Original subtitles

NARRATOR: Could this 5,000-year-old ball

be a stone cold killer?

SOMARA: Catapulted, thrown.

It could do some damage.

NARRATOR: Is this literally shocking invention

the Victorian Viagra?

AUERBACH: Order one of Pulvermacher's electrified belts

and turn yourself into a paradigm of masculinity.

NARRATOR: And what is so wrong about this ancient

Egyptian mummified cat.

This mummy is empty. There's no cat in it.

NARRATOR: These are the most remarkable and mysterious

objects on Earth.

Hidden away in museums,

laboratories, and storage rooms.

Now, new research and technology can

get under their skin like never before.

We can rebuild them,

pull them apart,

and zoom in

to reveal the unbelievable,

the ancient,

and the truly bizarre.

These are the world's strangest things.

Locked in a cabinet at the National Museum of Scotland

sits a strange stone object.

It was carved from a solid black rock

thousands of years ago.

It's beautiful, and it's aesthetic,

and it's almost like a piece of art.

NARRATOR: It is one of archaeology's

greatest mysteries.

It must have a function.

Archaeologists have been speculating about it for over

a century, but we still don't know what it is.

NARRATOR: Now, using the latest technology,

we can re-examine this incredible object

in minute detail.

This is the Towie ball.

For over 160 years,

the function of this intricately

decorated rock has eluded archaeologists.

The Towie ball is made of stone.

It weighs about a pound.

It's the shape and dimension of a baseball.

It features four stone lobes,

three of which are decorated with concentric circles

and spirals.

It's a remarkable object.

NARRATOR: The ball might be considered a one-off curiosity,

but it isn't,

BELLINGER: We've now found over 500 of these objects.

They range in exact size and in the type of stone used,

but they're all similar enough to be grouped, reasonably, as

a single category.

NARRATOR: But it is the Towie ball that

stands out as the most complex,

detailed, and finest of them all.

Who made it?

What is it for?

How old is it?

The Towie ball is discovered around 1860 by workmen digging

a drainage ditch in the small Scottish hamlet of Towie,

hence the name.

In fact, nearly all the carved

balls have turned up in Scotland.

They've been found in various places, about 20 in the Orkneys,

two in England and Ireland, and one from Norway.

But the majority have been found in Northeast Scotland,

and that suggests that this is almost certainly

a Scottish artifact.

They form broadly two groups,

one with these sort of nodular protuberances,

like the Towie ball,

others which can have many tens of bumps

or pustules or nubbins

upon them, looking very much

like very spiky versions of the Towie ball.

NARRATOR: But it is the Towie ball,

the most intricate of them all, that really

intrigues archaeologists.

MacDONALD: In archaeology,

we often date things by association,

but here, we have an object on its own and dateless.

NARRATOR: It isn't until 2013,

over 150 years after the ball was found,

that archaeologists finally uncover

a definitive way of dating it.

New excavations at the Ness of Brodgar

in the Orkneys discover a stone ball

beneath a wooden buttress.

NARRATOR: Archaeologists can use carbon dating

of the wood buttress to get a definitive age

for the ball, as they are confident it had been

intentionally buried beneath the buttress.

It was radiocarbon dated

to 2900 BC.

NARRATOR: So the stone carved balls, including the Towie ball,

are around 5,000 years old, from the Neolithic period.

BELLINGER: The Neolithic first appeared

over 10,000 years ago in the Middle East and China,

where they developed new technologies

for growing food crops, rather than having to go

out and hunt and gather their food.

NARRATOR: It is the beginning of farming

and a settled way of life.

It was also a revolution

technologically speaking, especially in terms of

the creation of polished stone artifacts

and also the increased complex decoration

of objects.

NARRATOR: The Neolithic period is a dramatic

and permanent transformation of human existence.

BELLINGER: Neolithic literally means "new stone age,"

and stone was the calling card and the core tool

and material that the individuals living in

this time worked with.

Stone endures in just about every environment,

and so that is what we have for the most part to make

our understandings of the Neolithic people.

