does mirror what we see in human mummies for certain periods.

Animal mummies were sometimes given elaborate wrappings, sometimes with extravagantly criss-crossed bandages, so their construction would have taken a great deal of time.

The exhibition will look at the scientific study of animal mummies of which the University of Manchester is a leader.

Using wrapped, partially wrapped and completely unwrapped animal mummies from a variety of UK collections, the exhibition will show what they look like inside and in detail using photography, radiography, CT scans and light microscopy.

The display will combine mummified specimens such as jackals, crocodiles, cats and birds with cultural artefacts such as stone sculpture and bronze statuettes, alongside 19th Century works of art and never-seen-before archives romanticising Ancient Egypt.

Dr McKnight said: This exhibition will showcase the role played by the British in the discovery, excavation, collection, curation and scientific research of this understudied subject.

Using wrapped, partially wrapped and completely unwrapped animal mummies from a variety of UK collections, the exhibition will show what mummies look like inside and in detail using photography, radiography, CT scans and light microscopy. A CT scan of an crocodile is shown

Animal mummies were sometimes given elaborate wrappings, sometimes with extravagantly criss-crossed bandages, so that their construction would have taken a great deal of time. A wooden case for a cat is shown left and a cloth mask for a falcon, right

‘Ibis birds were associated with Thoth, the god of wisdom and writing,’ Dr McKnight said. This mummy is labelled and decorated with hieroglyphs that look relatively modern

‘The University of Manchester, with its long history in Egyptian mummy research, is leading the field; helping to shed light on the material remains of this ancient practice and, hopefully, to reveal more about how and why these animal mummies were produced.’

The exhibition, Gifts for the Gods: Animal Mummies Revealed, is the first exhibition on animal mummies to be held in the UK.

Dr Campbell Price, Curator of Egypt and Sudan, Manchester Museum said: ‘It offers the chance to reunite mummified material from different archaeological sites for the first time in over a century.

‘It will feature over 60 mummies, including many never before seen on public display.’