Here’s What Mummies Smell Like

Dead bodies, almost universally, don’t smell great. Unless they perished in some sort of horrible caramel factory incident or from an allergic reaction in the middle of a field of roses? Chances are they aren’t producing any scent that’s whiff-worthy. Mummies, however, seem like they might an exception to the rule.

Again, a subterranean chamber housing a centuries-old corpse feels like it would definitely necessitate popping a clothespin on your schnoz. To be fair, I don’t have definitive information on the surrounding chamber, and thanks to mummies often being buried with food, I have a hunch that’s not clean air. The mummy itself, however, according to scientists who would know, smells, against all odds, pleasant. 

Massive props to the ancient embalmers, wherever their remains are interred, because they were positively incredible at their job of making a body timeproof.

We know this thanks to a study carried out by the University College London and the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, which employed both researchers and laymen’s noses to sniff mummies and record their thoughts. Which is a hell of a way to make a week’s pay. 

According to them, mummies’ bouquet is positively floral, with a list of notes that you could easily find in an overpriced boutique candle. The scented waxes and oils used to preserve the mummy worked their magic, with smells like pine, cedar, juniper, frankincense and myrrh surviving the millennia to be picked up today. 

Turns out wearing eau de mummy might not end a date as fast as you thought.