NARRATOR: The level of expertise and man hours

needed to create these stone balls

suggest they must play

a very significant role in Neolithic life.

But what is it?

What are these carved stone balls for?

One theory that's been suggested for the Towie ball

is that it is a demonstration

of the skill of the stonemason who made it.

Some have speculated that these stones

were actually, in effect,

portable portfolios that

craftspeople could carry around with them and present

as evidence of the quality and the variety of work

that they could produce,

and that could explain the level of detail.

It's a bit of showing off, really.

NARRATOR: The idea that these carved balls

are a sort of stonemason CV would

help explain some of the differences between

the 500 or so balls discovered.

Or does it?

Only maybe a dozen are as intricate

or as well finished as the Towie ball.

So that does not fully convince

to explain why they were made.

NARRATOR: Unless they aren't all finished pieces.

SOMARA: It took a huge amount of work to create these things.

So maybe the ones that were less finessed were

the result of people just giving up, getting frustrated.

Maybe the stonemason just ran out of steam.

NARRATOR: But some archaeologists think this idea

is just too hard to reconcile with the evidence.

It's not a theory that's entirely without

any merit, but it's not the strongest explanation.

NARRATOR: There is a very different and rather

surprising theory to explain the Towie ball.

Maybe it was some kind of Stone-Age storybook.

BELLINGER: Storytelling has always

been hugely important to humanity,

but 5,000 years ago in Neolithic Britain,

there wasn't any way of writing it down.

It was all oral.

MacDONALD: The notion is that the Towie ball might

have served as a sort of trigger for memory, using

the undulations on its surface as a kind of

means of counting or stringing together

a narrative by playing your fingers across it.

NARRATOR: Mnemonic storytelling aids do exist in other cultures.

MacDONALD: For the Luba people of Central Africa,

there's a tangible vehicle of memory, which is known as

a lukasa, or a memory board.

And these, made out of wood,

with some iconographic carving added to them,

but mainly with beads of different colors strung to them,

are used as a system of cues for recounting epic tales.

NARRATOR: But there's a snag with this theory.

Only a handful of balls are carved with

any real detail, and even they throw up problems.

Even if we look at the very best objects

for this sort of thing, like the Towie ball,

the patterns are simply too repetitive and too simple

to be extremely useful as a mnemonic device.

NARRATOR: Perhaps the Towie ball is something

less artistic and altogether more violent.

NARRATOR: There are multiple competing explanations for

the 5,000-year-old Towie ball's purpose.

One popular theory is that it is a weapon.

BELLINGER: Looking at these balls

and actually handling them,

it sort of brings to mind a weapon, potentially.

Those things weighing about a pound each,

if you hit someone with it, it's gonna hurt.

It's gonna leave a mark.

NARRATOR: The idea that the Towie ball might be

a Neolithic killing machine

fits well with increasing evidence

that this is not a peaceful time.

Neolithic burials have been excavated for,

you know, over 100 years.

But it's only recently, with the development of very

sophisticated osteoarchaeology, that we can begin to understand

how people died in the Neolithic.

MacDONALD: Increasing evidence shows that warfare

was more common than we have thought.

This wasn't a shiny, happy community all the time.

NARRATOR: Head injuries inflicted by weapons often

leave a very recognizable pattern of fractures.

MacDONALD: A recent research project examining

350 Neolithic crania from Britain

found that up to 7 percent had instances of traumatic injury.

I mean, if you think about it, with the positive aspects of

reliance on agriculture,

which allows you to settle in one place,

you've got a lot of people settled in one place,

and human nature being what it is, that inevitably leads to

stratification and ultimately, to conflict.

NARRATOR: So what kind of weapon could the Towie ball be?

MacDONALD: They could have been used as a kind of macehead,

with the lobes giving a means to wrap

sinew or cord around them and attach them to a stout stick,

and therefore be a kind of war club.

NARRATOR: But if it is just a glorified Stone Age club,

why decorate it so carefully?

There are precedents for this,

particularly the mouth macehead,

which is another Neolithic object, which is quite

extensively decorated.

