# Stuffed when dead? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 1, 2004, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stuffed-when-dead/257868 "2004-08-01T20:54:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![ChristineJellyBean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6a8cbe/32.png) [@ChristineJellyBean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ChristineJellyBean)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2004, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stuffed-when-dead/257868/1 "2004-08-01T20:54:39Z")
I have told my sister since I was about 12 (I’m 21 now) that I’m going to put in my will as a last request to be stuffed and sit on her fireplace :0) Do people ever get stuffed? ---
**Author:** ![yabob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yabob/32/2821_2.png) [@yabob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yabob)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2004, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stuffed-when-dead/257868/2 "2004-08-01T21:09:34Z")
Jeremy Bentham managed to have his wishes carried out: [http://members.aol.com/Philosdog/Bentham.html](http://members.aol.com/Philosdog/Bentham.html) [http://shakti.trincoll.edu/~awertz/philosopher/london/londonguide.html](http://shakti.trincoll.edu/~awertz/philosopher/london/londonguide.html) You might run afoul of some regulation or another these days. You will note that Bentham’s head is not kept with the rest of the body - it kept getting stolen, and reportedly was used by the students for football practice in one incident. ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2004, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stuffed-when-dead/257868/3 "2004-08-01T21:13:44Z")
There’s a college in my town (Lynn University in Boca Raton, Fl) that specialized in the “mortituary arts”, and they used to do research on Egyptian mummifaction, which IIRC involves some stuffing. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2004, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stuffed-when-dead/257868/4 "2004-08-01T23:05:35Z")
The latest technology in mummification is called [“plastination”,](http://www.koerperwelten.de/en/pages/plastination.asp) in which the corpse is soaked in acetone until all the water and fat is dissolved out, then replaced with silicone plastic. The result is a perfectly preserved mummy, soft and dry to the touch, and devoid of any smell. Should last darn near forever if stored correctly. ---
**Author:** ![Lissa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/85f322/32.png) [@Lissa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissa)\ **Post date:** [August 2, 2004, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stuffed-when-dead/257868/5 "2004-08-02T04:11:58Z")
> [@yabob](#): > > You will note that Bentham’s head is not kept with the rest of the body - it kept getting stolen, and reportedly was used by the students for football practice in one incident. Jeremy’s head isn’t in that great of shape. The preservation techniques weren’t advanced enough to make the head look life-like, so a wax model was made, and the real head was stored between his feet. As you noted, this turned out to be a not-so-good idea. Bentham actually asked that his form be preserved by the “New Zealand method” and “the entire skeleton with the head above it and connected with it, be placed in a sitting posture, and made up into the form of a living body, covered with the most decent suit of clothes, not being black or gray, which I may happen to leave at my decease.” [This](http://www.thoemmes.com/19cphil/autoicon_intro.htm) essay has some very interesting information: > [@](#): > > We opened the case containing the figure of Jeremy Bentham, and took out the latter. It was rather dusty, but not very much so. The clothes were much moth eaten, especially the undervest, and if taken off it would probably have been impossible to get the last on again. We undid the clothes, and found that they were stuffed with hay and tow, around the skeleton, which had been macerated and skilfully articulated. Both hands are present inside the gloves – the feet were not examined. > > In place of the head is a wax bust, which is supported on an iron spike. The head was found wrapped in cloth saturated with some bituminous or tarry substance (a sort of tarpaulin) and then in paper, making a parcel in the cavity of the trunk’s skeleton, being fashioned by strong wire running from the ribs to the vertebral column. On unpacking this the head itself was found to be mummified, dried, and prepared, by clearing any suboccipital soft parts, so that it looks not unlike a New Zealand head. In the sockets are glass eyes. The atlas, which had been macerated, is fastened in its natural place below the occipital bone. At the top of the head is a small hole in the skull, where the tip of the spike had doubtless come through, and round the hole is an impression formed by a circular washer and nut which had fitted the screw on the end of the spike, and by which the head was formerly fixed on the trunk. > > The face is clean shaved – hair scanty, grey and long. > > Bentham’s head was removed from the auto-icon’s rib cage and transferred to a separate box; then for a time it was on display at the feet of the auto-icon in its display cabinet. It seems that the head frequently went missing, on one occasion being kidnapped and held to ransom by students from King’s College, and on another turning up in a luggage locker at Aberdeen Station. Understandably, thereafter the head was moved to the security of the College vaults.