Sometimes, it has been reported that ancient tombs have been opened, and one may contain a human body that remains lifelike-even after hundreds of years. I know that the RCC had a tradition at one time, of regarding such bodies as evidence 9that the person lived a very holy life). My question; are there any verified accounts of an un-mummified human body staying in lifelike conditions? Such stories usually say that once opened, the bodies usually begin to deacy quickly. are there any truthful accounts of such a phenomena?
Not that I’m aware of. They make great stories, but verifiable accounts seem to lead back to either fabulation, or tombs opened only shortly after burial. See Paul Barber’s book Vampires, Burial, and Death.
I am a faithful Catholic. There are many mysteries, when we try to contemplate the spiritual; this idea of the uncorrupted bodies is really difficult for me to swallow, however. With certain Catholic saints, & other famous people I have either read about or I remember being taken on a New Orleans cemetary tour and having a body pointed out to us through a window (I couldn’t really see), the bodies are supposedly “uncorrupted.” For instance, check out the website on St. Bernadette http://www.catholicpilgrims.com/lourdes/ba_bernadette_intro.htm. I even remember reading about one female saint who believers or church representatives cut into pieces to distribute to different churches – little Catholic rabbits’ feet, I guess. Also, why would it be a sign of saintliness for the body to be uncorrupted – wouldn’t it only be a good thing if the body & spirit rose up together to heaven as with Mary & Jesus? What’s so good about the body staying uncorrupted on the earth? Also, there’s also often this other related body-saint thing I have read about where you can supposedly see the people present at the death in the saint’s eyes reflected or captured somehow in their eyes?; and supposedly “scientists” have dissected the eye, or done things with computers, etc., so you can see these images really clearly. Is it all just malarky?
While this is hardly a credible source, the short lived series *Miracles *dealt with this “miracle” in their first episode. A woman’s body was found undecomposed and Our Hero Paul Kallan, an investigator for the Catholic Church, was called in to examine it. He quickly discovered that the body was buried underneath an apricot tree. He said the apricot pits contained a substance which preserved the bodies lying beneath them, and ordered the exumation (sp?) of a nearby body to verify. He was right, that one was undecompsed, as well. IIRC, there was a soapy texture to the corpses’ skin, also a result of the apricot pits. A diagnosis of not-miraculous was rendered.
My google-fu is weak, though. I can’t find any more reputable cite to back this up.
It’s not any foreign substance, it’s a natural part of the decomposition process under certain conditions. It’s called saponification and the end substance is adipocere, which is the major composant of “soap mummies” (possibly disturbing images on that last one).
Aaah. From your cite: “This process is more common where the amount of fatty tissue is high, the agents of decomposition absent or only minutely present, and the burial ground is particularly alkali.” So perhaps the apricots were respondible for the alkalinization of the soil. Makes sense.
Lifelike? No. There are confirmed reports of the corpse drying out, the skin toughening, and no other decomposition taking place.
That bit is a myth.
The design, materials etc of some tombs quickly drew moisture out of the body. While the resulting appearance is more leathery than lifelike, the body does decompose, and opening the tomb a few centuries later would reveal a seemingly intact body preserved incorroputible by miracle.
I’ve seen at least one case which did turn out to be a mummy. The original investigators were men who did not wish to disrespect a female corpse. They did not remove her burial clothes, or look at her torso. A more recent team undressed the corpse and found that several large openings had been made in the skin and then stitched shut. The organs had been removed. She’d been packed with preservative herbs.
Cites for the above- A nice, credible, documentary aimed at uncovering the science behind the seemingly impossible, rather than the astounding mysteries style you see on the Discovery channel today. I really wish I could remember the name.
Indeed. In Orthodoxy, this is what is usually referred to when mention is made of an incorruptible saint. The body dries out and the skin darkens, but it doesn’t rot or stink. See, for example, the relics of St. John Maximovich, Fr. Ilie Lacatusu, St. Gregory of Raitho, and for good measure the hand of St. John Chrysostom.
