Rensselaer Union, Volume 8, Number 48, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 August 1876 — Peruvian Skeletons and Mummies. [ARTICLE]

Peruvian Skeletons and Mummies.

Few exhibits on the grounds possess a greater and at the same time a more dismal interest than the ethnological display in the Peruvian section, near the southwest comer of the main building. It is said to be the most complete exhibition of the kind pertaining to South America in the world. ,So numerous are the specimens that tliey might pass for the entire mortal remains from an extensive graveyard. The collection embraces two divisions—skeletons of Auracaaian Indians, who are said to have roamed through Western South America fifteen hundred years ago, and mummies of the Inca tribes, which, according to the most reliable information, became extinct three thousand five hundred years ago. These relics are the result of a century’s research, and were obtained from more than fifty mounds throughout the territory now comprised in Pern. Scientists have concluded, after long study, that the mounds from which the Auracanian relics were obtained have braved the wear and tear of fifteen centuries. These bones are bleached and bare, but in the long and hideous array of grinning skulls there is hardly one without a well-preserved scalp, although it is as brittle as charred paper, and upon being toucheddrops off the cranium like dandruff. The hair is perfectly preserved on most of tlie skulls, and by its progressive changes from the original color to a silvery white the ages may be approximated. Although tlie art by which the Incas preserved their dead thir-ty-five centuries ago died w’ith the extinction of that race, it appears that the Auracanians, living about three hundred years after the time of Christ, still tried, in their own rude way, to make mummies. This is evident from the decayed Cotton filling the mouths and ears ana adhering to the bones of the Auracanian specimens, just as it does in the case of the mummies of tlie Incas. It is supposed that this cotton was saturated with a preserving liquid and was used to swathe the body, some being stuffed into the mouth, ears and eyes of the corpse. The Auracanian skulls have narrow, receding foreheads, very high cheek-bones and projecting chins. Concerning the mummies of the Incas, Dr. Saffray, an historian and antiquarian of prominence in South America, asserts that they cannot be less than three thousand five hundred years old, because the mounds from which they were exhumed are surrounded by geological evidence that their age is even greater than that. The skin is preserved, but in a blackish, leathery state, and shriveled close to the bone. This, however, is not the only difference between the mummies and tlie skeletons of the Auracanians, for while the skulls of the latter betokdh a small compass of brain, with angular and repulsive features, the foreheads of the Incas were broad and high, and their countenances, evidently regular and full of intellectuality. The brittle skin on the wrists of many of them still retains the tattooed imitations of bracelets, apparently in as perfect condition as if it was only yesterday that the plue ink mingled with the flesh. The tendons of uie limbs yet remain, and in K’ is break through the parched skin, skeletons are repulsive enough to the sight, but hobgoblins like these —literal skin and bong, with heads of luxuriant hair, and long yellow teeth—are still more horrible. There is in the collection a female mummy, with iron grey hair, wrapped in a shroud of canvass wrought with feathers —a garment made so fragile by age that if taken from within its glass case, it could be blown into dust oy a strong puff of the mouth. A copper spoon, tor use on the journey to the happy regions of the sub, the god of the Peruyitfns, lies crosswise in her mouth, and the latter is eternally shut by an ivory disc fastened over it by a cotton cord enencircling the head. Tied around her bodv, like rods on the ax of a Roman lietor,'are knitting sticks and needles of hard wood, rolls of cotton-yarn which the least pressure would reduce to powder, a little bell of pure gold, with a stohe tongue, and several jars which contained food and water to enable her soul to make the trip to Heaven. Like most of the other mummies, this wasrfound in a stone jar in the mound. It is inferred from observations that the very poor of this race consigned their dead to the grave with no other coffin than a cotton shroud, and the wealthy indulged in stone -Philadelphia Timet. The teetotal movement in the European army in India is extending month bymonth. By the returns for May this year, it seems that there are 7,400 noncommissioned officers and men of the service on the rolls of the total abstinence societies. . A good many horses about Boston and Roxbury are dying from starvation, caused by malignant sore throat.