(upbeat instrumental music) - [Narrator] In the tombs that
ancient Egyptians prepared for their deaths, they left a record of how they lived more than 3,000 years ago, but the full meaning of many of the images remains a mystery. In almost every noble's tomb, one image stands out, the blue lotus, a type of water lily which is everywhere. But why should the lotus be
associated with the dead? Late in 1999, scientists in
Manchester began a series of tests to uncover the
secret of the lotus. They were looking in part
of the flower itself. But their tests also had another
focus, an ancient Egyptian, who would've encountered the
lotus, a mummy 3,000 years old. It would turn out that the
team would uncover some of the remarkable properties of the lotus and the links between the flower, the afterlife and sex in ancient Egypt. - People had looked at
the pictures in the tombs and they predicted certain things, but we've actually got evidence now. - Now, the speculation
can be later one side and we can actually go
after the hard evidence, the proof and discoveries such as these are very, very important. (upbeat instrumental music) (gentle music) - [Narrator] Egyptologists
interested in the day to day life of the ancient Egyptians
have learned a large part of what they know by studying
the detailed scenes recorded in the tombs. But these images are not a
way of remembering the lives of the departed. They're intended to promote
the tomb owners' chances of rebirth and wellbeing in the afterlife. After death, they believe
these scenes would become real. - Ancient Egyptian tombs are not sterile. They aren't places just to
put the dead and leave them in a pretty little tomb, far from it. They're kind of power houses. They acted as generators
in which everything placed in there. It wasn't done on a whim. It was done with a purpose,
the equipment, the tomb scenes, and so forth. They all literally scream out life. It's encouraging the dead to live. They're just exalting
that the mummy live again. - But not all the scenes
are quite what they seem. Artifacts found in tombs make clear that rebirth also involved
procreation and sex. Mummies were buried with
little fertility dolls to symbolize rebirth. Male mummies were often buried
with artificial phalluses. And many of the tomb images in which everyone is
always young are thought to have a hidden sexual meaning. - The depiction of sex was
quite, not quite hidden, but coded almost. It's as if it's a secret
coded language that was used. There's still a considerable way to go before we understand
all the subtle nuances because the ancient
Egyptians were if anything, rather subtle people when it came to portraying such a volatile and potentially dangerous act as sex. - [Narrator] One of the most common images in the tombs is the blue lotus, but its significance has
never been fully understood. Might the lotus also be a
sexual symbol of some kind? Egyptologist, Lise Manniche has been investigating the blue lotus and its connections
with both love and sex. The village of Deir
el-Medina near Luxor was used by the workman who built
and decorated the tombs of the pharaohs in the
Valley of the Kings, but they also produced
one of the most infamous of Egyptian drawings, a papyrus, which added a new dimension
to the symbolism of the lotus. - The people in this village
were quite gifted craftsmen. Among the interesting
drawings that we do have from this place is the
famous Turin Papyrus. I think it is a very interesting piece of early pornographic literature. It's not kind of continuous
story about what went on on a wild night in Deir Medina, but it shows various
couples having intercourse in various fashions. There's a scene showing a
woman sitting on a stool with a man facing her with a huge fellas and a lotus flower balancing
on top of her head. In one of the other scene, the woman seems to be
managing quite well on her own because she's sitting on
top of an inverted pot with a pointed bottom,
enjoying herself in that way, again, with a huge lotus
flower on top of her head. - [Narrator] Was this connection
between the lotus and sex, a clue to the role of the
lotus in Egyptian life? Was the lotus more than just a symbol? Lise Manniche thinks so, and she has also tracked
down another clue. (upbeat music) 100 kilometers up river
from Luxor is a temple known as Edfu. Here, there is evidence which suggests that the significance
of the lotus is based on some undiscovered
properties of the plant. Lise Manniche has tracked
down a piece of text in the temple which could make sense of the lotus's central
importance in Egyptian life. - In the Temple of Horus, the walls are full of pictures
showing the king offering to the god. Quite often, he would
offer a lotus flower, but the accompanying texts suggest that the lotus may have
had narcotic properties. The king speaks about the
lotus flower to the god. And he says, "When you
