Bodies that Do not Decay - Part 2
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| The Mummies of the Capuchin monks |
The mummies of the Capuchin monks are a good example of the bodies that do not decay. Furthermore, the sites of burial are at times chosen in such a way that decomposition is delayed. The case of the Capuchin monks hanging like broken dolls in the catacombs in Palermo, Sicily, is well known. The bodies of the monks have not decayed although they were left exposed to the air. It was discovered that the air in these catacombs has the peculiar property of drying out the bodies and turning them into natural mummies.
A 19th century traveler wrote about these mummies, “They are all dressed in the clothes they usually wore......the skin and muscles become as dry and hard as a piece of stockfish and through many of them have been here upward of two hundred and fifty years, yet none are reduced to skeletons.”
