In this world, nothing can be said to be
certain except death and taxes. At least, that’s what Ben Franklin said. We’re sure
you’d looove to hear 50 facts about taxes, maybe another time... Instead here
are 50 insane facts about dying! Number 50: We’ve all heard that your hair and nails continue
to grow after you die, but is it true? Well, hair and nails do appear to become longer after you
die, but it’s not because they’re still growing, it’s likely because the skin around the
nails has started to retract. After death, your skin dehydrates, and this
causes your soft tissue to shrink. So this myth is just based on an optical illusion! Number 49: A few hours after someone dies, their joints
stiffen and lock in place. This is known as rigor mortis. You may have already heard of
it, but did you know it’s only temporary? It lasts about 72 hours, but this can vary
based on body temperature and other factors. Rigor mortis is caused by skeletal
muscles partially contracting, and since they’re unable to relax, the body
becomes rigid for a brief amount of time. Number 48: You may have heard the term “the smell of
death,” but have you ever wondered what that means? When people say that, they are
either knowingly or unknowingly referring to a complex mixture of organic compounds. In this
case, it would be putrescine and cadaverine. They are the two gases that are responsible
for that distinctive smell of death, created when bacteria break down the
amino acids ornithine and lysine. Number 47: Dead bodies can look like they’re covered
in soap. This is known as saponification. When a dead body undergoes chemical changes, it
can transform body fat into adipocere, which is sometimes referred to as grave wax. It typically
happens when a body decays under wet, airless conditions. It’s said to have the consistency
of semi-hard cheese and a soapy, waxy texture. One famous example is The Soap Lady, who is
preserved behind a wooden and glass case at the Mütter Museum. Even though her body was
given to the museum shortly after it was exhumed in Philadelphia in 1875, there’s
a lot we don’t know about the Soap Lady, including who she may have been when she
was alive. They do believe she may have been in her late 20s when she died, and
X-rays revealed she wore pins that weren’t manufactured in the United States until the
1830s. So it’s likely she died in the 1830s. The Soapman, who also lived in Philadelphia,
is kept at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C.
They believe he was buried around 1800, and his body was discovered while digging a train
depot foundation in 1875. What a coincidence, maybe we should set up a date? Water and
alkaline soil must have seeped into his casket, causing the saponification, but unlike the
Soap Lady, he is not on public display. Number 46: Now that we’ve talked about the Soap Lady and
Soapman, let’s look at the bog bodies of Europe! Europe’s spongy, peat-covered wetlands provide
the perfect environment and conditions to create these “bog bodies,” bodies where their
decomposition is slowed by highly acidic, low-oxygen environments. Some of the bodies
found are said to date back to as far as 7,000 years ago. It’s also likely that many
of them were killed during ancient rituals, which might be a preferable option than just
dying by drowning in the mud of the wetlands. In 1950 the Tollund Man was discovered
in Denmark. After analyzing the body, experts believe he died more than 2,000 years
ago, but the exact details of his death are unclear. Experts do believe his death was
a ritualistic sacrifice to the gods. They also know that his last meal was porridge and fish
since the contents of his stomach were preserved. Number 45: Something called necrobiomes can help
in determining the time and cause of someone’s death. A necrobiome is all of
the bacteria and fungi that are found in the remains of a corpse after death. They change
in a predictable, chronologically consistent way, which is why it’s sometimes called the
“necrobiome clock.” As such scientists can tell when someone died based on the
types of microbes in and around the body. Number 44: Sometimes, whether you can be considered dead
or alive depends on the state you live in. Brain death is a controversial topic on a personal and
governmental level. In New York and New Jersey, if it goes against a family’s religious beliefs,
they can reject the concept of brain death. Number 43: Mummies were once used as paint dye. If you’ve
ever heard of “mummy brown,” you may or may not know how literal that name is. During the
16th and early 20th century, the rich brown color that some artists used was created from
grinding up Egyptian human and cat mummies. Since it was often transparent, it was used
for painting shadows, glazing, and flesh tones. Number 42: There is a place where you’re legally not
allowed to die. Well… kind of. Longyearbyen is a small settlement made up of around 2,400
people located on the Norwegian island of Svalbard. Many stories about this place mention
that it’s illegal to die in the settlement but that’s not techincally true. The law only
forbids you from being buried on the island. This is partly because the permafrost
wouldn’t allow buried bodies decompose, as well as being a tough surface to dig through
in the first place. Once Longyearbyen residents start getting into their retirement age or have
serious health problems, they’re expected to move to the mainland where treatment or a potential
burial can take place without any complications. There are some very rare exceptions made to
this rule, though. If a person has a special connection to Longyearbyen, they can request
to be buried in an urn at the local cemetery. Number 41: Human composting is legal in several states.