look at its brilliance, your eyes become dynamic or
imbued with dynamic properties. when you breathe in,
your nostrils dilate." And I think this is a
very good description of a person sniffing narcotic substance. - [Narrator] Lise Manniche
is sure that this explanation of the effect of the lotus
on the gods also reveals how the Egyptians used it themselves, that it was a narcotic or
a stimulant of some kind. There are hints in the tomb
paintings that this is true. Here too, the lotus is
often being sniffed. And there is a close
association with wine. Wine goblets were often
decorated to look like the lotus, and little jars of concentrate
are seen being added to the wine. Might these old so be
derived from the lotus? Was the secret of the
lotus that it was a drug which the Egyptians used in
much the same way as alcohol, and if they sometimes combined
them soaking the flowers in wine? Was this what lay behind
the images in the tombs and on the erotic papyrus? In Manchester, they now plan to find out. If the Egyptians had been taking drugs, they hoped that this mummy
would reveal the evidence. She was at the center
of a research project to establish the truth about the lotus and other mysteries of Egyptian life. The team was led by Dr. Rosalie David, Keeper of Egyptology at the museum. - The mummy came into the
Manchester Museum in 1825. She was given to the museum
by two private individuals together with two wooden coffins. And from the inscriptions on the coffins, we know that her name was Asru
and that she was a singer, a chantress in the temple at Karnak. Unfortunately, there's a
great deal we've don't know about the mummy. Science, we hope will reveal the truth about the lives of the ancient Egyptians. - No, you need to go there. - Just there.
- Yeah. - [Narrator] Asru's wrappings
were removed by her owners in the 19th century. That made access to her skin and organs, the key to the experiments, much easier for the scientific team. - Does it feel quite solid that? - It's very hard but you can hear it. I think you're on the bone really though. I got a small amount of tissue. - That's some tissue from the claws to it. It would been quite nice to have some. - [Narrator] The team
plan to obtain a number of minute samples of uncontaminated tissue from inside Asru's body. - Yeah. - [Narrator] They would search
for any signs of the lotus or drugs of any kind which
Asru might have been taking, perhaps for recreational purposes or possibly for ritual
or medicinal reasons. There's no evidence that
the Egyptians used narcotics until very much later, but no one has ever examined a mummy with the range of new
technologies they now planned. - It's very gungy actually. - Resinous.
- Resinous. - [Narrator] As well as Asru's tissue, they also needed hair samples. Since drug slowly accumulate in hair, these can reveal drug
use over a long period. However, finding hair on
Asru was not a simple task. Her head had been shaved and the only hair they
could find was body hair. - I'll take some hair
and then I'll take it by. - Yes. We call it. - Just pubic hair. - Pubic hair, yeah. - [Narrator] It was as Asru's
role as a temple chantress which meant she had to be shaved. Removing hair, wearing wigs
instead was thought necessary for ritual purity. Her coffin explains she lived
in Thebes now known as Luxor, the religious capital of Egypt. 1,000 years before Christ, near
the end of the new kingdom, she worked in the Karnak Temple. But as a temple chantress,
Asru was also an ideal subject for the scientific study. Here, she would've come into
regular contact with the lotus. As at Edfu, the lotus appears
to have a central importance. Lotus symbols are everywhere. Records indicate that
a chantress was a kind of part-time priestess, a high born noble who would live here for weeks at a time. - 3,000 Years ago, it
would've been very different. It would've been a very dark place in this inner part of the temple, full of color, full of life. The floors would polish silver. The walls would be adorned with
fine gold and lapis lazuli. This jewel light colors
would be heightened by the shafts of sunlight and the use of incense
and sweet perfumes would absolutely suffuse the whole building. - [Narrator] Asru's role with
the other chantresses was to support the priests in
looking after the deities in the temple. This included bringing
offerings of the lotus flower. In the morning, they would
chant to wake the gods. Three times a day, they would bring food
and other nourishment. They would fetch the clothes with which the gods would
be dressed by the priests. And throughout the day, they
would perform for the gods with singing and dancing. - Once the God was awoken in his shrine, then this divine spirit had to
be placated and entertained. - [Narrator] And was it only the gods who were being offered the lotus? If the lotus was a stimulant, might the chantresses have used it too for their energetic dancing. - You do manage to get
