Scientists have recently come to the conclusion that prehistoric Egyptians also mummified their dead long before the advent of the pharaohs, and this discovery was made after analyzing the mummified remains of a prehistoric body that has been dated from between 3,700 to 3,500 BC.

As CNN reports, since 1901 the prehistoric Egyptian mummy that was studied has been stored in the Egyptian Museum in Turin, Italy, and analysis of this mummy shows that Egyptians were keen embalmers 1,500 years before the coming of the pharaohs. While it has always been clear that this man was indeed mummified, scientists were previously of the belief that in this case, the mummification process occurred as the natural result of being buried in the hot sands of the desert.

However, scientists now know that at the time this prehistoric mummy was created, Egyptians already had the knowledge and the tools to mummify their dead, and also had serious religious beliefs about the afterlife that these mummies were heading to. Scientists note that before their research on this mummy, they had other indications that Egyptians were creating mummies much earlier than previously thought.

For instance, in the case of some mummies that have been discovered, archaeologists noticed that they were found with pouches filled with resin beside them. The majority of these prehistoric mummies were found in the Middle Egyptian regions of Badari and Mostagedda and can be dated all the way back from 4,500 to 3,350 BC.

Ancient Egyptian mummification was practiced 1,500 years earlier than believed, according to new research: https://t.co/V2JSSEMlyq #IUHSwrldhist1 Week 4 — Chris Hitchcock ???????????? (@CHitch94) September 28, 2018

The idea behind mummies is that the person who has died will be able to carry on living in the afterlife much as they did when they were still living here on Earth. In this way, if an Egyptian were to lose a limb, skilled physicians would attach a wooden limb to the mummy so that they would be able to survive unhindered in the afterlife after they had died.

The bodies of Egyptians that were left at prehistoric archaeological sites were generally left alone and ignored up until the 20th century as artifacts at this point were all the rage. And as archaeologists didn’t believe that prehistoric Egyptians understood the mummification process, there was really no good reason to examine the bodies that were found at these sites and analyze the resin and preservative balms that had been left behind.

But over the years as this Turin mummy was studied, it was found that resin and aromatic plant extracts that had been left with the body contained antibacterial agents that would have been used as a repellent against insects, while keeping the soft tissue of the body intact and preserved. Scientists studying chemical signatures found in the mummy also discovered that that body had been heated lightly, which means that a special formula would have been used on the linen before the mummy was wrapped.

The knowledge that prehistoric Egyptians had about resins was profoundly great, as Jana Jones explained.

“They had access to resins from the Eastern Mediterranean, suggesting long-distance trade. That similar components were used in the balms in burials 200 km (125 miles) apart and, indeed, continued to be used in similar proportions during the pharaonic period, some 2,500 years later, when embalming skills were at their peak, shows the enduring nature of ancient Egyptian ingenuity.”

While it is now known that prehistoric Egyptians were mummifying their dead long before the pharaohs, it is still not known how this individual in the Egyptian Museum in Turin died, and because of the fragility of this mummy, it would be quite impossible to submit it to x-ray analysis.