Currently, it’s allowed in Washington, Colorado, Oregon, Vermont, California, New York, and Nevada.
Return Home is a Seattle-based human composting facility. They use organic materials like straw,
alfalfa, and sawdust to turn human bodies back into soil. It’s meant to combat the environmental
impact that burials and cremations have. You don’t even have to live there to
take advantage of this somber service! Some have already had their bodies
flown to Washington after they die. Number 40: There are human body farms. The University of
Tennessee, Knoxville’s Anthropology Research Facility is known as the “body farm.” It
enables researchers to study the science of human decay while also allowing law enforcement
agents to train on how to recover human remains at crime scenes. Researchers can also look at
corpses at different stages of decomposition, potentially helping future
criminal investigations! Number 39: Embalming became popular because of Abraham
Lincoln. Have you ever wondered why we embalm our dead? It started during the Civil War.
Soldiers didn’t want to be buried on enemy soil, and families wanted to give their
loved ones a proper burial. Since refrigeration wasn’t as widely available
as it is today, they had to find another way to preserve bodies that would have to
survive long train rides in the summer heat. Embalming was the solution. It
was created by Dr. Thomas Holmes, who became known as the father of
embalming. However, it wasn’t used all that much outside of the Civil War until
President Abraham Lincoln died in 1865. The government had decided to
take Abraham Lincoln's body on a two-week national funeral procession.
They embalmed his body so that he could be taken from Washington
D.C. to Springfield, Illinois. Mourners were in awe of his “lifelike” appearance, which directly led to the popularization
of embalming across the nation. Number 38: Now we know why embalming became popular, we also
have to note that it’s not really necessary. It’s rarely required by law. In California, there
is a law that requires bodies to be embalmed, but only if they are being shipped by
a common carrier. If there are reasons you can’t embalm the body, there are other
ways to ship it without breaking the law. Also, while there are a lot of funeral homes that
will not do a public viewing without embalming, there is no federal or state
law that requires embalming. Number 37: When you're cremated, the average person will
produce three to nine pounds of cremains. This depends on the person’s age and weight, but it’s
rare for it to go over nine pounds. Typically, if it’s lower than three pounds, the
person in question was a child or infant. The cremation chamber, also called
the retort, can get as hot as 2000°F, or just over 1090°C. But even then, it will often
leave behind bones that cannot be burned to ash. In some places, like Japan, the bones are placed
inside of the cremation urn. In Japan’s case, the family will pick out the remaining bones with chopsticks and place them in the
urn as part of the funeral ceremony. In the United States, the leftover bone will be placed in a cremulator to be ground
up so it can be added to the urn. Number 36: During the Victorian era, British families would
take photos of the dead. As unsettling as that might seem to us today, it was a way for them to
commemorate the dead. During this time period, Brits would also cut locks of hair from the
dead to put them in lockets, rings, and art, as well as make death masks with wax. By the
mid-1800s, photography became more affordable and commonly available. This led to Victorian
families popularizing memento mori photography. As the life expectancy for children improved,
the need for death photography decreased. Number 35: It’s common to see death numbers spike around
Christmas, the day after Christmas, and New Year’s Day. According to the Centers for Disease Control,
93% of deaths are attributed to natural causes. Why are the holidays so dangerous? Many
people put off going to the hospital in order to see their family, and with
holiday staffing shortages at hospitals, it’s not suprising to hear that the number
of deaths spikes around the holidays. Number 34: We’ve all made jokes about doctors having bad
handwriting, but it turns out this joke migh have been taken a bit too far. In a 2006 report
on US healthcare facilities, it was reported that every year, over 7,000 people die as a result
of a doctor’s messy handwriting. Thankfully, the rise of digital prescriptions have probably
cut down on these numbers. Thanks, technology! Number 33: Dead bodies are not inherently a source of
disease. It’s not unusual for people to worry that they’ll become sick after touching a dead
body, but this rarely happens. You’re only at risk of becoming sick if the deceased succumbed
to a highly infectious disease like ebola. Just don’t drink water that has had a dead
person in it. You could potentially get diarrhea from the fecal matter released
by the decaying process of the corpse. The belief that dead bodies are dangerous to
the living began in the 19th century when miasma theory gained popularity. It was thought that bad
odors carried by the wind or coming from decaying organic matter transmits diseases and infections.