an idea of the vigor that many of these rituals
would be performed with, or have back bends back flips. You see the long wigs
hanging down beneath them. And we can see here a
very, very lively scene. These female dancers really
shown in an energetic pose. And so music and dance were
performed. Incense was burnt. Perfumes were offered. - [Narrator] But whether the chantresses and other ancient Egyptians
were also using drugs is a mystery which remains to be resolved. In Manchester, as Asru's
examination continued, the hope was that if she
had been taking drugs, perhaps including the blue lotus, they could now begin to find out. And might she also now reveal
the secret of the connection between the afterlife, the lotus, and sex. In Manchester, the detailed examination of
the mummy Asru was underway. They hope to discover if the
ancient Egyptians use drugs like opium and cannabis. And in particular, the blue lotus. Two members of the team,
anesthetist, Dave Counsell, and chemist, Vic Garner
had now been given samples of Asru's hair and tissue to test. - The evidence for drug
use in ancient Egypt on the whole is controversial. But it would seem unlikely to me that if the ancient Egyptians had access to these powerful plant drugs, that they wouldn't have used them. - [Narrator] But which
plants might they have used? The team plan to take advantage
of the newest technology to try to find out. Asru's samples were to be analyzed using an
extremely sensitive form of mass spectroscopy which
breaks the sample down into the molecules it contains. - We've had to look at
this sample of hair. - [Narrator] The test requires
only a minute specimen. - This is the Asru hair and scalp sample. There's some very fine
pieces of hair in there. - [Narrator] The team looked
at various types of her tissue and at individual hairs. This is a forensic test which Vic Garner's lab has been using to detect drugs in samples
provided by the police. Asru is the first mummy that he screened, and her samples revealed an
enormous range of substances from plant oils to henna with some chemicals
still to be identified. - And we found lots of compounds in there, but none of these narcotic compounds. It is possible that we may find compounds that may arise from plant material as well and that's what's going on at the moment. - [Narrator] Asru appeared
free of any known narcotics, but perhaps, if the blue
lotus was being consumed, it actually contained something else. The time had come to take a closer look at what was really in the flower. Finding a flower to test is difficult since the plants are now
very rare and hard to find even in Egypt. One of the few places
thought to have the plants conveniently for Dave Counsell and Vic Garner is Stapeley
Water Garden in Cheshire. Here, they have what botanists suspect may be the actual flower revered
by the ancient Egyptians. - Oh, looks a bit slippery here. We have to be careful, I think. - What's the temperature like down there? - Tell you a sec. Very pleasant really. It's quite warm. There's no crocodiles in here, right? - Nope. Might be cryptosporidium. - Can you pass me the secateurs? Thanks. So shall we take these two then, Vic? - Yes, but don't touch the petals. If you hold the stem very carefully. - [Narrator] 25 years ago, American researchers thought
they had detected a form of narcotic and alkaloid in the lotus, but that work has never been repeated. - I've never got to sniff a fresh one. So I think this is about
as fresh as it gets, so. It's quite a nice fragrance, actually. It's very nice. - What does it smell of? - I suppose the nearest thing, I think, it's a bit like bananas really,
but it's quite pleasant. It's quite pleasant. - I'd be very interested to
know how long the perfume lasts. - I wouldn't smell it
for too long though, Vic 'cause they, ancient Egyptians, one theory is that they used
to get high from sniffing it. - The blue lotus obviously
contains something in there and it must be something
more than just the appearance of the flower. It must be perfume. It may be that there's
some material in there that has a physiological effect. - [Narrator] They decided to
test both the chemicals found in the flower itself and
in the flower's perfume. They were looking for any substance which could give the flower
the effects of a drug. What they actually found
was completely unexpected. - Ah, right. Okay. So we getting a lot
of noise and no real peaks. So on the base of that, you would say that there's
no material corresponding to that particular alkaloid. - [Narrator] There were
no signs of any narcotic, but they made their first
important discovery. - Really, we're seeing phytosterols. - [Narrator] These were
phytosterols, plant steroids which often have powerful
medicinal effects. And then as they looked more closely, they made a breakthrough. - We kept on with our analysis. We've used a different type of analysis and we found some material
