Southeast Asia’s 12,000-year-old mummies rewrite prehistoric timelines
Scientists have identified remains that may be the oldest mummies in the world, dating back as far as 12,000 years, and they appear to come from across Southeast Asia. The discovery pushes the known history of deliberate, or at least assisted, preservation of human bodies far earlier than the famous Chinchorro mummies of South America and predates the well-known Pharaoh mummies of ancient Egypt. The remains were found in a spread of sites in parts of China and Vietnam, with potential connections to communities in neighboring countries including the Philippines, Laos, Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia. Researchers emphasize that the mummified remains show signs of heat exposure, suggesting smoke-drying over fires as a preservation method used by hunter-gatherer groups long before agriculture took hold in the region. The finding hints at a long, shared prehistory of ritual and memory in Southeast Asia, where keeping the body intact was believed to sustain bonds between the living and the dead.