Museo de las Momias (Mummy Museum), Guanajuato
If you end up breathing your last breath in the little province of Guanajuato in Mexico, you'd better make sure your graveyard rent is paid. Otherwise, you might be exhumed, mummified and put in a museum!
History
Because of a unique law that is in force in this part of Mexico, graves in the local cemetery have to either be bought for an exorbitant amount or rented every five years. If the deceased's family fails to pay the rent, the body is exhumed and disposed of to make way for new arrivals.
Through some mysterious process that scientists have tried in vain to explain, a small proportion of the bodies from this graveyard end up mummified.
Rather than being destroyed by the local authorities, these are put in the macabre Museo de las Momias. Here they join a vast "human library," poised in all possible postures of death, that has been accumulating since the museum was founded in 1865.
It is not only the death fetish of the Mexican imagination that has kept this museum going (there can be an eerie, almost carnivalesque atmosphere among the visitors lined up outside). The main draw is the air of supernatural mystery about the whole phenomenon.
Scientists from as far away as Tokyo have analyzed the bodies trying to find an explanation, but no one has so far succeeded in understanding why five or six exhumed bodies every year have turned into mummies.
Some speculate that the minerals in the soil are the cause, while others hint at divine punishment for crimes committed in life, fearing that the bodies may be condemned to a perpetually moribund half-life of paralyzed torment.
What to See
Whatever the explanation, this sort of place is obviously only for those with a strong stomach, and even hard nuts may want to avoid some exhibits – such as shelves full of mummified babies.
The only other known mummy-museum of this kind in the world is the Catacombe dei Cappuccini in Palermo.
Map
Location map and satellite view of the Mummy Museum in Guanajuato. Using the buttons on the left, zoom in for a closer look or zoom out to get your bearings. Click and drag the map to move around. You can explore all of Mexico from space on our Mexico Map.