that could have an effect. This is now very exciting. - [Narrator] A different type of liquid-based mass spectroscopy was able to detect molecules too
big to show up before. What they found was substances
called bioflavonoids. These are chemicals which are responsible amongst other things for
the coloring of plants, but they're also known to
have important uses as drugs. And in the lotus, there
were three bioflavonoids. It was the combination of all the chemicals they'd now found, which might give the lotus
powerful physiological effects. Combing the literature, they looked for other plants
with a similar chemical makeup. And it was the three bioflavonoids
which proved the key. - They're very common
in the plant kingdom. They're responsible for a
lot of colors and so forth, but they also occur in
a lot of preparations that are used to this day like ginseng and also, ginkgo biloba. - [Narrator] Ginkgo biloba is
a leaf extract now widely used to stimulate blood flow and
improve mental alertness. And when they analyzed it,
the results were startling. - When we compared the
data from ginkgo extract and the blue lotus extract, we found several points of similarity. There are so many points
of similarity that we think that the effects of these two
materials may also be similar. - [Narrator] The health benefits
of ginkgo have been known about for centuries. So might the Egyptians have
used the lotus in a similar way? Was this why they might have
soak the flowers in wine? They arranged to see an expert
who could tell them exactly what effects the lotus would've had. Liz Williamson is a pharmacognosist, a chemist able to assess
the effects on the body of different substances. And it was the complex
combination of chemicals found in the lotus which excited her. - Well, I think you've
established that the chemistry of the two is fairly similar particularly around the flavonoid region and it looks like the lilies
even richer in these flavones than ginkgo itself, which suggests that the
ancient Egyptians would use it in a similar way to that which
we use ginkgo for nowadays. And we are using ginkgo for a
lot of different conditions, but the main ones are probably for age related deteriorations. It's known as a kind
of an anti-aging herb. It's a free radical
scavenger, an antioxidant. And it's particularly
been shown to be useful in mild Alzheimer's
and memory dysfunctions and various conditions where
blood flow is at fault. So migraine, tinnitus and so forth, and even known that would
even involve the sort of Viagra-like effect, which will be just as
important for women as men. And it looks like we
have great similarities. - [Narrator] The ability of the lotus to stimulate blood flow suddenly highlighted
the missing connection between the lotus and sex. - And I noticed you found
a couple of compounds which are phosphodiesterase inhibitors and that's the way that Viagra works. - Thank you very much. - Good. - [Narrator] So the lotus was
not only a general panacea, it was also a natural form of Viagra, potentially the key to both
health and sexual vigor. Did this at last make sense of the different ways the
lotus had been portrayed? Had the team discovered
the secret of the lotus? Vic and Dave decided they
had to make one last check. How could they be positive
that the lily used by the ancient Egyptians
really was the same plant as the one they had sampled at Stapeley and would it have had the
same Viagra like effects? At Kew Gardens, in addition to their collection
of modern water lilies, they also have priceless samples of the Egyptian blue
lotus itself dating back to the pharaohs. They agreed that Vic and
Dave could take a sample. - The ones that we were looking at. - Which rounder, isn't it? Which rounder. - [Narrator] In the grounds, they passed one of the
oldest ginkgo biloba trees in Britain. Botanically, this seems a very
long way from a water lily. Did the blue lotus of ancient Egypt really have the same properties? - You can see why it's called biloba. - Yeah. Two lobes in the leaves, really. - And you see it's very leathery. - Yeah. Very old plant supposed to be. Isn't it a bit of throwback? - Well, you actually see things like this in carbon nitrous fossils. - Yeah, yeah. - Can you smell anything on it? - No. - Really smell much as it. - In Kew's underground archive, a thousands of dried specimens collected from all over the world, Egyptians specialist,
Nigel Hepper led them to flowers and wreaths which
had come from Egyptian tombs. - One with the blue water lily. - That's not much data about lies. - That is fantastic. - It's been taken off the one underneath. - And the petals are absolutely exact. - That's from the coffin of Ramses II. - Right. - Now, it's the other
one here, another draw. This is the one that we probably can use. This is from Hawara.
