| Welcome to page 7. Nobody likes a good mummy more than I do. Or, come to think of it, MOST people probably like a good mummy more than I do. In fact, I don't really like mummies at all. In spite of that, a few years back I did a series of cartoons about mummies. Here's how it came about: |
 |
I was a planetarium console operator (running the weekday star shows) at our local planetarium for 12 years, until I was fired in '94 because the boss didn't like me.
One of our longest running shows was The Egyptian Mummy. In addition to the "star" show, which was a history of mummification rituals and religious practice and belief, we had an exhibit of real mummies, and a film of a mummy dissection (or "autopsy") from a museum in England. I ran the show 4 times a day, 5 days a week for over a year, or more than a thousand times.
After the first few hundred shows, I got a little bored with it, and inspired by the theme, began drawing mummy cartoons while running the show. The planetarium console has a red backlighted panel for reading scripts in the dark. With this dim red backlight, I drew my cartoons.
The first mummies came about (according to the planetarium script, which was not necessarily 100% accurate) because the ancient Egyptians buried their dead in the sand and the jackals came along and dug up and ate the bodies. Sometimes, the hot, dry sand dried out the bodies so quickly, they were preserved and uneaten (unappetizing to the jackals). The Egyptians looked for ways to assuredly dry and preserve the bodies, and developed a complex procedure involving removal of soft tissue organs, packing the empty cavities with rags and sand soaked in dessicating salt solution (natron), and wrapping them in cloth strips soaked in the same solution and painting them with sealing resins. There's a lot more to it than that, but that's the basics. Religious rituals and prayer were also an important part of the process.
They believed bodies had to be preserved this way to continue on into the afterlife. They mummified their dead children and favorite pets (cats, really, considered sacred). If you were rich, you got the best mummification. If you were poor, you got a sloppy job or none at all. Priests ripped people off regularly, such as by supposedly mummifying a dead child, but actually returning to the parents a few wrapped up leg bones from who knows who. Pharoahs had pyramids built to house their mummies, and their food, furniture, clothing, gold and jewels, so they could have these things in the afterlife. Today we know that tomb robbers easily defeated their purpose, and whatever the robbers didn’t get went to the museums. I guess you really can’t take it with you.
The Egyptians weren’t the only ones to make mummies, and may not have been the first, but they are the most famous for it. Ironically, in spite of their complex machinations to preserve the bodies, there’s not much to them except bones and rags, and they basically just fall apart if you don’t handle them carefully. So please be very careful handling your mummies. Arf!
 |  |  |  |  |
| Is it safe? | Favorite cartoon | Tour guide | In a pickle! | Missing in action |
 |  |  |  |  |
| On safari | Indecent proposal? | Pharmacist's complaint | Public television | Raise your hand if you're sure! |
 |  |  |  |  |
| Perfect hostess | Planetarium director's new car | Local favorite wins! | On the beach | Perfect tan |
 |  |  |  |  |
| Madge and client | Wash day | Foreign exchange student | Biology lab | Focusing cosmic energy |
 |  |  |  |  |
| Preserving our heritage | Mummy Youngman | What's on the menu? | No end in sight | In loving memory |
 |  |  |  |  |
| Is your cat finicky? | No accounting for taste | Career plans | Camouflage | Mummy Road |
 |
Search the Bible in nine languages and multiple versions, or just read it online, at the Bible Gateway. |
Sign YellsAtDog's Famous Guestbook
View YellsAtDog's Famous Guestbook
You are Wonderful Vistor 
since April 2, 2000. Thanks!
 |
 |
Get your own Free Home Page