Pet King

The archaeologists and local workers have been working together for a long time, and someone immediately jumped into the pit with a special container, carefully loaded the freshly unearthed cat mummy into the container, and brought it to Hans.

Zhang Zi'an, who saw the cat mummy for the first time, was surprised. He even felt that Richard's paw gripped on his shoulder slightly contracted, which showed that he was also deeply shocked.

The same was true of the other elves who followed him.

The cat's mummy's body and limbs are wrapped in a linen fabric like a woven mat, revealing only its head, and the whole looks like a bowling pin.

From the exposed head alone, it is difficult to tell if this is a cat, because the face is blurred, and even one ear is missing. It is said that the cat's head is more like a pig's head, and the outline can only be seen from the paint. A little cat's shadow.

Hans had already seen it strangely, waving his hand to take the mummy away and store it carefully.

"Are you surprised? The first time you see a cat mummy are similar to you. At least tens of thousands of mummy like this are buried under the ruins of this temple." Hans shrugged.

According to Hans, the burial chamber of the Best Temple was first discovered by a local farmer in 1888. About 19 tons of various mummy were unearthed and stacked into a 60-meter-long and 21-meter-thick layer. Among them, the cat's mummy It accounts for the majority, with 80,000 feet, as well as meerkats, dogs and fox mummy. The farmer sold most of the mummy, grinded it for fertilizer, and only a small part was saved and transported to the British Museum.

The pit in which Hans worked was another smaller burial chamber, only sporadic mummy found-the so-called sporadic, relative to the two figures of 80,000 and 19 tons.

In ancient Egypt, when the cat died in the house, the owner would send the cat's body to Bhubtis as soon as possible, and the priests would make mummy and bury it, and dedicated it to the goddess Best. To keep cats from being hungry in the underworld, mouse mummy and wooden fish-shaped toys often accompany the cat mummy.

Over time, countless cat mummy was buried around the Best Temple.

"Do you think I came here to look for murals and reliefs? No, we are looking for these mummies. It is also because of the existence of these mummies that we have facilitated the cooperation between the three countries this time," Hans laughed.

Zhang Zi'an still didn't quite understand, "What's the use of these mummy? I mean use other than cultural relics."

These mummies may have some value in archeology, but what use are they to Wei Kang and the scientific research team? After all, they are looking for live cats, not dead cats that have become dead.

The process of making a cat mummy is similar to the process of making a human mummy: first immerse the cat's body in a special salt water, dissolve the fat, wash away the epidermis and hair; after soaking for 40 days, remove the body to dry; The corpse was treated with antisepsis, filled with spices in the abdominal cavity, and the surface of the body was coated with gum to prevent the corpse from contacting the air; finally, the corpse was wrapped with linen.

The brain and internal organs have already been removed in advance and stored in the funeral burial forever.

It is because of the processing process that the epidermis is washed away, so the appearance of these cat mummy is not commended, and because of this, it is impossible to judge the evolution process of Egyptian cat hair color from the cat mummy.

So, what's the significance of the cat mummy to the scientific team?

Hans smiled mysteriously, "The answer is-DNA."

Zhang Zi'an seemed to understand something.

The hot and dry climate of Egypt combined with the special methods used by the ancient Egyptians to make mummy, the corpses are often preserved intact, and even after thousands of years, DNA can still be extracted from the mummy.

An article in Nature has published an article, "Palaeogenetics of Cat Transmission in the Ancient World," in which scientists use more than 200 cat mummy or DNA in the remains to study cat migration.

The mummy and remains are from Europe, North Africa, East Africa, and West South Africa, spanning from the Middle Stone Age to the 20th century.

However, considering such a long time span, the sample size is actually smaller.

The true scientific spirit is reasonable doubt and not blind obedience to authority. This is the foundation for science to change with each passing day.

Hans, they are skeptical of the conclusions of the "Palaeogenetics of Cat Transmission in the Ancient World", they think that the sample size of this article is not enough to support the corresponding conclusions.

Local scholars in Egypt also expressed dissatisfaction with the conclusion of this article, because the article said that domestic cats were first domesticated in fertile soil instead of ancient Egypt.

Based on the principle of disobedience, Hans and the Department of Biology of the University of Cairo hit the spot and collaborated on the same research. They also studied the DNA in the mummy, and intended to find a more reasonable explanation for domestication and migration of domestic cats .com ~ Humans have no tradition of using cats as food, so it is difficult to find cat remains in ancient human settlements, which has caused great difficulties in research. However, Egypt ’s unique climate and geographical advantages and ancient customs have kept it here. A large number of cat mummies and naturally-occurring corpses were the source of their confidence in Hans. They believe that as long as time passes, the conclusion of that article will be overturned.

Coincidentally, after contacting the Department of Archaeology of Cairo University, Wei Kang felt overjoyed when he learned about the study, because the mummy's DNA can be used to discover the evolution of cat hair color.

The fur color of the African desert wild cat is relatively fixed, so how did the domestic cats with hundreds of coat colors evolve?

It may be incredible to say, but to the extent that science flourishes today, the genetic mechanism of cat hair color has not been fully understood.

The genetic mechanism of cat hair color is extremely complicated, and it is a heterogeneous species in mammals, which is completely different from most other mammals.

For example, the calves born from two black and white cows must be black and white, but the location of the plaques may be different.

But the offspring of the two red-brown cats may be siblings-of course not green.

Two accented Siberian forest cats may also give birth to kittens that are not the same color as their parents.

Therefore, it is very difficult for pet breeding experts to breed new breeds of domestic cats. It often takes a few generations or even a dozen generations of pedigree and appearance to solidify in order to produce a new breed of stable coat color genes.

Although Wei Kang is not a pet breeder, he is very aware of this as an expert in cat research, so he sent an invitation to Hans to cooperate with them, asking them to provide a corresponding DNA research report, and wanted to discover the original Egyptian cat from the cat mummy. Key nodes of evolution.