It's excavated by the. - [Narrator] When this
wreath was first assembled, it would've been a colorful arrangement of blue, yellow, white, and green. Now, it needed the eye of
an experienced botanist to identify the blue lotus
amongst the dry pedals. - We can't use any that's
actually still fixed in the wreath but there are some here. Yes. Look, there's a nice bit. - Oh, lovely. Yeah. - And I'll put it on there. - We don't wanna take more
than necessary really, so. - Right. - We can just trim a small amount. - A pair of forceps. - Okay. - Looks great. - There's a cute sample. - Thank you very much. Yeah. - [Narrator] Back in the lab, they could now check if
the flower of the pharaohs really had the same chemical fingerprint as the modern plant they've tested. - You think you got enough
there to experiment? - Yeah. I can get good results out of one milligram of that sample. - And if you can get any results,
that would be very useful. - [Narrator] And when they
compared the ancient petal from Kew with the modern
petal from Stapeley, even they were surprised at the match. - This is the trace
for the Stapeley petal, the modern petal. This is the trace for the Kew petal, the old petal, 2,000 years old. And what we're looking
at here is the profile of the phytosterols, and look how similar the profiles are. 2,000 years different, and yet the profiles
of these phytosterols, these biologically important
are practically identical. - [Narrator] There could be little doubt that the lotus known to
the ancient Egyptians would've had the same
properties as the modern plant. But did the ancient Egyptians consume it? Was it really their Viagra? They began the hunt for the
telltale lotus fingerprint in tissue obtained from Asru. To date, they've found nothing certain. But some unidentified
peaks could be byproducts of the lotus. And the discovery that the
lotus has Viagra-like properties has already given a new
significance to the many images of the flowers seen in Egyptian tombs. The images of the lotus
now fitted perfectly as part of a complex sexual code which Lise Manniche has been deciphering, a code which highlights
the importance of sex as the key to rebirth in the afterlife. - To be reborn was something that the ancient Egyptians
were really obsessed with. And that means that sexuality
has a very large part to play in this. For instance, the persons
are all in their best age, they're reproductive age, and often, they are very scantily clad or their garments are quite transparent. Also, scent is very important. Scent underlines sexual
matters in all civilizations. And the people here are being anointed with costly oils and perfumes. And they even have lumps of the
pressure scent placed on top of their heads to show us and to show the other ancient Egyptians how nice they all smelled. - [Narrator] And now, it
seemed that the lotus too, the most common image in the
tombs could also symbolize sex. - [Lise] They wear lotus
garlands around their necks. Some of them would have lotus
flowers decorating their hair. They hold lotus flowers in their hands. The lotus flower is all over the place. - [Narrator] As a sexual symbol, the lotus could become the key to an extremely elaborate sexual code. - There are lots of plays
awards from where to picture and picture toward. For instance, there's a very
interesting play of word on the word to ejaculate,
sti, and the word to pull. And incidentally, the
word for scent is written with the very same
three letters, STI, sti. So all these underlines
the sexuality of the scene. - [Narrator] For the dead, the lotus would still emulate rebirth just as it would be a sexual
stimulant for the living. - It's a very interesting discovery and does have significant
ramifications in our understanding of why the ancient
Egyptians use the lotus, the image of the lotus so frequently. And it's interest thing
now to point something say, this is obviously where it began. This is one of the means by which they made themselves happy. - [Narrator] Soaked in wine, the lotus would not provide an
instant boost to the alcohol, but its long term use would
boost the sexual vigor and general health of
those who consumed it. - I think we really have
got to the key for the use of the blue lotus and in my opinion, the blue lotus was not used
as a source of narcotics. I think it was used for its
beauty, for its perfume, and if it has the added
advantage of giving you a feeling of wellbeing when you drink an infusion, an alcoholic infusion of this flower. Well, that's everything that
the pharaohs needed really, isn't it? - [Narrator] And might the importance of the lotus have also
derived from its properties as a panacea against disease? Was the truth that illness
was in fact widespread in ancient Egypt? As the team continued
their examination of Asru, might she provide some answers, a glimpse of the reality which lay behind the images
of healthy young people in the tombs? Asru was now undergoing a
full medical examination. It was part of the team's
attempt to establish the truth about disease in ancient Egypt. The team had already
discovered a new significance for the blue lotus, a plant which they had shown
would boost both health and sexual vigor. Now, they hope to learn more
about the general health of the people. Might the importance of the
lotus in ancient Egypt be linked to the prevalence of disease? In the tombs, almost everyone
is shown as young and healthy. Occasionally, musicians are shown as blind which might be explained
by parasitic diseases. But in surviving medical papyri, it's usually impossible to
