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In a message dated 97-10-21 10:40:56 EDT, you write: > I don't know any details except that they were embalmed in some way and > then placed in sealed urns. The etiquette/ritual for opening the bodies > of deceased Bourbons was elaborate and public (at least in the presence of > the members of the deceased's household--chamberlains, ladies in waiting, > assorted knaves, jokers, flunkies and so forth). Most of the organs were > removed and also embalmed but the hearts alone were deposited at Val-de- > Grace. > (Other organs went to St-Denis along w/the body.) Possibly substances > used in the embalming accounted for the iridescence? > > John Parsons > Sounds that way, John. Cadavers and biological specimans can be preseved in formaldehyde, which I think preserves the color. I pickled a dead baby mouse in alcohol when I was about 9, and it looked OK indefinitely--until those in charge found out about it and took it away as an unsuitable plaything for a child. I don't know if formaldehyde is what's used in modern embalming, but I have the impression it's some kind of liquid. I believe there's only one papyrus that tells how the Egyptians mummified, and I don't know if the instructions are considered reliable. The body was soaked in salt water for 60 days, I think, with things done with unspecified "herbs." The internal organs were removed first (they'd otherwise rot quickly) and put in the tomb in special jars called canopic jars. One indication that the Egyptians were essentially drying out the body (not embalming it in a modern sense) is that mummification is also found in Peru. Like the Egyptians, the Indians on the coast of Peru live in a dry climate near a desert. They wrapped dead bodies in fabrics and buried them in the sand, which preserved the fabric and dried out the body. One theory is that the Egyptians accidentally discovered that the bodies they were burying in the Sahara weren't rotting, and then tried to improve on the natural process. My favorite example of a preserved body was in what used to be the Museum of the American Indian, and I think this material was moved to the Smithsonian. A British explorer was killed by some South American tribe which shrunk his entire body, moustache and all, down to about 18 inches high. The color looked perfectly natural, and it was the most amazing thing I've ever seen. We, incidentally, are relic collectors too, and our reliquaries are called museums. Especially some of the earlier things in art museums are hard to justify as aesthetic objects or even beautiful objects. Mummies, broken shards from old Greek pottery, a Paleolithic "hammer" (or whatever it was used for), etc. Nobody's going to throw away a Byzantine icon, even if it's badly made for that kind of thing and the artist must have been a terrible craftsman. If the piece isn't "museum quality," it drifts down to the antique market. In the natural history museums, I'm sure there's a scientific value to preserving dinosaur bones. But that's not why they're put on display, and people ogle them essentially as curiosities, as wonders. Maybe the same feeling a medieval pilgrim had when he got to look at a skull that was supposed to have actually been the skull of John the Baptist. The Met, incidentally, has a tooth reliquary. Apparently the tooth of a female saint was preserved. To display the tooth, a crystal or glass head was made, and the tooth, now dark brown, was fitted into its proper place. Yuck. This was noted as a rare kind of reliquary. On the two nail reliquaries I know of, neither has been called a rare kind of reliquary to my knowledge. That was my reason for assuming that nails said to have been used to crucify Christ are more common than, say, preserved teeth of saints. pat sloane %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%