Dead bodies notoriously don’t smell the best, so it was believed that if you caught a wiff of a
decaying body, you were at risk of becoming sick. Number 32: There are people in the United States who have
been cryonically preserved after their deaths. In 2014, Alcoa Life Extension Foundation
claimed that they had 300 patients frozen in liquid nitrogen within their facility. Those
familiar with the TV show Futurama and its main character who was frozen in a similar manner for
1,000 years might think that we’re joking here, but that’s not the case. The goal of the
company is to freeze its customers until a cure for what killed them is developed.
Once that happens, they will thaw out the corpse and reanimate them. We just hope it
doesn’t take 1,000 years to find those cures… Number 31: You can be cremated in the water! As
strange as that sounds, water cremation, also known as alkaline hydrolysis or
aquamation actually exists. The body is placed in a mixture of high-heat water and
potassium hydroxide. Pressure is then applied, which decomposes the body
to its chemical components. Water cremation uses far less
energy than traditional cremation, and it doesn’t produce any
emissions like carbon dioxide, making it more environmentally friendly,
although it's only legal in some states. Number 30: There are over 200 frozen bodies
on Mount Everest. It’s not atypical for climbers and Sherpa guides to lose
their lives while climbing Mount Everest, and they’re usually left where they fell.
This is mostly because trying to transport a body more than 20,000 feet down mountainous
terrain would most likely lead to the rescue team losing their own lives. It’s much
safer to just leave the bodies there. Oftentimes, those bodies become so well preserved
that they will even act as waypoints for climbers who make their way up the mountain, such
as the famous “Green Boots.” To this day, Green Boots has not been identified.
Some believe that the body may belong to Indian climber Tsewang Paljor, who died
while trying to climb Everest in 1996. The body is referred to as “Green
Boots” due to the green Koflach mountaineering boots that are
still worn by deceased climber. Number 29: There have been accounts of people being buried
alive. One example comes from 17th-century England, where a woman named Alice Blunden had
been knocked out cold after drinking poppy tea, likely due to the drink containing morphine or
codeine. Blunden was declared declared dead at the scene by a doctor, and shortly
after buried in a local graveyard. Luckly for her a group of children who were
playing by her grave heard some strange noises, and when their schoolmaster checked the grave,
they discovered Blunden was still alive. It would take an entire day to dig her out, and she was so
close to death by the time they finished digging that they returned her to her grave once again,
believing that she had suffocated while they were trying to dig her up. The next morning
it was discovered that she was indeed dead, but she had also tried to free herself
after being buried alive for a second time. This hysteria around being buried alive got
so bad that in late 19th century Germany, over thirty safety coffin designs were
patented. While several were built and sold, there is no recorded proof that
anyone was saved by a safety coffin. Number 28: The saying of burying the dead “6 feet under”
started with the Great Plague. During the London Plague of 1665, gravediggers were instructed to
dig down at least 6 feet deep. We’re still not sure why this rule was put into place, but there
are a few theories as to why it was implemented. One theory states that authorities
believed the deeper graves would keep animals from digging up the plague infected
bodies. Linking to the previous theory, it seems that they also believed it
would prevent the spread of disease. It may have also been to deter grave
robbing. No one knows for sure, though. Number 27: After you die, your body can explode. It’s
rare, but it does happen! Due to a buildup of gasses and fluids during decomposition,
pressure can start building up and boom. Decaying corpse bits everywhere. It typically
happens to bodies in sealed coffins since the gas has nowhere to escape, slowly building up the
pressure within the coffin like a pressure cooker. It’s not so much a “boom,” but
the lid will pop open. After that, foul smelling fluid and gas
would start leaking out. Number 26: Self-mummification is possible. Typically, it’s
easier to mummify a body in certain climates, like peat bogs, arid deserts,
and alpine peaks. However, Japan once had a Shingon sect of Buddhist
monks who would mummify themselves. The practice is also known as sokushinbutsu
and it could take over three years to complete. Those who completed the ritual were known as
sokushinbutsu, or “a Buddha in this very body.” From 1081 to 1903, at least 17 monks were able
to self-mummify, but it’s possible there are more that simply haven’t been recovered. They would
follow on a strict diet, seal themselves in a tomb, and meditate until death. The practice was
officially banned in 1897, so the last person to self-mummify, the Buddhist monk Bukkai, had done
so illegally as he peformed the ritual in 1903. Number 25: A burst of brain activity during the
dying process might explain why your life flashes before your eyes before your death.
