Pictures: Millions of Puppy Mummies in Egypt Labyrinth

Gone to the Dogs
Photograph courtesy P.T. Nicholson
As part of the first full excavation of Egypt's ancient Dog Catacombs, scientists examine 2,500-year-old animal remains—a small sample of the roughly eight million animal mummies in these tunnels.
Likely supplied by ancient puppy mills, most of the mummies are dogs, and many were just hours old when taken for mummification, according to new research based on the summer 2010 excavation.
Snaking beneath the desert at the ancient royal burial ground of Saqqara (map), the Dog Catacombs were discovered more than a century ago. But only now is research shedding light on the massive number of mummies found in this complex of tunnels and chambers dedicated to Anubis (picture)—jackal-headed god of the afterlife.
Poorly mummified and piled high, the carcasses long ago deteriorated into indistinct heaps, experts say.
"It's not easy to identify individual mummies in the galleries or in the photographs," said Paul Nicholson of Cardiff University in the U.K. "We have piles of mummy remains just over a meter [three feet] high, on average, that just fill the side tunnels.
"Although the mummies are not well preserved or well decorated, unlike some museum specimens, they can still give us a great deal of scientific information," Nicholson added.
The mummies were stacked between about the late sixth century B.C. and the late first century B.C., Nicholson said.
(Related: "Dog Mummies Found in Ancient Peru Pet Cemetery.")
Published April 6, 2011
Mummy Pile
Photograph courtesy P.T. Nicholson
Piled with decomposing animal mummies, a tunnel in the Dog Catacombs is evidence of ancient Egyptian pilgrims' fierce desire to be heard by the canine-headed god Anubis.
Today, "in some churches people light a candle, and their prayer is taken directly up to God in that smoke,” archaeologist Salima Ikram said. In much the same way, a mummified dog's spirit would carry a person's prayer to the afterlife, said Ikram, founder of the Animal Mummy Project at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.
"And because it's the same kind of species as the god, it would have special access to Anubis's ear. So the person would have a sort of direct line to the god," Ikram added.
(Related: "Egypt Confirms Looting, Vandalism of Saqqara and Other Antiquity Sites.")
Published April 6, 2011
Body of Evidence
Photograph courtesy P.T. Nicholson
Mummified dogs such as this aren't the only animals filling the Dog Catacombs.
"There are also some jackals, foxes, and, ichneumon [Egyptian mongooses]," said Cardiff's University's Nicholson. "But the overwhelming majority of animals here are dogs, so we believe this place was intended just for the cult of Anubis."
Elsewhere in Saqqara's so-called Sacred Animal Necropolis, there were many other cults—and many other mummified animals, including baboons, cows, bulls, and so on, said Nicholson, whose work was partly funded by the National Geographic Society's Committee for Research and Exploration. (The Society owns National Geographic News.)
(See pictures: Egypt’s Animal Mummies.)
Published April 6, 2011
Tortuous Work
Photograph courtesy P.T. Nicholson
The mazelike Dog Catacombs hold dogs of "all shapes and sizes, all ages, from fetal to mature," the Egyptian Museum's Ikram said.
"Some are short-legged, more like dachshund types, while others are long-legged and more like golden retriever types. I think they [mummified] whatever was there at the time and whatever suited the pilgrim's pocket."
Ancient puppy farms likely operated in the area to supply dogs in such numbers, and many of the animals were mummified as newborns, Cardiff's Nicholson said.
"Perhaps the priests of Anubis would have regularly taken a certain number of animals each week to mummify for pilgrims."
(Related:"Buried Dogs Were Divine 'Escorts' for Ancient Americans.")
Published April 6, 2011
Face-to-Snout
Photograph courtesy P.T. Nicholson
The Egyptian Museum's Ikram takes a close look at a mummified dog in a special niche in the catacombs—one likely commensurate with an honored role in real life.
A number of older, male dogs that might have lived in the nearby Temple of Anubis were mummified with far more care than the rest, Ikram speculated.
"We think that these might have been the actual sacred dogs that were the manifestation of Anubis on Earth," she added.

Strangely, a small number of cat mummies have also been found in the Dog Catacomb. Perhaps, Ikram speculated, the felines had taken up residence in the Temple of Anubis and become sacred by association.

Or maybe they were fakes. "There may have been some time when they didn't have enough dogs and decided to just wrap up a cat and make it look like a dog," she said. "It might have been a charlatan moment."

(Related: "Surprise Egypt Tombs Yield Ornate Coffins, Dog Mummies.")
Published April 6, 2011
Portal to the Underworld
Photograph courtesy P.T. Nicholson
A worker tidies an entrance to the Dog Catacomb. With the permission of Egypt's Ministry of Antiquities and in association with the Egypt Exploration Society, archaeologists continue to sift sands at the site.
Cardiff's Nicholson said, "For the first time at this site, we're looking at a really large sample of the dog mummies and trying to learn how old they are, what gender they are, whether we can say anything about their species or how they met their deaths."
Among other remaining mysteries: oddly avian mummies. "They are wrapped up as falcons," Ikram said, "but until we're able to have them x-rayed, we won't know exactly what they are."
(Also see "Dog Sacrifices Found in Medieval Hungarian Village.")
Published April 6, 2011