Here’s what you’ll learn when you read this story:

• Researchers may have finally cracked the identity of a mummified body from Austria that’s long been the subject of speculation.
• All signs point to the body being that of Franz Xaver Sidler von Rosenegg, an 18th-century parish vicar dubbed the “air-dried chaplain”
• A team of researchers, investigating how the body was so well-preserved, found that embalmers likely filled part of the body with wood chips and fabric ... inserted through the rectum.

This story is a collaboration with Biography.com.

A mummified body, found within a crypt at St. Thomas am Blasenstein in Austria, has confounded researchers for centuries. The subject of local lore—as well as superstitions about its “healing properties”—the corpse was reportedly thought to be an “18th-century clergyman who succumbed to an infectious disease.”

Noteworthy, CNN notes, for its well-preserved skin and tissue, the mysteries of the mummy that has been dubbed the “air-dried chaplain” endured until 2025, when a water leak in the St. Thomas am Blasenstein crypt allowed modern-day researchers to gain access to the body. They finally arrived at a reasonable idea of who the deceased was, the surprising way he died, and what mummification method was used to preserve the body.

And that last part is ... well, it sure is something.

Andreas Nerlich, a professor of medicine at Germany’s Ludwig-Maximilians University of Munich, led a team that conducted chemical analysis, CT scans, and radiocarbon dating of samples taken from the body. The team published their results in an article for the journalFrontiers in Medicine, and what they found both confirms some of the local conjecture around the corpse and broadens our modern understanding of the burial practices of the 18th century.

For example, local speculation around the identity of the corpse intimated that it had once been Franz Xaver Sidler von Rosenegg, who served six years as the parish vicar at St. Thomas am Blasenstein. Radiocarbon dating “placed the year of his demise between 1734 and 1780” per CNN, and “suggested an age at death from 30 to 50 years, with the most plausible span between 35 and 45 years.” This is in line with what is known about the death of Sidler, who died in 1746 at 37 years old.

By studying chemical isotopes within a bone sample, the researchers were even able to determine what the vicar typically consumed. Their analysis suggested a diet rich in grain and meat, which their study notes is “well in line with the expected rural food supply of a local parish vicar.” Though, CNN notes, the study also suggests that the vicar may have suffered from food shortages in the latter part of his life, “perhaps caused by the War of Austrian Succession underway at the time.”

The team was also able to determine what the late vicar did not ingest: poison. Back in the early 2000s, an X-ray conducted on the corpse noticed a “bullet-shaped object” which led researchers at the time to speculate that the then-mysterious dead man had actually been poisoned via a capsule.

But this study was able to get at the mysterious object, which they found to be a “small glass sphere with holes on both ends.” They found no evidence to suggest that this, nor anything else, poisoned the man. The sphere was likely “part of a set of rosary beads accidentally trapped in the embalming material,” and the cause of death was very probably an acute pulmonary hemorrhage as a result of chronic tuberculosis.

But if you thought the study was done with discovering things that had entered the late vicar’s body, you’d be wrong: they’re just done with the things that entered through his mouth.

One additional puzzle the team faced was exactly how this well-preserved body had been embalmed:

“The study’s biggest surprise came as a result of the CT scan: The scientists found the mummy’s abdominal and pelvic cavity packed with material such as wood chips from fir and spruce trees, linen, hemp and flax fabric, including some that was delicately embroidered. Additional toxicological analysis revealed traces of zinc chloride and other elements.”

The combination of materials explains how the body maintained its “air-dried” state. As Nerlich explained to CNN: “The chips and the fabric would have (bound) water. The zinc chloride would have had a drying effect and reduced the load of bacteria in the bowel.”

But the discovery of these materials raised a question. Nerlich noted, “It was really unexpected because the body walls were completely intact.” So, how did they get in there?

Well, the team’s theory is that this particular mummification process involved inserting all of these materials ... right up the corpse’s rectum.

Now, this particular preservation process differs significantly from more commonly practiced methods, like those we know from Ancient Egypt, wherein the corpse is opened up so that the preservative materials can be placed inside.

Nerlich also informed CNN that, to their knowledge, this particular embalming technique “hasn’t been reported in scientific literature before.”

That, of course, we already know. Because, let’s face it, if your high school history class had taught you about mummification via materials inserted into a corpse’s rectum, that’s a piece of information you would have retained well after graduation.