The mystery of the mummy of the little Rosalia Lombardo, which opens the eyes finally elected!
In capuchin catacombs Palermo in Sicily, there is a scary mummy of a two-year-old girl who seems to open and close her eyes regularly. An Italian anthropologist solved the mystery of this little one surnames the “Beautiful in dormant wood”. A clue: she is not really a living dead man.
Little Rosalia Lombardo was only two years old when she died of pneumonia in 1920. His father had so much broken heart by losing his daughter that he asked a local embassy, Alfredo Salafia, to mummify her. Today exposed with thousands of other mummies in the Palermo Capuchin catacombs located under the Sicily Capuchin Convent, Rosalia has acquired the reputation of being one of the world’s best preserved mummies. But the "Beautiful in dormant wood" is also famous for another reason. Every day, Rosalia seems to move her eyelids to reveal her clear blue eyes, and for decades, no one could explain how it was possible.
Here is a time-lapse video to show you what it looks like:
Optical Illusion
Then, finally, in 2009, the anthropologist and curator of the Capuchins catacombs, Dario Piombino-Mascali, discredited the Sicilian myth of the beautiful blonde momified child. “All this is only an illusion of optics produced by the light that filters through the side windows of the coffin and that is subject to the changes during the day.” , he explained to the journalists.
Secret conservation formula
Dario Piombino-Mascali made this discovery when he noticed that the mummy glass coffin had been moved by the museum's employees, slightly shifting it, and allowing him to see his eyelids better than ever before. “They are not completely closed, and they have never been closed” , he said. The anthropologist also managed to find the mysterious formula used by Alfredo Salafia for the impeccable preservation of Rosalia. When Salafia died in 1933, he took away the secret of his conservative chemicals in his grave, and for decades no one could understand how Rosalia could be so perfectly intact after all these years.
While most mummies buried in catacombs were treated by monks and basically dried by the dry environment, Rosalia was artificially mummified. In 2009, Dario Piombino-Mascali found a manuscript in which Salafia lists the ingredients used to momify Rosalia. Here is what you can read: “a dose of glycerin, a saturated formol dose with sulfate and zinc chloride and a saturated alcohol dose of salicylic acid” .
An experienced chemist and taxidermist Alfredo Salafia had mixed this mixture and injected it into the body of the little Rosalia via a single small hole. The mixture then made effect, the formol eliminating all bacteria, glycerin ensuring that its body does not dry, and salicylic acid killing all mushrooms in the flesh. The role of zinc salts was to petrify Rosalia's body.
Now that Piombino-Mascali has solved the mystery of Rosalia’s preservation and its frightening eyes, he hopes that the many visitors of the catacombs will enjoy the curious mummy without going to create “utterly unfounded stories” about him.
Loading comments ...