You don’t need to die to experience this though, it’s not uncommon for people who have
had a near-death experience to report their life flashing before their eyes,
or having an out-of-body experience. In a small study that mapped the brain activity
of four people as they were dying, there was a burst of brain activity after each person’s heart
stopped. A biomedical scientist at the Charlotte Martial of the University of Liège believes it
may be part of the brain entering survival mode once it is deprived of oxygen as the heart stops
beating and thus supplying oxygen to the brain. Number 24: Hearing is believed to be the last sense to
go. In a groundbreaking study from June 2020, neuroscientists were able to provide empirical
evidence that people are able to hear while becoming unresponsive as they are dying. They
were able to measure the brain activity in hospice patients at St. John’s Hospital and
compare it to a control group of healthy, young participants. The study
showed that the dying brain responds to sounds even when the
patient is seemingly unconscious. Number 23: People used to believe that touching
a murderer who was executed by hanging could cure illnesses. In England, from
the 18th century until public executions were abolished in 1868, people actively
tried to touch the body of the condemned, especially their hand. They believed it would
cure a variety of illnesses, including swelling! Number 22: There are some animals that
will not die of old age, although other things can kill them. We
know of 7 types of animals that can live on forever as long as they are not killed
by external factors: jellyfish, lobsters, turtles, flatworms, whales, radiation-resistant
bacterium, and the tardigrade, or water bear. Number 21: Some animals will grieve just like humans
do. Some will even hold memorials for their dead. There are at least five animals that
are known to grieve: monkeys, elephants, dolphins, dogs, and giraffes. Elephants
are even known to cry for their dead, bury them, and pay tribute
to their bodies and bones. It’s also not unusual for crows to gather
around their dead, but not to mourn. They do it in order to find out how the crow
died and learn how to avoid their fate. Number 20: In Madagascar, the Marina tribe exhumes their dead
every five to seven years to care for them. The ritual is known as famadihana. Ancestors are
removed from their graves so that the living can replace their burial garments with fresh silk
shrouds. While the bodies are still above ground, the living will drink, talk, and
dance with their deceased loved ones. Before the sun sets, they
return the bodies to the tomb. Number 19: Mellification is the process of preserving a
body with honey. Herodotus, a Greek historian, claimed the Assyrians would use this
method to embalm their dead. There’s also a myth that Alexander the Great’s
body was preserved using this method, placed in a golden coffin filled with honey. It’s
most likely a myth, but Abdallatif al-Baghdadi, a medieval physician and historian,
claimed to have once found a honey pot in an Egyptian tomb. Allegedly, they found
the body of a dead child inside the honey, so preserving the body of an fully grown
adult is not fully out of the question. But this method wasn’t just used during
ancient times. Some of you may have heard of the Mellified Man, a human mummy
steeped in honey. What sounds like it could have been accidental mummification
is actually a story of body donation. According to Chinese medical records, there were
men in the Middle East who would volunteer to be mummified in honey in order to create medicine
for others. The volunteers would eat honey, drink honey, and bathe in honey until
death. They would then be sealed in a stone coffin filled with honey, and it would
be left to cure for 100 years. After that, the body would be dug up
to be turned into medicine. Before you get too excited about having
a potentially human tasting sweet treat, no one can really prove this ever happened.
Guess Skittles will have to do for now... Number 18: In some ancient cultures, it was
considered respectful to eat your dead. The ancient Melanesians of Papua New Guinea and Brazil’s Wari people would eat the
bodies of dead relatives out of honor. Number 17: Some people will live with their deceased
loved ones for years. In Indonesia, the Toraja people of southern Sulawesi will often
treat the dead as just a sick family member. They will regularly visit them, speak with them, and
bring them meals. Even after they bury their dead, they do not see them as truly gone. They will
carve wooden tau-tau statues to match their loved one’s likeness. Those statues will stand
on cliff-top perches to watch over the living. Number 16: The “death rattle” is a common symptom of death.
It happens when the dying person can no longer swallow or cough, as well as being unable to
clear saliva or mucus from their throat. This creates a crackling, wet noise that amplifies as
the person breathes. It can sound like moaning, loud gurgling, or snoring, and it typically
doesn’t cause any pain or discomfort. Number 15: Death masks were once used to commemorate the
dead. The masks were created by placing a mold on a dead individual’s face made of wax or plaster.
Perhaps the most famous example of the death mask being used was during the execution of Mary
Queen of Scots. After the queen was beheaded, a mold was placed on her face, and a hand-painted
death mask was created in her likeness! Number 14: People can die from a broken heart.