NARRATOR: But there may be a problem with this theory.

We know that the Towie ball is made

out of a metamorphic stone known as hornfels.

If this hits a solid object,

it is going to suffer a conchoidal fracture,

much in the way that glass would.

NARRATOR: Expanding the state-of-the-art

3D graphic, we can examine every part of

the Towie ball for the tiniest evidence of this

distinct fracture.

We don't see these sort of fractures on

the Towie ball or any other of these stone balls.

NARRATOR: We also know Neolithic peoples

often bury their weapons in their graves,

but the Towie ball is not found in a grave, and neither

are many of the other carved balls.

It all suggests the Towie ball isn't a weapon.

But is there another explanation,

one that would justify the effort that

has gone into making the Towie ball?

Is it a message to their gods?

One thing that's really striking about these objects,

when you look closely at the designs themselves,

is that they really resemble those found on some

religious structures created during the same time.

So particularly thinking about Newgrange,

a passage grave in Ireland.

You know, it suggests that there could

be a religious purpose to these balls.

NARRATOR: Archaeologists believe religion

and these intricate symbols

are intimately connected to life in the Neolithic.

It brings us back to the ideology of the people of

the Neolithic period in Europe --

the winter solstice, the equinox, bodies of water,

offerings to other worlds.

We can see traces of the ritual, but it's hard for

us to connect the dots and reconstruct the full

spiritual system.

But it was there.

NARRATOR: So what is the truth about the Towie ball?

Stonemasons' advert, weapon, Stone Age storybook?

With so many possibilities,

there is no single answer

and ultimately, we may find that there are two

or three different viable interpretations

for the use of these objects.

NARRATOR: The Towie ball remains an enduring

and beautiful mystery and a window

into the lives of our ancestors 5,000 years ago.

In an antique collector's cabinet in Virginia sits

a strange metal contraption from the 19th century.

It was, quite literally, one of

the most shocking medical devices ever created.

NARRATOR: Now, using the latest technology,

we're bringing this bizarre contraption out into the light.

Pulvermacher's electro galvanic chain.

It was claimed to be a revolution in medical science.

NARRATOR: It's made from 120 perforated metal links

connected together into a chain.

Each link consists of a copper casing, housing

a zinc rod wrapped in vinegar-soaked cloth.

Handles made of metal and wood attach to either end.

It looks well made and has

the feel of a professional piece of kit.

MARKS: People went crazy for them.

Thousands of people were strapping

these strange things across their bodies.

NARRATOR: Which is surprising, given that its sole function was

to deliver 132 volts of electricity directly into

the body,

more or less equivalent to plugging yourself

into a U.S. power outlet.

This is basically a device for electrocuting yourself.

NARRATOR: Why would someone do something so bizarre?

Does it actually produce electricity?

And were people really electrocuting themselves

for their health?

NARRATOR: In the mid-19th century, Britain's empire is

expanding rapidly.

The country is embracing change,

led by an explosion of innovation

and game-changing invention.

And then there's the Pulvermacher belt.

Its inventor, Isaac Pulvermacher,

is a mysterious figure.

We don't have any photographs of him, but we know

he was a Prussian traveling inventor.

NARRATOR: In the 1850s,

Pulvermacher is traveling around Europe,

gathering support and testimonies that will help

him sell what he claims is the portable cure for almost

every ailment known to man.

The self applicable electro galvanic chain belt,

for the cure of nervous and chronic diseases

without medicine.

What a title.

MARKS: It's a panacea.

It can treat rheumatism, liver problems,

tiredness, headaches,

dizziness, fatigue, even sexual problems.

So you name it, the belt can fix it

through the magic of electricity.

Or so says the mysterious Pulvermacher.

NARRATOR: Pulling the belt apart reveals that it

can definitely give you a nasty shock.

So the belt consists of a series of

interconnected links.

Each one has a copper casing, and inside that is a zinc rod,

which is wrapped in a little cloth

soaked in vinegar.

NARRATOR: Two different metals,

with a conducting liquid between,

like vinegar, will produce electricity.

