Mummy

The term "mummy" generally refers to a body whose soft tissues and organs have been preserved, preventing further decay and decomposition, through either natural processes such as frigid temperatures, or artificial measures such as ritualistic embalming.

One peculiar and extraordinary example is the "sokushinbutsu" - or "Buddha in the flesh" - Buddhist monks and nuns whose bodies remain intact centuries after death. This gruesome, excruciating self-mummification process begins while the subject is still alive, and can continue for years. Although many variations to the practice have been reported, it most often involves a conscious, voluntary asceticism generally including sophisticated meditation practices coupled with gradual starvation (a diet of nuts, pine needles, tree bark, resin), tea with anti-bacterial properties (to inhibit decomposition), and slow self-suffocation (aspiring sokushinbutsu may be virtually buried alive). Roughly two dozen cases have been verified to date (there are 16 extant sokushinbutsu in Japan), but it is believed that as many as several hundred attempts were made, with many of the resulting mummies having been destroyed or otherwise lost to time. The last known individual to become a sokushinbutsu - a monk named Bukkai - did so illegally when he died in 1903, more than three decades after the practice had been criminalized by the Japanese government who deemed it barbaric and backwards.

When it comes to the silver screen, especially horror movies, it's practically de rigueur for stiff, dusty, ancient corpses to come back to life, usually driven by destructive urges or an insatiable desire for vengeance. The granddaddy of the mummy genre is the 1932 Universal Pictures cult film "The Mummy", inspired by the real-life archaeological expedition, led by Howard Carter, which discovered Tutankhamun's tomb in 1922 (as well as the supposed curse that subsequently struck down members of Carter's team). Beyond the classic tales that turn to the cultural traditions of ancient Egypt (the earliest known embalming techniques date back the Early Dynastic Period, around 3150 BC), there's another group of "mummy" films set in Central America. These are generally Mexican productions in which the revenant is inspired by pre-Columbian civilizations.