MINI MAIDEN: This little girl (La Nina del Rayo) died at age 6 and was preserved remarkably well by the Andean conditions. COURTESY OF ANGELIQUE CORTHALS
In 1999, high in the bone-dry plains of the Atacama Desert in Argentina, Johan Reinhard, currently the Explorer-in-Residence at the National Geographic Society, and colleagues uncovered three exceptionally well-preserved corpses. Two children, a girl and a boy aged 6 and 7 respectively, and a 15-year old adolescent they named “the Maiden” had all been sacrificed some 500 years ago and buried near the summit of one of the world’s highest volcanoes, Llullaillaco.
The conditions of preservation in the high Andes were so unique that to prepare the mummies for display in Salta, Argentina, curators there consulted forensic anthropologist Angelique Corthals, then at the American Museum of Natural History, to recreate the extreme cold and dryness required to keep the bodies looking fresh and to preserve ...