It's high school science.

This makes every link in the belt

an individual battery cell.

SELLA: The beauty of these things is

that the more of these you link up,

the bigger the voltage you get.

STEELE: Pulvermacher had a range of different models,

but the 120-cell version

could deliver a whopping 132 volts.

NARRATOR: There are several recommended ways

to use the device.

These include the simple shock method,

where you hold the metal tubes with damp hands and bang

the linked chains together.

Each time they connect, you get a shock.

There is the conductor brush, specifically

for electrocuting the mouth and ears.

And then there is the interrupting clockwork system,

which, when connected to the electric chain

and wound up, sends shocks to that part of the body

that most needs a regular jolt.

But where does Pulvermacher get the idea that

electricity really can be some kind of miracle cure?

And why do the Victorians buy into it?

The idea of medical electricity really takes hold

in the 18th century with the quest for something called

the vital force

and an accidental experiment

with a frog. -[frog croaks]

Vital force is an idea that goes all the way back

to the ancient Egyptians.

What is it that animates living beings?

What is this mysterious force that

makes things alive rather than dead?

NARRATOR: The man who believes he has

found it is Italian scientist Luigi Galvani.

His experiment is...unusual.

STEELE: He was playing around

with static electricity machines,

and, at the same time, dissecting frogs,

and what we think might have happened

is that one of his assistants touched

a scalpel on a nerve in the frog's leg.

Perhaps that scalp had been charged up with some

static electricity from somewhere, and the frog's

leg kicked, and what this showed us was there was

a fundamental relationship between electricity

and whatever makes muscles move.

NARRATOR: Galvani is convinced that he has discovered

this vital force,

and he renames it animal electricity,

a life force that comes from the tissue itself.

When Galvani publishes his first report

on this experiment, it really, no pun intended,

shocks the world.

NARRATOR: Galvani believes his new theory

of animal electricity has huge medical potential.

STEELE: But it was gonna take more than the kicking leg

of a dead frog to convince the world of this.

This all changed in 1798, when Galvani died and passed

on the baton on to his nephew and assistant, Giovanni Aldini.

NARRATOR: Aldini takes his uncle's theories on the road.

The inspiration for the Pulvermacher belt

comes partly from his work,

one of literally the most shocking experiments of

the entire 19th century.

NARRATOR: Pulvermacher's electrical belt

is a medical invention that takes

the 19th century by storm.

It relies on the idea that

electricity is the vital force of life.

One man more than any other becomes

famous for spreading that idea around Europe --

Italian scientist Giovanni Aldini.

He tours Europe with a voltaic pile, and he uses it to conduct

electricity through the cadavers of various animals,

like dogs and sheep, making them kick and twitch.

But he decides to up the ante a bit and uses not an animal...

[woman screaming]

...but a person.

NARRATOR: His most famous experiment takes place in

1803 at the Royal College of Surgeons.

In front of a large audience,

Aldini hooks his device up to recently hanged murderer,

George Foster.

He sends 132 volts of electricity

surging through the dead convict's corpse,

and it immediately begins to move.

The audience is terrified -- they think Aldini is trying to

bring back to life a dead murderer,

but he reassures them saying, no,

this is a device that might be able to revive others

and save their lives,

perhaps someone who had recently drowned.

NARRATOR: Aldini's demonstration

changes the way 19th century people view electricity.

Even Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is directly

influenced by George Foster's electrifying return.

Of course, Aldini isn't actually re-animating the dead.

He is demonstrating that the nervous system uses

electricity to control a living body.

STEELE: Our muscles move in response to electrical signals

that flow through our nerves to the muscles.

Electricity is a vital force,

but in a dead body, there's no source of electricity.

NARRATOR: Maybe the fabled vital force hasn't been discovered,

but here is proof that electricity

is an essential part of life.

Aldini's experiment kickstarts further

experimentation in using

electrotherapy to treat all kinds of ailments.

It's thought that the application

of direct current to the human body

might be able to cure all kinds of issues,

a true panacea.

