Evening star., 1901-02-25
PERUvTAEl'!. MUM MES
TWO RECENTLY TRANSFERRED TO
THE NArIbxALlMusEuM.
The, Are of s0'Aer and Her Babe
The Age is Uncertaim-Charac-
ter Ofothe Pack.

Two mummies from thu sands of Ancone
in Peru are to be added to the collection in
the division of prehistoric anthropology,
Smithsonian Institution. These mummies
were brought to the United States several
years ago and given into possession of the
authorities Of the Medical Museum, where
they were studied for all that relates to
physical man. They were recently trans
ferred to the custody Of W. H. Holmes,
head curator of the National Museum, and
president Of the Anihropological Society,
and by him exhibited before that society at
its last meeting at the Cosmos Club, Tues
day, February H. They will, within few
days, be committed to the care Of Prof.
thropology of the Smithsonian Institution,
where they will form part of the perma-
nent exhibit.
Mother and Her Babe.
The mummies are those of an Indian
mother and her bahes who died in pre-Co-
lumbian times. The outer padding of the
pack containing the remains is of course,
cotton cloth; then comes covering of cot
ton in the bowl and then cotton cloth
bandages about the brown bones and skin.
All around the mummy pack as it rests in
a pine box at the National Museum are
leaves of the cotton tree. Rope of a rather
heavy kind binds the pack.
The mOther at the Cme OF Qeath was OF
middle age, the scientists having come to
that conclusion because of the condition of
the teeth. The child was quite young. In
the pack was found a womans work basket
neatly woven with reeds and in this SPIN
die needle and red pepper Some bits of
pretty pottery were found among the
bones.
from the burial sands of Ancone, are in a
sitting posture, the feet being drawn under
the trunk of the body and the upper part
of the body crouching forward. In the case
Of the mummy of the mother the head has
been detached and the skull opened by an
atomists at the Medical Museum.
The Age Uncertain.
The age of the mummies is said to be ,,n-
certain. There Is no way" said Prof
Wilson, "of arriving at just conclusion
of the age of mummy except by taking in
consideration all the surrounding circum-
stances. For instance, here is a skeleton
which, as you see, was buried in a grave
walled around with fiat stones. Among
the bones there Is a stone hatchet, flint
row heads and shell out of which the
living person drank. We judge from that
that this man died before his race knew
anything of the working of metals, though
1t may be that they had some slight knowl-
edge of copper. 1 have found copper
arm rings in graves of that kind"
1t was said at the Smithsonian Institution
this afternoon that little difficulty is eX-
perienced in approximatng the age of
Egyptian mummies because of reference to
dynasties commonly found on the tombs.
Then the character of the cloth used as
wrapping for the body furnishes another
clue at :5-
No Preservative Art.
Although many thousand mummies Of
the aborogines Of the western continent it
is said, have BEEN. found between Alaska
and Patagonia those people used no pre-
servative art, as DID the Egyptians 1t is
said that they had no knowledge of arsenic
nor of those spices which were employed
by the ancient Egyptians in expelling mois-
ture from the body. The mummies that
have been taken from the burial sands of
Peru are the result of tie dry air and GER
tain preserving salts in xhose sands. Many
desiccated bodies have been found in Alas
ka and in Mexico In the Smithsonian In
stitution is the desiccated body Of an In
dian woman discovered In 1917 Short
cave. eight miles from Mammoth cave,
Kentucky. "a ~