Animal Mummies

A mummified eel's box

By the Late Period, animals were being turned into mummies if they had even a slight connection with a god. Mummies were made of snakes, fish, mice, gazelles (like deer), beetles and even eels.

This bronze eel is on top of a box containing an eel mummy. It has a human head wearing the double crown of Upper and Lower Egypt. The eel was the animal of one of the oldest gods, called Atum, who was said to have created the world. Eels and snakes were mummified and offered to Atum in his temples, then buried in his cemeteries nearby.