NARRATOR: The world is ready to embrace electricity

in medicine -- they call it electrotherapy.

And leading the charge is Pulvermacher's belt.

So does this strange device really work?

By the middle of the 19th century,

electrotherapy is all the rage.

You have clinics opening up in major cities like London

and Paris, all promising cures

for whatever ails you through

the application of direct current.

NARRATOR: But the miracle electrotherapy cures rapidly

get out of hand.

As is often the case with new inventions,

especially those that tout to cure common ailments,

it quickly moves out of the control of scientists

and medical professionals,

and electrotherapy becomes something that

people are interested in as a household item.

NARRATOR: This huge expansion in electrotherapy is possible

because of a very different type of invention --

mail order catalogs.

AUERBACH: Mail order catalogs are the predecessors

of things like Amazon.

You have a huge catalog.

You see the item you like, you put in an order, and presto,

a few days or weeks later, it shows up on your doorstep.

NARRATOR: In this brave new world of mail order

miracle cures, Pulvermacher's belt is a smash hit.

WEST: People want to be convinced that

what you have will work.

They want you to cure their baldness or their impotence

or whatever else it is, and it makes them feel

better to think that there's something out there that works.

NARRATOR: And you can tell them pretty much anything you want.

Unlike now, there are no rules around advertising.

There's no licensing, and there's no regulation of

the market. -The moment you allow

someone to lie and make money and face no consequences,

the obvious result is that people will

lie and make money and face no consequences.

NARRATOR: And it isn't just Pulvermacher's electrotherapy

cures taking advantage of this medical free-for-all.

In parts of America,

there are three times as many quack doctors as real ones,

and the mail order cure business is driving them.

You can find adverts for face soap containing

small amounts of arsenic.

You can find cigarettes that are supposed to cure asthma

and cholera, and you can even find

adverts with images of toddlers

advertising cocaine toothache drops.

NARRATOR: Pulvermacher's belt rides this wave of miracle cures

because it is supported by some eye-catching advertising.

One always successful strategy is to appeal to either

femininity or to masculinity, and this is exactly what's done

with the electrified belt, and there's advertisements of these

rather buff Victorian men in kind of scant clothing with

this belt strapped on, and it asks the viewer,

"Men, why are you weak?"

The solution is obvious -- order one of Pulvermacher's

electrified belts, and turn yourself into

a paradigm of masculinity.

And it isn't just Pulvermacher

trying to corner the electrotherapy market.

So you start to see ads for electric socks,

you've got electric corsets,

advertisements for all kinds of home electrotherapy devices,

claiming to cure everything and anything that

ails the human body.

In this brave new world of DIY

electrotherapy treatments, Pulvermacher's belt

is making a killing, and he moves his main production

center from London to Cincinnati,

allowing him to sell belts across Europe and America.

NARRATOR: But there is one very big issue with lots

of these electrotherapy cures, including Pulvermacher's belt.

AUERBACH: The real problem with all these electrotherapy

gadgets is that the claims were completely overblown.

The idea that you can cure constipation and headaches

and impotence all simply by mildly electrocuting yourself

is ridiculous.

NARRATOR: So ridiculous, in fact, that it

eventually attracts the attention of

the U.S. government.

How will they respond to these outlandish claims?

NARRATOR: By the early 20th century,

the writing is on the wall for the Wild West world of

electrotherapy miracle cures, like the Pulvermacher belt.

The government clamps down on

the false promises made by electrotherapy devices.

You also have the postal office stepping in and more

carefully regulating what you can buy

and sell and deliver over the postal service.

NARRATOR: The government has spotted

a major stumbling block with the belt.

There's no proof that it makes anyone better.

The market in home electrotherapy devices

really crashes out, and Pulvermacher's

electro galvanic medical chain goes down with it.

NARRATOR: Pretty soon, it's impossible to sell

an electrical miracle cure

without actually proving that it works.

It's the end of the line for Pulvermacher's belt.

The company goes bust, which really

shouldn't come as much of a shock.

