Mary Valentis pictured movie magic when a new partnership between the Albany Medical Center and the Albany Institute of Art and History was announced in the spring of 2012.
The two entities were planning on working together to once again perform a series of medical examinations on the Institute’s two mummies that were obtained in 1909 by trustee Samuel Brown. Similar tests had been performed by Albany Med in 1988, but due to advancements in technology and the suspicions of several Egyptologists, the decision was made to perform a new round of scans.
Valentis, an Albany Institute board member and a University at Albany English professor, thought documenting the venture would not only be educational, but a fun experiment. She soon enlisted the help of friend and colleague William Rainbolt, a former UAlbany professor of journalism and English.
Neither Valentis nor Rainbolt had made a film before. They began by doing extensive research on the mummies. Next, the pair reached out to the Institute and the Albany Foundation about making a documentary, and found friends who work as professional crewmembers in Hollywood to help with production.
“We sort of pulled together this group of people,” said Valentis. “We didn’t know what we were doing, but Bill and I wrote the script and eventually pulled the film together.”
Old assumptions put to the test
Brown purchased the mummies from officials at the Cairo Museum during a trip to Egypt more than a century ago. Curators had told Brown one of the mummies – the oldest one is now about 3,000 years old – was female. The other, which was unwrapped so Brown could verify that they really were mummies, was said to be male and born in the Ptolemaic era around 300 B.C.
Brown had the mummies sent back to Albany by steamboat, where they’ve stayed for more than 100 years.
“I had first seen the mummies in third grade on a field trip at the Institute when it was down on Washington Avenue, as I’m sure many other people have.” said Valentis. “They’ve become part of the Albany lexicon.”
In 1988, Albany Med and the Albany Institute partnered to perform several scans on the mummies. X-rays were taken that showed some organs wrapped in cloth, but for the most part little new was learned. The Institute still believed they housed one male mummy and one female mummy. However, updates in technology would help dispel those assumptions 30 years later.
Unraveling the truth
Valentis said it was Bob Brier, an Egyptologist at Long Island University, who had doubts about the female mummy’s actual sex. The coffin that the mummy was sold with included hieroglyphics that suggested in life, the mummy was a male sculptor and ancient priest.
“We were excited to find out the truth,” said Valentis.
The crew was able to shoot footage for the entire documentary in one day. They began by getting shots of the two mummies being transported from the Albany Institute to Albany Med by UAlbany’s student-run, volunteer Five Quad ambulance service. While writing the script, it was actually Rainbolt’s idea to get the university’s ambulance service involved.
“They were extremely careful while moving them,” said Rainbolt. “It was amazing to see the reverence for what was going on here through the whole process. Even the technicians took the same approach.”
At the hospital, CT scans and new X-rays were performed over the course of a day. The film crew was allowed to get very close while the procedures were being done and also used the time to speak with the medical professionals and Egyptologists present.
In March of 2013, a year later, the results from the tests were announced. Tests confirmed the mummy that had been presumed female over the decades was actually a man.
Scans indicated the older mummy had the narrow pelvis of a man. Other indicators included an angular jaw, hooded eyebrow ridges and the fact his right arm was longer, suggesting he may have commonly used tolls like a hammer and chisel.
Valentis said the experience was “amazing and stunning.”
“Everything came together in a really interesting way,” she said.
What resulted was “The Albany Mummies: Unraveling an Ancient Mystery.”
Show time for the mummies
The 28-minute documentary has been picked up by local PBS affiliate WMHT, and is airing this month.
Rainbolt said the first half of the film explores the history of how the mummies got to Albany, while the second half is about the new round of testing and the discoveries made. He said he thinks the audience will not only be interested in the medical mystery surrounding the mummies, but most will relate to the human aspects of the story.
“These are just two people who lived at one time,” said Rainbolt. “Sure, it was several thousand years ago, and their time and culture was a lot different than ours, but in other ways they are just like us.”
The former professor said the two men probably asked questions about the meaning of life and what comes after death.
“Mummification is what these people had for dealing with those questions,” he said.
Rainbolt said he believes our bodies leave a record of how we lived our lives, and these mummies are no different. By examining them today, medical professionals can find out how they lived, what diseases existed at the time or if they suffered from stress like we do now.
The idea now is to let the mummies rest for some time. Perhaps in another 30 years further medical advancements will mean more can be learned about the two Egyptian men.
“This is really a journey story,” said Rainbolt. “It’s about two people not connected in any way during their lives but have been together since they were bought in Cairo and housed in Albany.”
Both Rainbolt and Valentis called the entire experience “moving.”
“The Albany Mummies: Unraveling an Ancient Mystery” will be airing on WMHT throughout September and October. Check your local listings.