identify the illnesses described or to establish how
prevalent the diseases were. - She's probably one of the
best behave patients we've had just keeping nice and not moving. - [Narrator] This x-ray
scanner was the starting point, not only for Asru's medical checkup, but the beginnings of
a general health survey of the ancient Egypt. Together with the slides being prepared from Asru's tissue samples, they began to reveal just how
misleading were the images in the tombs. First to be examined were
samples from Aru's intestines. - These showed quite clear
evidence of the larval forms of a worm called strongyloides
in the wall of the intestine. You get the worm by walking
in contaminated water or contaminated mud. The mud contains immature
forms of the worm which are able to penetrate
the skin of the feet or hands. And then they get into
blood vessels in the body, they get into the veins
and travel to the heart where they then in fact,
get into the lungs. From the lungs, they
climb up your windpipe to the back of your throat
and then you swallow them. And in the intestines, they
develop into the adult forms. If Asru had this disease
and we know that she did, she'd tend to develop diarrhea
because of the irritation. And because there might well
be some bleeding associated with that, Asru might well have been
anemic at the time of her death. - [Narrator] They also
detected sand in Asru's lungs at the scarring of the tissue
which the sand had caused. This is a disease called sand
pneumoconiosis still found in desert populations today. Asru would've had great
difficulty breathing before she died. - Asru was distinctly unwell. She had evidence of
quite distinct diseases. Certainly, the combination
of them would make her weak, might made her breathless. And in fact, ultimately led to her demise. - [Narrator] Through Asru,
they were now getting a glimpse of diseases which would've
affected the general population. It gave a stark insight into
the reality of life at the time and highlighted the
significance of a panacea like the lotus in ancient Egypt. And it was just the beginning. Asru's x-rays revealed the enormous range of illnesses people suffered from, how very different life was from the idealized version in the tombs. Asru was far from young
and healthy when she died. - In the distal joints of the fingers, there are osteoarthritic changes and these are degenerative
joint disease indicating that she's likely to be an elderly woman, certainly older than 50. - Yes. - This joint is enclosed
and this would be indicative of an infective arthritis,
a septic arthritis. - She might have played a harp so could this have been connected? - Well, if that involved a lot of movement of the phalangeal joints in the fingers, then one could imagine that it would do because osteoarthritis is
related to wear and tear on joints. - [Narrator] It was clear that Asru would've been
living a life of pain as well as everything else. She had a fractured vertebra in her spine and a badly slipped disc. - More wedged, its bulging
backwards into the spinal canal. - Could you have this as
a result of her activities as a temple dancer, do you think? - I suppose that depends on how
energetic that is, but some. - [Narrator] And there was
an important discovery, signs that Asru may have had another far more serious disease. - What that is, and that looks very much
like the bladder wall which has calcification in it. And if one saw that in
a contemporary x-ray with extensive calcification
of bladder wall, one would think of
schistosomiasis as a cause for that appearance. - She was from an upper class background and maybe this contributed
to her fairly lengthy life because she probably had
the best diet available and a relatively relaxed lifestyle. She would not have been
engaged in housework. There would've been servants
in the house and so on. But we also know from this evidence that she had a painful life, diseases that would've brought
her physical difficulties. - [Narrator] As they sought to understand how many of Asru's diseases
might have been widespread, probably the most significant
discovery was that Asru may have had schistosomiasis. Until recently, this parasitic disease also called bilharzia has been
the scourge of modern Egypt. And Rosalie David, now needed to establish if it was a similar
plague in ancient times. But there has been no certain
way to detect bilharzia. And Rosalie David decided
to travel to Egypt to seek help from the experts, the team who have been battling to bring the disease under control. Bilharzia is carried by
a parasite which develops in water snails. From there, it infects
humans who come into contact with the water, attacking
many organs within the body. In Egypt today, Alan
Fenwick advises the team which has brought the
disease under control in part by controlling the snails. - And what this gentleman is
doing is checking the canal for snails. This canal doesn't look
particularly attractive, but the point is that fresh
water is very important. People come down to the
canals to wash their clothes. They, women come down to wash the dishes. Men come down when
they're building bricks. And when children are
coming home from school and it's as hot as it obviously is now, it's very attractive
to dive into the water. - Yeah. In antiquity, some of the activities at least would've been similar
in terms of the canals. - [Narrator] It's clear
from the tomb paintings that the ancient Egyptians
performed all the same activities in water. And the country has always
