
Sign up to save your podcasts
Or


Think of ancient mummies, and you might imagine Egyptian pharaohs in their highly decorated cases. But in actual fact, Chile has the oldest mummies in the world. Unesco recently addded the archaeological sites and the artificial mummification of the Chinchorro culture to its World Heritage List. Around 300 mummies have been excavated from three different sites in the north of the country, near the border with Peru. The nomination took decades of work, drawing on many years of different scientific studies.
Jane Chambers travels to Arica in northern Chile to find out more about the Chinchorro culture and how they used mummification to remember their dead, 7000 years ago.
Photo: Chilean mummy from the Chinchorro culture (Credit: Bioarchaeology lab of the University of Tarapaca)
By BBC World Service4.4
939939 ratings
Think of ancient mummies, and you might imagine Egyptian pharaohs in their highly decorated cases. But in actual fact, Chile has the oldest mummies in the world. Unesco recently addded the archaeological sites and the artificial mummification of the Chinchorro culture to its World Heritage List. Around 300 mummies have been excavated from three different sites in the north of the country, near the border with Peru. The nomination took decades of work, drawing on many years of different scientific studies.
Jane Chambers travels to Arica in northern Chile to find out more about the Chinchorro culture and how they used mummification to remember their dead, 7000 years ago.
Photo: Chilean mummy from the Chinchorro culture (Credit: Bioarchaeology lab of the University of Tarapaca)

7,747 Listeners

1,065 Listeners

5,471 Listeners

1,821 Listeners

967 Listeners

1,789 Listeners

1,047 Listeners

2,077 Listeners

609 Listeners

765 Listeners

89 Listeners

403 Listeners

427 Listeners

827 Listeners

736 Listeners

230 Listeners

333 Listeners

359 Listeners

479 Listeners

244 Listeners

3,221 Listeners

743 Listeners

115 Listeners

1,041 Listeners