Israel to exhibit antique mummy with recent diseases

Israel’s national museum is set to display a 2,200-year-old Egyptian mummy of a man who was afflicted with some modern-day illnesses such as osteoporosis and tooth decay, the museum said on Tuesday.

The illnesses, discovered using a CT scan, indicate that during his lifetime, the man was largely sedentary, avoided manual labour in the sun and probably ate a carbohydrate-heavy diet.
The mummy is the only such relic in Israel, named the “Protective Eye of Horus,” after a pharaonic deity. It was kept for decades at a Jesuit institute in Jerusalem before it was loaned to the Israel Museum. It will be displayed in a museum setting for the first time starting on Wednesday.

The research on the mummy builds on previous international studies that have shown that people in ancient Egyptian times suffered from some of the modern-day diseases.