been critically dependent on irrigation. So was bilharzia also widespread then? In modern times, up to 80% of the population
have been infected and it has been one of the
country's major killers. Recently, dramatic reductions
in the incidents of bilharzia in Egypt have been brought
about by regular screening and treatment with modern drugs. But if the ancient
Egyptians had bilharzia, they had little but the
lotus for protection. So Rosalie David had brought
with her to Egypt samples from several of the Manchester
mummies, including Asru so that they could subject the mummies to the modern screening tests now being used to detect bilharzia. These tests have been developed
by Dr. Maged Al-Sherbiny, and worked by detecting
antibodies in the blood. So the first task was to
liquefy the dry mummy samples. No one has ever found
an antibody in a mummy and most researchers have
doubted that it can be done. But to Rosalie David's surprise, one of the tests came out positive. It was the first time an
antibody had been detected from ancient Egypt. And it was an antibody against bilharzia. - You can see now while
we're doing the development is that here is the
positive reference samples. - Yes. - And if you can see in
tissue sample number three, we can see that there is some activity which comes up a fainter activity, but there is activity there. - So if is actually the case,
then these are antibodies which are 2,000 years old still present. - Yes. Antibody is
extracted from the tissues and they are still life and active and they are giving us this activity here. - So this is a first. - Absolutely. - [Narrator] The finding of
this first active antibody from ancient Egypt was clear evidence that the people also suffered from this debilitating and lethal disease. And the finding was
confirmed in Manchester when one of the team
examining Asru's tissue, found direct evidence of
the bilharzia parasite which causes schistosomiasis. - We've tested Asru for any
evidence of schistosomiasis within bladder tissue that's
been endoscoped from her. And this is showing a section
of that bladder tissue that's been stained. And as you can see, there's
fluorescent staining that's actually bound to oval
shapes within the bladder which suggests that she was
infected with schistosomiasis. - It's very exciting to find evidence of this disease in Asru. It shows that even somebody
of the upper classes could fall prey to this
particular disease. It's very likely that the chantresses had to undergo some kind of ritual ablution, bathing in the sacred lake. This could be the way in
which she came into contact with a parasite that
causes schistosomiasis. - [Narrator] If even people
like Asru could get the disease, it's likely to have been common amongst the population at large. - [Rosalie] If you think
of a large proportion of the population suffering
from this disease, they would've been functioning below par and they created these
wonderful buildings, had this marvelous civilization,
that says a great deal. I think about how they achieved so much even despite the state of health. - [Narrator] In a world
where mummies are now showing that the average age
of death was around 40, the lotus would be a
powerful symbol of life. As this picture of ancient
Egypt was coming together, Rosalie David now traveled down to Luxor to look again at the images in the tombs. A new layer of meaning in the
tombs was gradually emerging and the ever present lotus was the key. - I think the fact we
know more about the lotus from our scientific studies does really give you a different
view of the tomb scenes. You can look beyond the pictures and the beauty of the scenes,
and it gives you an insight into perhaps what they were
hoping for in the afterlife. - [Narrator] The lotus could
now be seen as a potent symbol of both rebirth and long life in a world which was actually
dominated by disease. - Although we always, I suppose, surmised that they had illnesses, it's a great contrast now
to have this hard evidence and to look at this in
relation to these paintings which show such a
different idealized world. Asru have probably
would've been represented in this very elegant and idealized way, but the physical reality is
very different from this. - [Narrator] 3,000 Years after her death, Asru's mummy has opened a
new window on a distant past, and a water lily has begun to
reveal its fundamental role in Egyptian life, the key
to health, sex, and rebirth. Together, they've helped
uncover the reality of life at the spiritual heart of Egypt at a time when the country's par was at its peak. Now, the team in Manchester
plan to complete the last stages of their work with Asru
using the images of her skull to reconstruct what
she really looked like, the reality which lay behind
the images in the tombs. In full makeup and wig, Asru was about to show Rosalie David her true
likeness for the first time. - Gosh, that's incredible. And she looks, I suppose,
as somebody aged about 60. It's interesting how her upper
lip hangs over the bottom because of course, she had
those protruding teeth, but I don't think it's
evident in the mummy itself, but it's very pronounced there. Well, in her youth, she would've been quite beautiful really. - [Narrator] Through the team's work, has come a clearer understanding
of the Egyptians yearning for eternal youth in the next world, after a life which even
for the elite was in fact, driven by disease. And a new appreciation of
the crucial role of a flower which is a symbol of health
and regeneration was essential for their happiness in an
afterlife free of imperfections. (gentle music)
