Hidden Egyptian handbook reveals secrets of mummification Hidden Egyptian handbook revea... 1/1 A 3,500-year-old Egyptian medical text is shedding new light on the ancient practice of mummification. Recently discovered inside a much larger work, the papyrus document being studied by University of Copenhagen Egyptologist Sofie Schiødt is the oldest known mummification manual. If there is one thing about ancient Egypt that has captured the popular imagination, it's mummies. These wrapped and preserved bodies have survived for thousands of years, inspiring whole genres of romantic and horror fiction alongside the interest of the scientific community, but even today our understanding of exactly how they were made is incomplete.