Chinchorro Mummies

CHINCHORRO MUMMIES

Ancient people obtained information about their morphology by palpation, examining defects in the skin, studying torn bodies, and embalming. The most venerable mummified remains of Homo sapiens, dating back to 8475-7448 BCE, were discovered in Chile near the city of Arica (2001DoubravaMR). The oldest embalmed body from this region is 7900±180 years old (1984AllisonMJ_LowensteinJM). Here the Chinchorro people developed their own system of making human mummies and practiced it in 5050-1720 BCE (1995ArriazaBT). The mummification demonstrates the «exceptional knowledge of anatomy» of this South American people (2003ArriazaBT). In preparing their tribesmen for burial, hunter-gatherers resorted to complex methods: they removed organs, performed craniotomies and disarticulations, resected bones, then correctly reassembled them into a single skeleton, and sutured the skin (1984AllisonMJ_LowensteinJM; 2004SepúlvedaM_WalterP).

From 1984AllisonMJ_LowensteinJM: Fig. 1 (no changed).

It is not known whether the Chinchorro tribe used the accumulated valuable material on the structure of the human body for health purposes. It cannot be denied, since the production of mummies for over three millennia speaks for itself.

It is documented that Chinchorro embalmers dissected the femur. In doing so, they undoubtedly had to cross the ligamentum capitis femoris (LCF). Thus, the South American "pathologists" established the fixing role of the LCF, involuntarily studying its norm and pathology. Manipulating the bones, the Chinchorro specialists also observed the areas of attachment of the LCF: the fossa of the head of the femur and the fossa of the acetabulum.

References

Doubrava MR. Radiometric evaluation of the prehistoric mortuary practices of the Chinchorro culture in northern Chile. Retrospective Theses & Dissertations. Las Vegas: University of Nevada, 2001. [digitalscholarship.unlv.edu]

Allison MJ, Focacci G, Arriaza B, Standen V, Rivera M, Lowenstein JM. Chinchorro, momias de preparación complicada: métodos de momificación. Chungara: Revista de Antropología Chilena. 1984;13:155-73. [chungara.uta.cl, academia.edu]

Arriaza BT. Chinchorro bioarchaeology: chronology and mummy seriation. Latin American Antiquity. 1995;6(1)35-55. [cambridge.org]

Arriaza BT. Cultura Chinchorro. Las momias artificiales más antiguas del mundo. 2003, Santiago de Chile: Universitaria, 2015. [books.google]

Sepúlveda M, Rousseliere H, Van Elslande E, Arriaza B, Standen V, Santoro CM, Walter P. Study of color pigments associated to archaic chinchorro mummies and grave goods in Northern Chile (7000-3500 BP). Heritage Science. 2014;2(7)1-12. [link.springer.com]

Keywords

ligamentum capitis femoris, ligamentum teres, ligament of head of femur, homo sapiens, disarticulation, operation, intersection, transection, observation

The original text in Russian is available at the link: Мумии Чинчорро

NB! Fair practice / use: copied for the purposes of criticism, review, comment, research and private study in accordance with Copyright Laws of the US: 17 U.S.C. §107; Copyright Law of the EU: Dir. 2001/29/EC, art.5/3a,d; Copyright Law of the RU: ГК РФ ст.1274/1.1-2,7

BLOG CONTENT

8000–1000 BCE

Comments

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