A mummy, to put it bluntly, is an old dead body. But unlike a skeleton or a fossil, a mummy still retains some of the soft tissue it had when it was alive—most often skin, but sometimes organs ...

Not to put too fine a point on it, a mummy is an old dead body. But unlike a skeleton or a fossil, a mummy still retains some of the soft tissue it had when it was alive—most often skin ...

Mummification was practiced throughout most of early Egyptian history. The earliest mummies from prehistoric times probably were accidental. By chance, dry sand and air (since Egypt has almost no ...

The mummies, which date back 4,000 years, were initially discovered a century ago in the Tarim Basin in Xinjiang, China Jason Hahn is a former Human Interest and Sports Reporter for PEOPLE.

To get it in your inbox, sign up for free here. But the history of mummies is much more complex and spans cultures around the world. Such well-preserved remains have enabled scientists to ...