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Sniffing Down Tale of Badly-Decomposing Cleric

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OldTimeRadio

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I need someone to check the factual appendix at the rear of Guy Endore's novel THE WEREWOLF OF PARIS.

The information I need concerns a Ninth or 10th century British bishop (?) whose sarcophagus in Westminister Abbey (I think) was opened by modern antiquarians circa the 1890s.

The hideously foul stench which all unexpectedly erupted from the tomb was so overpoweringly offensive that it sent everybody in the great edifice racing out the doors.

I'm trying to obtain independent verification of this event, but I can't remember the Good (Bad?) bishop's name.

Thanks! I really appreciate this one.

Sincerely,

George Wagner

Edit - Sorry, I thought I'd posted this to General Forteana. Will some friendly Mod please transfer it? Thanks)
 
I have a few odd notes on weirdly decomposing bishops.

I'm busy as a bee at the moment but will check later if someone else hasn't snagged this.

I moved it as requested. Perhaps a title change might be in order?
 
The Abbey was only founded by Edward the Confessor about 1045-50, (that's the 11th Century) although there was supposed to be a shrine there founded about 616.

There were Abbots, not bishops, there, as it was an Abbey, until the Reformation, when they were replaced with bishops.

I have a copy of Dean Stanley's:- Memorials of Westminister Abbey, (the Fifth Edition of 1882), but the only burial of an early bishop it records, is of one the Bishop of Durham, Egelric. (Given as Aethelric in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicles). Arrested by William I in 1069 he was imprisoned at Westminister until his death in 1072, when he was buried "in the porch of the Chapel of St Nicholas, ordering his fetters to be buried with him, to increase his chance of a martyrs glory".

Dean Stanley reports a possible: "stone coffin recently found near that spot". But no report of any smell.
 
Thanks!

Thanks for the help so far.

Emps, your word is my command. I've changed the thread title as you suggested.

My assumption is that the cleric (that should cover all bases) must have been an extremely stout man who left a lot of suet behind. Thousand-year-old rancid human fat isn't something I'd care to encounter.

The 1930s American archaeologist Anne Axtell Morris wrote of opening an Aztec (I think) coffin which contained the same odiferous material. She and her colleagues had just previously used the still-sealed coffin as a dining table. (And the Aztec remains were likely a few centuries fresher than our British cleric.)

Again, the information I need is in the factual appendix at the end of Guy Endore's novel, if anyone has a copy.
 
Well the substance you are seeking is adipocere, I think. Yum, it has a whole site devoted to it and a café-shop! where you can buy an adipocere mug, pillow, mousemat or teddy-bear etc.

Notable Individuals Page does not seem to feature the case you want, though. Plenty of pics*. I think I've dated half of them. :?

*Not for the squeamish, needless to say. Though one poor kiddie is quite miraculously preserved. RIP. :(
 
But isn't adipocere, sometimes called "corpse wax" or "grave wax," just a naturally-saponified, very-low-grade "soap"?

(I've actually seen the male adipocere corpse which resides in a glass case in the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC.)

I think there's a real difference between adipocere and just-plain-rancid body fat.

But, heck, maybe I'm wrong.
 
I wonder if any spiritual signifance would be attached to such an event.

Since incorruptibility was seen as a sign of holiness, would especially foul decompostion indicate the opposite?
 
naitaka said:
I wonder if any spiritual signifance would be attached to such an event. Since incorruptibility was seen as a sign of holiness, would especially foul decompostion indicate the opposite?
Click to expand...

That certainly has lain, unspoken, at the back of my mind, and may even be the root-cause of my interest.
 
Obese individuals often undergo a quite furious decay process, or at least did before the advent of modern embalming. And I understand it's sometimes a problem even with embalming.

King Midas of Phrygia, yes he of the golden touch, was exceptionally stout. When he was interred (around 650 BC, if memory serves), the decomposition was so intense that it even consumed his cedarwood coffin. The latter is no easy trick.

But at least he left no suet behind.
 
But isn't adipocere, sometimes called "corpse wax" or "grave wax," just a naturally-saponified, very-low-grade "soap"?
Click to expand...

i hadn't heard of 'corpse wax' before, but from what i recall of A level chemistry, you need a fat and an acid for the process to take place (there's a receipe for soap in the old testement, using goats fat and the ashes of willow bark)... but where is the acid coming from in this case?
 
BlackRiverFalls said:
(there's a receipe for soap in the old testement, using goats fat and the ashes of willow bark)
Click to expand...

I hadn't realized that. Thank you.

... but where is the acid coming from in this case?
Click to expand...

But, again, isn't there a difference between adipocere and just plain rancid suet?

Doesn't adipocere form in in-ground burials where rain and other acid-bearing waters can interact with the flesh of the body? How can you get that in an above-ground sarcophagus located indoors?

I suppose a bad and continuing leak in the roof combined with a poorly-sealed sarcophagus might suffice, but that sounds far-fetched even to me.
 
By the way, does adipocere neccessarily have a terrible stench? My first guess is that it would have the odor of unperfumed soap, since that's what it is.
 
DerekH16 said:
BlackRiverFalls said:
... but where is the acid coming from in this case?
Click to expand...

The stomach?
Click to expand...
Click to expand...

But in that event wouldn't almost all interred bodies turn to adipocere, since we all have diluted hydrochloric acid in our stomachs?

And "this case," our 900-years-dead cleric, seems to have involved very rancid suet and NOT adipocere.
 
