Desiccation

Desiccation refers to the process of drying out or losing moisture. In a historical context, desiccation is notably connected to mummification in ancient civilizations like Egypt. As Joshua Clark and Chuck Bryant from the Stuff You Should Know discuss, the Egyptians initially buried bodies in the desert sand, where natural desiccation preserved them inadvertently. When they shifted to using caskets, the bodies began to rot since the desiccation process was blocked by the barriers. This led to the development of embalming techniques aimed at artificially replicating desiccation to better preserve the bodies, ultimately allowing the Egyptians to mummify their dead with greater precision and durability 1 .