If you travel to Palermo, there is an enclosure that occupies a preferred place in the tourist guides and, nevertheless, we are not sure that it is a recommended excursion.it is about the crypt of the Capuchin Convent and the visit goes through human mortal remains.They are the chilling mummies of Palermo .
The chilling mummies of Palermo
The Capuchin Convent is located on the outskirts of Palermo and has become one of the main tourist attractions of the city.It is not known why the human being has that tendency to horror, to enjoy with fear.In the catacombs of this monastery horror increases room after room .Mummies are in different states since the processes for their conservation have been very different according to the epochs.Some are exposed in shelves , others within their open boxes , other hung or supported on the walls, in total there are about 8,000 bodies in the crypt of the convent.
The subsoil of the Capuchins has the characteristic of being very cold and dry .In the 16th century, in the year 1599, the first corpse was deposited .It was the of a monk who, after more than 400 years can still be seen next to the entrance.In principle in this place only the members of the congregation were buried , but, over the centuries, the Palerminos wealthy requested to be "buried" in the conventual catacombs .This allowed them to preserve the bodies and visit their dead whenever they wanted.The monks agreed and became io in a custom.One of the last people deposited there , in 1920, was the little Rosalia Lombardo , of which we already talked about in a previous article.
To conserve the bodies , the monks used a very unsophisticated method.When they took the corpse, they removed the internal organs and put it in the sun to that dried.After a while they washed it with vinegar and filled it with straw .They dressed him in his best uniform-military gala, young people who died before marrying their wedding dress, bourgeois dressed in Sunday...-and they finally lowered him to the catacombs where he remained exposed.Although is not the only formula used for mummification, it is the most common in the bodies of the crypt.Other methods of conservation were also used according to the epochs.
There are various rooms ; one for the monks , another for the men , another for the women and another for the children .The exhibition of the corpses is considered an invitation to reflect on the brevity of life and the futility of concern for the mundane things to which we humans submit.
What do you think of the creepy mummies of Palermo? Do you invite reflection as the Capuchins claim or simply feed the morbidity of visitors?
If you have been interested in this article, you may want to know 8 amazing facts about mummies.: Juan Antonio F.Segal, Rhaessner.
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