Known as broken heart syndrome, or takotsubo cardiomyopathy, this fake-sounding
sickness is a very real thing! It happens when the heart experiences a surge of stress hormones
that are often the result of an emotionally taxing event. High-stress situations like the
death of a loved one, bankruptcy, being fired, public speaking, divorce, or a terminal medical
diagnosis can cause you to die of a broken heart. Number 13:
In the Philippines, the Tinguian people will dress the deceased in their best clothing, sit them down
in a chair, and give them a cigarette. They will have their dead sit there for several weeks, but
don’t worry, the bodies do eventually get burried! Number 12: In Ghana, you can be buried in a “fantasy
coffin”. It’s a popular custom in Ghana to bury your loved ones in a coffin that
reflects who they were. The coffins could represent a hobby, occupation,
or other characteristics. For example, a successful businessman may be
buried in a Mercedes Benz coffin. Number 11: In the Victorian era, there were different
expectations of men and women for how long they would mourn. Widowers would only
mourn for six months or less. Widows, on the other hand, were expected to mourn
for two and a half years. Men were often encouraged to remarry more than widows would be. Number 10: On his deathbed, King Charles II paid a great
deal of money for a tincture made from human skulls. When he was dying, Charles II paid
Jonathan Goddard, Oliver Cromwell’s doctor, for the formula of his miracle cure, King’s Drops. King’s Drops were said to
help treat gout and dropsy, among other ailments. The secret ingredient was
a powder made from five pounds of crushed human skulls. It really takes alternative
medicine to a whole new height! Number 9: Water can speed up decomposition.
We’ve talked about water cremation, but in normal circumstances, decomposition
changes happen more slowly in water, mostly due to a cooler temperature
and anaerobic environment. But once you remove the body from the water, the
putrefaction process will likely accelerate. Number 8: There’s a rare mental condition where people
believe they’re dead or are missing organs. It’s known as Cotard’s syndrome, or Cotard
Delusion, and “walking corpse syndrome.” While doctors don’t know what causes it,
it often comes with another brain disorder, like dementia, a mood disorder, epilepsy,
and many other medical conditions. Number 7:
In Nederland, Colorado, there’s a Frozen Dead Guy Days Festival. It’s a weekend-long
festival that’s held in honor of Bredo Morstoel, a 110-year-old corpse. It’s believed Morstoel was
cross-country skiing in Norway when he died of a heart attack. His grandson put his body on dry ice
and brought him back to the United States in 1989. When his grandson had to leave the United
States, his sister kept her father’s body cryogenically frozen in a shed behind her
house. After she was evicted from the house, Tuff Shed would donate a better shed,
and Delta Tech would take care of the body. Twice a month, they deliver
dry ice to keep the body frozen. At the festival, people engage in coffin racing, frozen salmon tossing, costumed polar
plunging, and frozen t-shirt contests. Number 6: One day, social media will
have more dead people than living people on it. Researchers at
Oxford University have stated that, by 2100, there will be around five billion
dead people on Facebook if the platform survives that long. At Facebook’s current rate,
dead people will outnumber the living by 2070. Number 5: Around 150,000 people die every day. This
total includes all deaths from accidents, illness, disasters, and violence. Number 4: In 897, the corpse of a Pope was
put on trial. Pope Stephen VI exhumed the corpse of Formosus in
order to prop him up on a throne, and put him on trial. He had a deacon answer
for the corpse since Formosus, understandably, wouldn’t be able to answer for himself. The
Pope’s corpse was accused of violating canon law, perjury, and several other crimes. He was
declared guilty, and his status as pope was posthumously taken away. They also cut off
his fingers and threw him into the Tiber River. Number 3: Bodies containing a lot of fat are often
cremated in the morning while the machine’s bricks are still cold. Meaning, they’ll be
one of the first bodies burned that day. Since their cremation will require a higher
temperature for a longer amount of time, those managing the crematorium have to
be careful. When heat rises too quickly, black smoke can start clogging
and messing up the machine. Number 2:
You can get a death erection. It’s also known as Rigor Erectus,
and it’s usually observed in corpses of men who have been executed. It’s associated with men
who have been killed by hanging specifically. It’s believed that this happens because of the
pressure on the cerebellum created by the noose. Number 1: Let’s end on a cheerful note. Bees! There
is a European tradition in which bees are told important news regarding the
beekeeper’s household, like births, weddings, and even deaths. Some people
believed if you didn’t spill the tea, the bees would leave their hive,
stop producing honey, or die. When Queen Elizabeth II died, we saw John Chapple, the royal beekeeper, tell
the bees about her death. Now watch “50 Insane Facts About Pain” or check
out “50 Insane Death Row Facts Nobody Tells You”