In Orthodox theology, the body remaining incorruptible is viewed as evidence of a person’s sanctity; as the body is as much a part of a person as the soul, a person who has been glorified in heaven will often have their body remain incorrupt on earth. It’s not definitive proof of their sainthood, of course, but is considered one point in favor of it.
Don’t click the Soap Mummies link!!!
Gaaah. The horror. The horror.
Java applets, Flash, probably midi or streaming MP3 too, though my sound is off. It’s one of the worst “throw as much crap as I can onto one page” home site I’ve ever seen. And it has a black background. Locked my underpowered PC up for about five minutes. (And I never got to see the mummies.)
I may be new here, but this is a subject I’ve been reading a lot about lately. I’m also a faithful Roman Catholic. 
Miss-Shari (and anyone else who reads this post), hopefully by the time you’re done reading what I’ve written, you’ll have a better understanding of this concept of “incorruptibles” and also the distribution of relics.
It is a little hard for us to swallow, this idea of peoples bodies not decomposing after their deaths. While some cases, like the one mentioned earlier about the bodies being preserved because they were buried under an apricot tree, are just events that happen naturally, there are many incidents (St. Bernadette, St. Cecilia…the list goes on) when the body simply does not decay, or if it does decay, it is not at the normal rate. Sometimes the only way to explain it is the supernatural. There are documented examples of coffins being placed in very moist environments and decaying, but the corpse(s) inside remain(s) incorrupt. There are even documented examples of the corpses being lifelike, meaning they are flexible, the skin is not discolored, etc.
The reason this is considered a sign of their holiness is because it has already been determined (by the Church, who always conducts very thorough investigations) that it not by natural means (Like apricots) that these bodies have not decayed and therefore is attributed to being a sign of God’s favor. However, just to keep the record straight, incorruption is not accepted as a miracle for beatification or canonization, it just helps their cause. A good book to read regarding incorruptibles is “Incorruptibles” by Joan Carroll Cruz. She details the different forms of natural “incorruption” as well as the seemingly-supernatural incorruption of saints.
As for the division of the saint’s body to be sent to various parishes throughout the world, this is connected with a tradition that dates back to the earliest days of the Church. First off, let me clarify something: When talking about relics, I am referring to first-class relics, defined as a bone or other part of the saints body, whereas a second-class relic is something they owned (such as clothing) and a third-class relic is something that has been touched to a first- or second-class relic. Now that we’ve got that straight, on with the explanation!
The reason the relics are divided up and sent around the world is primarily because, during the Mass of Dedication for a new Church, a relic of a saint (or relics from several different saints) is sealed inside the Altar during its consecration. The reason for this lies in the celebration of “the breaking of the Bread”, as the Mass was called in the early Church. During the days of persecution, early Christians who feared discovery would celebrate the Mass on the tombs of the martyrs. While the Altar is no longer the tomb of a martyr of the faith, the Code of Canon Law (the laws of the Catholic Church) has this to say: The ancient tradition of placing relics of martyrs or other saints under a fixed altar is to be preserved. (CIC 1237 §2)
So ralph124c, the answer to YOUR question
Yes, there are truthful accounts of the phenomena of incorrupt, lifelike, un-mummified corpses from centuries past, even ones that do not rapidly decay after the opening of the coffin. In addition to “Incorruptibles”, Joan Carroll Cruz has written many other books in similar veins (such as Relics & Eucharistic Miracles) that you might find interesting and/or helpful.
There’s a (probably apocryphal) story about Henry VIII’s sixth queen, Catherine Parr. Seems the chapel in which poor Catherine’s tomb was located fell into ruin about 100 years after her death. When it was discovered, they found that the body inside the lead coffin was still “flexible and moist” and in a remarkable state of preservation.
Samuel Pepys reported in his famous diary that he actually took her body up in his arms and “proceeded to kiss her, reflecting that my first kiss was to a Queen.”
Exposure to air quickly decomposed the body, and when it was finally interred in the restored chapel, it was nothing but bones.