Thursday 24 January 2019

Red-haired Mummies around the World

Most of us immediately think of Ancient Egypt when we hear the word “mummies”, but did you know that mummies have also been found in countries far removed from Egypt, such as China and Peru?  Not only that, but many of these mummies are Caucasians with blonde or red hair!

At first it was assumed that the mummies found in Egypt were the direct ancestors of the Egyptians living there today, namely Arabs.  But advances in science and technology have now revealed that many mummies of Ancient Egypt are Caucasian or white-skinned with blueish eyes and, in many cases, blonde or even reddish hair.  Even the most famous mummy, the young Pharaoh Tutankhamen, was European, according to modern DNA testing!




Many other mummies found in Egypt may not need DNA testing to prove their connection to Europeans because their red hair and Caucasian features already testify to their race.  Even the mummy of another famous Pharaoh, namely Ramesses II, whose body has been well preserved, revealed red hair pigments, according to this scientific article:
https://www.beyondsciencetv.com/2017/08/02/the-mystery-of-ancient-egypts-red-haired-mummies/


Mummy of Ramesses II
It is also of interest, however, that some experts believe that the famous enigma, the Sphinx,  has negroid features, and among the Caucasian mummies, many with African heritage have also been discovered.  
This is not really surprising when you consider that Egypt is actually part of the African continent, and that African nations from Nubia and Ethiopia merely had to travel down the Nile to reach Egypt.  Furthermore, it is worth considering how people migrated throughout history, and that like in our modern history, some nations travelled further across the world than others, establishing colonies or simply exploring uncharted lands.
A painting from the tomb of Seti I shows that Ancient Egypt had a variety of races
With this in mind, the discovery of red-haired mummies in China and Peru begins to make more sense.  The mummies of China and Peru show mummifying techniques similar to those used in Ancient Egypt, and since many of them also feature reddish hair and European features, we can assume a definite link between them.  

The red-haired mummies found in China are especially interesting because they have been well-preserved in the dry desert-like conditions of the Tarim Basin in far north-western China.  These mummies wore colourful clothes and in particular, woollen tartans – much like our modern-day Celts!   

Some books go into great detail about the mummies found in China:

The Tarim Mummies: Ancient China and the Mystery of the Earliest Peoples from the West 
 

https://www.amazon.com/Tarim-Mummies-Ancient-Mystery-Earliest/dp/0500051011


This book, The Mummies of Urumchi, details the woollen tartan clothes of the mummies:



The enigma of red-haired people in ancient history continues, with the discovery of a tall, female Caucasian red-haired mummy in Mammoth Caves, Kentucky...
 ...and reaches even further to small islands such as the Canary Islands off the coast of Morocco...
...and even as far as Easter Island where the famous statues have been restored to show the “top-knot” hairstyle made from reddish stone.  The statues’ features are also Caucasian.  When Captain Cook first visited Easter Island in the 1770s,  he recorded that he saw many people with fair skin and reddish hair living among darker, brown-skinned people. 



 There is also evidence of red-haired people among the Maori, the native people of New Zealand, according to this article:
We might never know all the historical facts exactly, but in the meantime the theories surrounding an ancient European race with reddish hair has been inspiration for my Fantasy series.  Based on the legend of Atlantis, blended with New Age themes, the main characters in the RHUNA series are white-skinned people, some with red hair.  Although Rhuna is a Polynesian woman from Easter Island, she mingles with people of many races and backgrounds as she travels the ancient world.  

The second and third books are set in Ancient Egypt, and in the third book Rhuna, The Star Child, the European and Arab races living in Ancient Egypt mix with the African nations from the south, and Rhuna interacts with the beautiful African Queen Uxbana.

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