<p>WARSAW, Poland — Polish researchers examining an ancient Egyptian mummy that they expected to be a male priest were surprised when X-rays and computer tests revealed instead it was a mummy of a woman who had been seven months pregnant. </p>
<p>The researchers said Thursday it’s the world’s first known case of such a well-preserved ancient mummy of a pregnant woman. </p>
<p>The mummy arrived in Warsaw in 1826 and the inscription on the coffin named a male priest. No examination until the current one had disproved the belief that it was a male.</p>
<p>“Our first surprise was that it has no penis, but instead it has breasts and long hair, and then we found out that it’s a pregnant woman,” Marzena Ozarek-Szilke, an anthropologist and archeologist, told The Associated Press. “When we saw the little foot and then the little hand (of the fetus), we were really shocked,” </p>
<p>They estimated the woman was between 20 and 30 years old and said the size of the baby’s skull suggested she was 26 to 28 weeks pregnant. </p>
<p>Their findings from the Warsaw Mummy Project of years of tests on this and other mummies at Warsaw’s National Museum were published this week in the Journal of Archaeological Science. </p>
<p>“This is our most important and most significant finding so far, a total surprise,” team member Wojciech Ejsmond of the Polish Academy of Sciences told the AP. “It opens possibilities of learning about pregnancy and treatment of complications in ancient times.” </p>
<p>The researchers say the excellent quality of the embalming suggests it could have been performed well before the first century B.C., as it is dated now. </p>
