​By Heather Jacobs
hjscribes.com
January 17, 2021

NOTE: This post contains Amazon Associate product links from which the author receives commission on each product purchased.

The Many Uses of Mummies

Paper is the lifeblood of literacy, and literacy the cornerstone of an empowered society. While a European account of papermaking would place its invention somewhere in the 15th century, the Chinese had Western civilization beat with their discovery of the process, using fibers and hemp, around 100 A.D., and the Ancient Egyptians, using papyrus, as far back as 2700 B.C.
 
Mummy paper is a paper product made from the linen wrappings of Ancient Egyptian mummies. Aside from sounding like something used in an occult ritual, there is debate as to whether this practice occurred in the mid-nineteenth century. While it may sound strange, mummies were once so abundant that they had been used for a variety of purposes, including as medicine. Mummy powder was as readily available and widely used as Aspirin is today. The reasoning, while flawed, was not as sinister as eating-a-dead-body-to-cure-headaches may seem. It was once, erroneously, believed that the Ancient Egyptians had used Bitumen to embalm their dead. Thus, powdered mummy was believed to be a great source of the stuff. But where is the benefit in making paper out of the wrappings of mummified corpses? It is important to understand a little bit about the history of paper to see where this idea may have come from. 

Got Paper?

If not for paper, the movable type printing press may not have been the revolutionary accomplishment it was. With Johannes Gutenberg’s invention in the 15th century, literacy was no longer limited to the elite and Westerners were no longer dependent on the handwritten and oral communication of ideas. Years following its creation, the speed and efficiency the printing press offered brought a period of open public discourse and exchange of ideas. This freedom of thought and speech loosened the church’s grip on society and allowed citizens to openly criticize their government. In an attempt to quell any speech considered seditious (the bar was set pretty low for that standard), the British government sought to control the distribution of printed materials to the public. It was then mandated that the right to print would require licensure, and that the content expressed was to be controlled and approved by the government. With the rise of opposition newspapers, and the loss of business to nations with much friendlier printing laws, Great Britain could no longer realistically control the press. The licensing of printing expired in 1694. Thus, the pace of printing the written word continued at breakneck speeds.
 
But with the ability to mass produce publications came a shortage of the raw materials necessary to manufacture paper; linen and cotton. Newspapers consistently posted ads on their back pages asking citizens to save used linen rags and exchange them for payment. The situation was much more desperate in colonial America where the British government had forbidden the importation of paper products from other nations. Laws preventing the colonists from manufacturing for themselves meant that all materials were to come from the motherland. Scarcity of raw materials combined with the cost of importing goods would make the price of paper untenable for those wishing to print in the colonies. This would become a focal point of the colonists’ demand for independence.
 
The matter of a paper shortage persisted well after the American revolution and by the 1850’s, there was a dire need for a new papermaking process. The London Times had publicly offered a reward to anyone who could invent a new way to create the good stuff. This is where the idea of mummy paper is said to have come into being. Before the discovery of the wood-pulp process of making paper, Geologist, Archeologist, and Explorer, Isaiah Deck, while visiting Egypt, had discovered mummy pits. Mummy pits are exactly what they sound like. Large pits filled with mummies. Deck estimated that there were likely a half-billion mummies throughout Egypt, all of which were wrapped in the precious linen needed to create paper. No one knows for sure what happened next, but speculation of the use of mummy paper has been the center of lively debate.
 
In Dard Hunter’s book, Papermaking: The History and Technique of an Ancient Craft, the topic of mummy paper is mentioned in relation to the work of I. Augustus Stanwood. According to Stanwood’s son, Daniel, his father had used the linens of mummies to create the wrapping paper used by butchers and grocers. In his recollection of the product, his father had discontinued this practice after an epidemic of cholera was linked back to his paper. It is unclear if the paper was the actual cause of a cholera outbreak.
 
Fast forward to 2010, independent researcher, S.J. Wolfe had discovered a book in Brown University’s Hay library said to have been created using mummy paper. The book, Hymn: for the bi-centennial anniversary of the settlement of Norwich, Conn., is the first and only known publication that definitively used mummy linen for its paper. Wolfe believes that this is evidence that mummy paper could have in fact been used to print newspaper during the paper shortage of the newspaper boom. Wolfe is the director of EMINA (Egyptian Mummies in North America), a database dedicated to the cataloging of mummies that made their way to North America.
 
While it is unclear as to whether mummy linen was, at any point in history, used for paper on more than a few odd occasions, I’d like to believe that it was. There is something delightfully wonderful about weird and creative solutions to problems.
 
If you’d like to read more about this subject, check out these links below:​

• Adult Literacy in the United States, National Center for Education Statistics, July 2019, nces.ed.gov/datapoints/2019179.asp.
• Andreeva, Anna. “Mummy Buff Unwraps Secrets at Hay.” Brown Daily Herald, 7 Feb. 2010, www.browndailyherald.com/2010/02/07/mummy-buff-unwraps-secrets-at-hay/.
• Bäuml, Franz H. “Varieties and Consequences of Medieval Literacy and Illiteracy.” Speculum, vol. 55, no. 2, 1980, pp. 237–265. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/2847287.
• Dawson, W R. “Mummy as a Drug.” Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine, U.S. National Library of Medicine, Nov. 1927, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2101801/.
• Dolan, Maria. “The Gruesome History of Eating Corpses as Medicine.” Smithsonian.com, Smithsonian Institution, 6 May 2012, www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-gruesome-history-of-eating-corpses-as-medicine-82360284/.
• Hunter, Dard. Papermaking: The History and Technique of an Ancient Craft.
• Leinhard, John H. “No. 1227: PAPER FROM MUMMY WRAPPINGS.” No. 1227: Paper from Mummy Wrappings, University of Houston, www.uh.edu/engines/epi1227.htm.
• Mattoon, Nancy. “Has This Library Solved ‘The Mystery Of The Mummy Paper?".” Book Patrol: A Haven for Book Culture, 19 Feb. 2010, blog.seattlepi.com/bookpatrol/2010/02/19/has-this-library-solved-the-mystery-of-the-mummy-paper/.
• Mellen, Roger. “The Press, Paper Shortages, and Revolution in Early America.” New Mexico State University, Media History, 2015, web.nmsu.edu/~rpmellen/Press%20Paper%20Shortages%20and%20Revolution%20in%20Early%20America.pdf.
• Wheetley, Abigail. “The Mystery of Mummy Paper.” Our Blog, blog.bookstellyouwhy.com/the-mystery-of-mummy-paper.
• Wolfe, S.J., and Robert Singerman. Mummies in Nineteenth Century America: Ancient Egyptians as Artifacts. McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers, 2009.