Chapter I: Front Matter

Transcriber’s notes:

In this transcription, paired _underscores_ denote _italicised text_.

Footnotes are located below the relevant paragraphs.

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It should be noted that the book is not a faithful translation of the original French text. The author/translator excluded sizeable portions of the original work and also inserted observations and notes of his own without necessarily identifying them as such. Furthermore, when compared with the original, the translated matter contains numerous anomalies of punctuation, use of diacritics and italics, spelling and paragraphing. Most of these have been left unchanged, but to assist the reader some punctuation has been corrected silently, including anomalous quotation marks (after consulting the French text).

Most overt spelling errors have also been corrected silently (and appended as a list at the end of this transcription), but other spelling anomalies have not been altered as many represent archaicisms of the period. The French word ‘enfin’ is inconsistently translated as ‘in fine’ or as ‘finally’.

Some pages were numbered incorrectly as a result of transposition of digits (89/98, 701/107). An unusual group of characters ‘O|O’ occurred in three places, two of which were non-existent in the French and have been deleted, while the third has been correctly rendered as ‘100’ in accordance with the French text. In several locations the author has changed units of measurement from ‘pints’ to ‘lbs’, and in this transcription the change has been noted as such by a comment within curly brackets, i.e. {pint}.

Footnotes added by the translator have been identified by upper-case letters to distinguish them from the French author’s original footnotes which are numbered. Some of the latter were significantly abbreviated/redacted by the translator.

The book cover was adapted from the original by the transcriber, who added a title to an otherwise featureless cover.

HISTORY

OF

EMBALMING,

AND OF

PREPARATIONS IN ANATOMY, PATHOLOGY,
AND NATURAL HISTORY;

INCLUDING

AN ACCOUNT OF A NEW PROCESS FOR EMBALMING.

BY J. N. GANNAL.

PARIS, 1838.

TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH, WITH NOTES AND
ADDITIONS.

BY R. HARLAN, M. D.

PHILADELPHIA:
PUBLISHED BY JUDAH DOBSON,
No. 106 Chestnut Street.
·········
1840.

MERRIHEW & THOMPSON, PRINTERS,
7 Carter’s alley.

NOTE OF THE TRANSLATOR.

It will be reasonably anticipated from the title of the present volume, that it embraces subjects of equal interest to the general and professional reader, as well as indispensable material for the researches of the practical anatomist and student of natural history.

The latter class will find in it all the requisite details for a successful prosecution of its arduous, intricate, but favorite pursuits; whilst those of its patrons of the former class, cannot fail to be interested in the various and important facts and discussions embraced in a general history of embalming from the earliest ages to the present period, so inseparably connected with the moral and physical history of our own species.

An additional subject of interest to all classes will be acknowledged in the facts and observations elicited by the arduous and industrious researches of the author, whilst investigating _the new process of embalming_, which has led to such happy results to the students of anatomy and natural history. The great importance, in all respects, of M. Gannal’s discovery, has been fully and adequately acknowledged by the different commissions appointed by the Institute of France, and the Royal Academy of Medicine, who have awarded to its author both honour and profit, as a real benefactor to science, to the progress of which he has so substantially added. The current of the text, together with the notes and illustrations of the translator, embraces all the discoveries of the age, of this nature, of value to the practical anatomist and naturalist, consisting both of original observations, and of highly important information contained in the standard works of De Bils, Ruysch, Swammerdam, Clauderus, De Rasière, Dumèril, Hunter, Breschet, Pole, Margolin, Bell, Cloquet, Swan, Parsons, Horner, &c.

Concerning the nature, extent, and merits of the new discovery of M. Gannal, the translator, has spoken in the appendix, from a personal acquaintance with the author and a minute examination of the collection of embalmed objects contained in his cabinet at Paris.

_Philadelphia, September, 1840._

ANALYTICAL TABLE OF CONTENTS.

PREFACE, p. 5.

INTRODUCTION, p. 9--Embalming among the Egyptians--Cause and origin
of this custom--Opinion of authors: Cassien, Herodotus, Diodorus
Sicculus, Maillet, Bory de Saint Vincent, Volney, Pariset,
etc.--First idea of embalming offered to the Egyptians by the
mummy of the sands--Opinion of Count de Caylus de Rouelle--Plan
of this work--Natural mummies--Mummies of the Guanches--Of the
Egyptians--Of the Jews--Of the Greeks and Romans--Of modern
nations--Mummies the object of superstitious dread--History of
the Pole, Razevil--Mummy employed as a remedy in disease--Its
marvellous properties--Officinal mummy of Crollius--In what
embalming consisted among the Egyptians and Guanches--What it
has been among the moderns--What my discoveries have made of
it--Motives which have induced me to publish this work.