The Chemistry page on the Adipocere site refers to soap as the result of alkalines on fat.

http://adipocere.homestead.com/chemistry.html


"Certain soils are highly alkaline, contributing to adipocere formation as well. An alkaline source acts on a corpse's fat in much the same way that lye acts on vegetable fat- by hydrolizing it; that is, turning it into a sort of soap. This chemical process is called saponification. Adipocere formation is often referred to as saponification. And thus, soap mummies are born."

Elsewhere it refers to a range of odours from odours of sanctity to overpowering stenches. The page of readers' contributions has some horrid tales from grave-diggers and undertakers who regard disinterment as a messy task. The site also suggests that partial saponification is very common, especially with American sealed caskets and that our route towards dust is often much slower and odiferous than we would like to believe.

I wonder if the site is sponsored by a cremation campaign? :shock:
 
JamesWhitehead said:
The Chemistry page on the Adipocere site refers to soap as the result of alkalines on fat.
Click to expand...

Thanks. Alkalines as just as likely to be carried by rain and ground waters as acids, perhaps even more so.

....a range of odours from odours of sanctity to overpowering stenches.
Click to expand...

Thanks again. I remember a mediaeval account of the exhumation of a female saint where the body was said to not only be perfectly preserved but to exude an almost overpoweringly-pleasant odor of fresh-cut roses. It was supposed to have been noticed 20 miles away from the grave!
 
Saponified body fats do not smell that much. The really bad smells come from the anaerobic decomposition of the body tissues. The bacteria that do this are usually found in the soil and do not exist for long in the air.
Most of the decomposition would be well over after a few hundred years and so I think the smell (usually from sulpher compounds) will have dissipated, or so I would have thought.
Was the body buried, that is below the ground, or was it put in a tomb or sealed coffin above ground?
 
tilly50 said:
Was the body buried, that is below the ground, or was it put in a tomb or sealed coffin above ground?
Click to expand...

My understanding is above-ground, indoors, in a church sarcophagus.
 
I recently saw a show on TV about bodies turning into "soap". It showed the remains of a long-deceased lady and she had basically turned into a large slab of soap!! And yes, I think she had been a bit on the "chunky" side. ;)

And about the odors--the sweet smell that supposedly surrounded the remains of some saints has been referred to as "the odor of sanctity". And yes, it was believed that an uncorrupted body was an indicator of saintliness--I might add that with a more modern understanding of body decomposition, the Church is less convinced that well-preserved or sweet-smelling corpses are necessarily indicators of a life well lived!!

And I have read about an ancient Egyptian mummy--I think it might have been Queen Nefertari but I'm not positive, I'll have to check on that--anyway, when this royal lady was disinterred after several millennia had passed, the odor was unbearable. The Egyptologists had to give the poor lady time to "air out" before she was fit for polite company again!! :shock:
 
synchronicity said:
I recently saw a show on TV about bodies turning into "soap". It showed the remains of a long-deceased lady and she had basically turned into a large slab of soap!!
Click to expand...

Yes, but the question with which I opened this topic didn't concern adipocere (grave-soap) at all, but 1,000-year-old just plain rancid suet.

And I have read about an ancient Egyptian mummy--I think it might have been Queen Nefertari but I'm not positive, I'll have to check on that--anyway, when this royal lady was disinterred after several millennia had passed, the odor was unbearable. The Egyptologists had to give the poor lady time to "air out" before she was fit for polite company again!! :shock:
Click to expand...

I've read of this mummy, too, and that such stench-emitting Egyptian mummies are extremely rare. But I don't believe it was the Queen you mentioned, because the location of her mummy seems to be still up for grabs.

[In fact,, unplesantly-odiferous mummiews are so rare that the first suspicion is that the mummy might be a modern murder victim being foisted off as an ancient mummified noble. Thank God Mssrs. Burke and Hare never thought of this angle!]

I've read just recently that the Egyptians were such masters of anti-microbial embalming (without even realizing that microbes exist!) that mummies discovered in water-filled tombs normally require nothing more than a thorough drying out to be nearly "as good as new" and ready for display.
 
OldTimeRadio said:
I need someone to check the factual appendix at the rear of Guy Endore's novel THE WEREWOLF OF PARIS.

The information I need concerns a Ninth or 10th century British bishop (?) whose sarcophagus in Westminister Abbey (I think) was opened by modern antiquarians circa the 1890s.

The hideously foul stench which all unexpectedly erupted from the tomb was so overpoweringly offensive that it sent everybody in the great edifice racing out the doors.

I'm trying to obtain independent verification of this event, but I can't remember the Good (Bad?) bishop's name.

Thanks! I really appreciate this one.
Click to expand...

All I've been able to find is this .pdb download of the book, OTR - hope it proves to be of some help to you.
 
Thanks, Jack, but I can't open the file!

If anyone can, the information I require on the odorous cleric is in the novel's appendix, probably near the start.

Thanks all!
 
There isn't an appendix in that .pdb file! Or even a contents page!

And the novel quits mid-sentence somewhere towards the end of the book - the number of pages vary depending on the size of your selected 'font' in that crazy .pdb viewer. :cry:
 
Thanks, guys.

I'm beginning to think this entire project has a curse on it.

Maybe I should have left the old cleric rot in peace - or at least in pieces.
 
I was in downtown Cincinnati today and I stopped off at the Public Library to check for Guy Endore's THE WEREWOLF OF PARIS. We have the second-largest public library system in the United States - the main buildings cover two square blocks - so I assumed they'd have a copy.

It turns out to be the ONLY Endore novel they don't have. (The title's always been a favorite of book thieves.)

In short, Rats!
 
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