At the Penn Museum in Philadelphia

is a curious ancient Egyptian relic,

a tiny mummy -- but not of a human.

This strange bundle of linen strips

has the unmistakable head of a cat.

Cats were really important for the ancient Egyptians.

So, you know, it makes sense that they would

have wanted to mummify cats just as they did humans.

NARRATOR: But something about this mummy shocked researchers.

Now, using cutting-edge imaging technology, we can show in

astonishing detail what is so strange

about this bizarre object.

It is 19 inches long, with a small, round head,

tiny ears, eyes, and a nose, attached to

an elongated body without legs.

But that's not what makes this artifact so strange.

NARRATOR: Because for a cat mummy, it's got one very

big shortcoming,

There's no cat inside, not even any random bones.

NARRATOR: Where is the cat? Was it removed?

Was the cat even there in the first place?

Could this weird relic be a modern fake,

or an ancient one?

Egyptian mummies have fascinated people for hundreds

of years, but it reaches a peak in the 19th century.

Egyptomania was an international craze

around the world at the time.

NARRATOR: People just can't get enough

of Egypt and its mummies.

BELLINGER: People believed that they had

magical powers and properties, mystical properties.

NARRATOR: But mummies were never meant to be

a Victorian sideshow.

Mummification in ancient Egypt was a way of

preserving the body so that after the death, this individual

could have an afterlife. -NARRATOR: In the 19th century,

the problem archaeologists have is that it is impossible

to see inside the wrappings without destroying the mummy.

In order to learn about mummies,

they had to be unwrapped,

and this was a very destructive technique.

NARRATOR: But that doesn't stop

the Victorians holding bizarre unwrapping parties.

People would pay a lot of money to

be present at one of these mummy unwrapping events.

NARRATOR: So late 19th century Egyptologists leap on the newly

discovered technique of x-rays to end this mummy destruction.

Today, x-rays continue to reveal

hidden wonders beneath the linen wrappings.

ESCOLANO-POVEDA: It is basically like a virtual autopsy.

It gives us lots of new opportunities to learn

about the mummies without destroying them in the process.

NARRATOR: So, when a team from Penn Museum

examines the cat mummy in detail,

they turn to the x-ray machine to reveal its secrets.

They are expecting to virtually unwrap

the mummy and examine the cat inside.

But they are in for a shock.

When they image this mummy,

there's nothing to see.

NARRATOR: Using cutting-edge graphics,

we can reveal the interior in detail.

There's no cat, not even any random bones.

NARRATOR: Where is the cat?

Is this just an elaborate fake?

The idea that this is

a modern forgery is certainly plausible.

Fake Egyptian artifacts have a long and infamous history.

BENECKE: Artifacts from Egypt became very fashionable.

The sites where the diggings took place were robbed all

the time, and they could not be protected very well.

And that opened up the market for forgeries,

because it was much, much easier

to forge everything and to sell it for

very high prices.

NARRATOR: And forgers were definitely faking mummies.

The Vatican Museum in Rome had two mummies in its collection,

and in 2015, researchers ran

them through the full battery of tests,

x-ray, CT scan, DNA analysis, you name it,

and what they discovered is that the mummies were -- were fakes.

They were full of a jumble of

medieval bones and a 19th century nail.

NARRATOR: So it's credible that the cat mummy might be

a modern forgery...

except for one thing.

In close up, the wrappings reveal a telltale pattern.

The way it is wrapped has this sort of crisscross pattern

that creates these diamond shapes

that was very common in the late period and especially

in the Greco-Roman period.

This is then a good indication that

it is actually an ancient Egyptian mummy.

NARRATOR: This strange cat mummy is authentic.

So was the cat removed in antiquity?

Or was it never there in the first place?

Is it simply an ancient fake rather than a modern one?

NARRATOR: Researchers are certain this ancient cat mummy

is authentic,

even though it does not contain the body of a cat.

So why would the ancient Egyptians go to so

much effort to make it appear like it does?

The answer might have something to do with the reason

the Egyptians made animal mummies in the first place.

Animals were associated with individual gods and goddesses.

