Mastering Mummification - Part III

It worked. The atmosphere inside the tomb is respectful and serene, and the lighting is sufficiently dim. Therefore, Lenin has something of a yellow cast about him, but it’s hard to tell if that was the actual color of the body or if it was a trick of the eyes after coming in from the bright sunlight. Lenin is enclosed in an airtight glass “coffin” in the center of the tomb and the viewing line wraps around at the end toward his head. He appears very well preserved – except for a slightly waxy look around his fingernails.

Stories abound about Lenin, like the one where his tomb was flooded by backed up sewers and his body replaced by a wax dummy. It’s an interesting and fanciful tale, I think. The respect given to Lenin almost 75 years after his death leads me to believe the Russian government would never have allowed that to happen. They are afraid the flash from a camera will damage the body, why would they have let a backed up sewer destroy his body?

Is Lenin real? In my not-so-expert opinion, yes. And, Dr. Brier agrees with me.

“Yes, I have seen Lenin’s body and talked with his embalmers,” Brier e-mailed. “It’s real. They probably dip him in formaldehyde periodically.”

Not the way I hope to enter the “afterlife”. Ultimately, I think I agree with Rick O’Connell, “For the record, if I don’t make it out of here, don’t put me down for mummification.”

For additional information on mummification, please check out the links at the end of Mastering Mummification – Part I and do read Dr. Bob Brier’s article in the January/February 2001 issue of Archaeology, called “A Thoroughly Modern Mummy”.

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