Friday, May 20, 2016

19 Tons of Mummified Cats- A Fertile Source of Adventure


While the Victorians were zealous to discover and explore the world around them, their ability to preserve history was negligible. Thousands of relics and pieces of art vanished during the 1800s from over eager archeologists, uncaring curators, well meaning collectors, and pragmatic businessmen. That last category provides us with this week’s post.
In 1888, an Egyptian farmer discovered a massive burial ground filled with over 200,000 mummified dogs, foxes and, most numerous, cats. This incredible find was quickly plundered. The most valuable gold and bronze treasures quickly stolen and the best specimens bought by tourists, the rest of the mummies were sold at auctions, for manure. One winning bidder paid £5 17s 6d a ton.
Nineteen tons of mummified cats were ground up in Liverpool and used as fertilizer in fields all over the British Isles. In the 1800s Mummies had been used as manure for awhile, but this is the most outrageous example of this type of historical misuse. This tragedy of lost history and greed is an inspirational goldmine for a Victoriana adventure.

The Egyptians mummified cats to preserve their bodies for the afterlife. Part of the mummy’s soul, called the ba, must return to the body at night to rise again in the morning and be rejoined to another part of the soul called ka. All those ancient cat spirits floating over the fields of England could have any number of effects.

Adventure ideas
The hundreds of cat souls gathered around a field might seek out new bodies causing all the local dead to rise again possessed. Recently buried corpses, slaughtered animals, even caught mice, all reanimate with the cruel and playful attitudes of a cat.

Plants grown in a field fertilized by mummy manure may be mystically affected. Perhaps the lost souls cause new bodies to be formed covered in leaves like a mummy in its wrappings. A legion of cat corpse shaped ambulatory plants would make great weird minions.

All the mummified cats undoubtedly attract the attention of the Egyptian goddess of cats, Bastet. Many of the cats were mummified in her honor, and she would keep an eye on their treatment. Perhaps the use of the cats was allowed by her to bring an ancient hidden cult of Bastet to power in the British countryside.

Bastet was often depicted fighting the evil serpent of the underworld Apep. The use of the cats as fertilizer could drive all the snakes from the farmland to hide in houses. This could anger Renenet the cobra headed goddess of the harvest, bringing her into conflict with Bast.

Of course, food grown in fields fertilized by mummies will have strange effects on anyone consuming it. Mutation, madness, and mind control could turn a quiet village into a new cult of cat worship.

Easiest of all, tons of mummified cats could have been switched before being shipped to a fertilizer factory and are now in the hands of an evil conspiracy. Thousands of mummified cats could have any number of sinister uses.

While this adventure seed is very rural, it’ll work just fine in a city based campaign. Small gardens crop up in any available bit of soil, costermongers sell produce from fields just beyond the city limits, and some eccentric consumers might pay extra for mummy fertilized food.

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