And so, by creating an animal mummy,

people believed that they were actually

capturing some of the spiritual power of the god

associated with the animal.

So, for example, the falcon was associated with the god Horus,

the baboon with the god Thoth, and the cat with

the goddess Bastet, who happened to be

among the most popular of the gods

in the Egyptian pantheon.

NARRATOR: Egyptologists believe most animal mummies like this

are gifts to the gods.

ESCOLANO-POVEDA: They were mummified in order to

be presented as offerings to different gods.

The idea was not to offer them an afterlife

but to make them work as an offering to a god.

NARRATOR: Before the late period,

when the cat mummy is made,

bronze statues were the go-to method for offerings to

the gods,

but as the demand for offerings grew,

the cost and complexity of bronze leads to an increase in

the use of mummified animals,

and archaeological evidence suggests that

Egyptians get very enthusiastic about them.

During the so-called Late Period of ancient Egypt,

tens of millions of animal mummies were produced.

NARRATOR: The number of animal mummies consumed is startling.

In 2011, a team of archaeologists found a set

of catacombs in Saqqara dedicated to the god Anubis,

and they have estimated that there are

around eight million animal remains within the catacombs.

NARRATOR: There simply weren't enough wild animals

to meet this kind of demand.

Egyptologists believe this gap is filled by

farming sacrificial animals on an industrial scale.

If so many mummies are being made,

could an empty mummy be slipped in to make money from

gullible pilgrims?

Or is this practice more common than

Egyptologists believed?

In 2000, researchers start

a 13-year project to answer this question.

The results are astonishing.

BELLINGER: They ran over 800 mummies through a CT scanner

and were astonished to find

that only one-third of them actually contained

full animal remains inside.

Another third had partial animal remains,

and the rest had no animal remains at all.

NARRATOR: So what is the explanation

for this empty cat mummy?

BELLINGER: Some scholars have proposed the idea that

this sort of empty mummy was part of

a generalized scam culture, and you know, honestly,

who's gonna unwrap it to check, right?

NARRATOR: There is one problem with the scam theory.

It may not contain an actual cat,

but this object has still been through the same laborious

and expensive process as a real mummy.

It was wrapped according to the style that would be used

in -- in real cat mummies, and also, the face and the head

of the cat was modeled so that it looked like a cat in

the same way as was done with -- with real mummies.

So, uh, the ears will be modeled, the face, the snout,

the eyes, and details will be painted so that it looks like

a real cat.

NARRATOR: This amount of care and effort doesn't fit with

the idea that the cat mummy is just a cheap knockoff.

The true explanation for this strange thing may lie within

some of the other animal mummies the UK researchers examined.

BELLINGER: They found some extraordinary things.

I mean, one, for example, a crocodile mummy,

which, inside, revealed to contain

four adult croc skulls surrounded by

four baby crocodile skulls.

Just a very strange thing.

NARRATOR: What purpose could mummifying

multiple animals serve?

One explanation is that this was a premium style

that those who were wealthy enough to purchase

such things would do in the hopes that it would get them

even more favor with the gods.

NARRATOR: Egyptologists have suggested this could

explain the empty cat mummy.

Perhaps it's simply at the other end of the scale

from the lavish versions,

a ritual offering on a budget.

This is a classic case of you get what you pay for.

If you only had a little bit of money,

well, you would splash that out, and you'd get

an empty cat mummy that still looked okay,

was a little rough, but it served your purpose.

NARRATOR: Because in ancient Egypt

the absence of an actual cat might not be the problem

it seems to a modern eye.

ESCOLANO-POVEDA: According to ancient Egyptian thought,

if you had something that looked like the mummy,

it would do the job.

It would magically work in the same way as

a real mummy would do when you offered it to the deity.

So for an ancient Egyptian, it would actually not be

a huge problem to have one of these fake mummies.

NARRATOR: It seems this cat mummy never contained

an actual cat, but that doesn't make it a fake.

The people who bought it probably

knew there was nothing inside it.

It is still a gift for the gods,

just one for believers on a budget.