Dismemberment was too good for Egyptian mummies, who, once plundered from their tombs, were ground up to be ingested as medicine, or turned into paint - the "Mummy Brown" used in some famous 19th-century canvases. Such is one of the threads of King's jolly-ghoulish compendium of fascinating tidbits, which ranges over grave-robbing medical students, necrophiliacs, vampires, sin-eaters, "incorruptible" saints, forensic anthropology, DNA testing, cryonics and euthanasia.

There is something admirable in the author's refusal to get depressed about her subject. Most amazing to me was the tradition of Buddhist monks who embalm themselves while still alive (by eating bark and poisonous sap over years). King advises: "Never let your undertaker double as the owner of a biomedical tissue company that harvests organs and other body parts for transplantation and for medical research." I will try to keep that in mind.



http://snipurl.com/6mydn