3,000yo Egyptian cheese infected with deadly disease unearthed at ancient burial site

Mmmmmmm delicious!



Source

Connoisseurs say that the taste of cheese improves with age – but what if it was left to age for 3,200 years? Archaeologists in Egypt now have the chance to find out, but it comes with an unexpected bonus: deadly ancient bacteria. A team from the University of Catania in Italy found the cheese at the tomb of Ptahmes, a 13th-century BC mayor of Memphis in Egypt. The cheese was found wrapped with canvas inside a broken jar. It could be the most ancient cheese ever discovered, according to the team’s study, published in the journal Analytical Chemistry.

Makes me wonder if anyone has given it a taste?

“The archaeologists suspected it was a kind of food left for the owner of the tomb and they decided to ask for chemical analyses,” said lead author Enrico Greco, a leader in the new field of ancient food discoveries known as ‘archaeofood.’ Ancient Egyptians may have dodged a potentially life-threatening bout of illness by not eating the cheese, after researchers found the specimen contained signs of a bacterium known to cause brucellosis, a deadly disease spread from animals to people via unpasteurised dairy. The tomb of the Memphis city official was found to contain murals showing various barter scenes featuring cheese, a product that had a medicinal use in ancient times. It is also thought that cheese was included in feasts buried alongside wealthy Egyptians.

Perhaps it was a cursed "gift" for any potential tomb raiders. Or did the bacteria build up over all those early years.

Must smell wonderful! Interesting story!

Haven't they also found honey in one of the pyramids that due to it's natural preservative powers was actually still edible after thousands of years?

a reply to: stormcell

Maybe the Egyptians knew that deadly bacteria would grow on said cheese and planted it for good reason. Gotta remember, ancient Egypt is old, really old, 3000 years before that cheese was even made the first Pyramids of Giza were already built or being built.

a reply to: Imagewerx

To my knowledge and understanding honey never goes bad. It crystallizes and needs to be heated to return it to a liquid state, but is palatable forever.

a reply to: randomtangentsrme

No. It goes bad. If anything it will eventually turn into crude oil one day, which is basically spoiled condensed organic material.

a reply to: strongfp

I would love to see a source on that. Thanks in advance.

a reply to: Imagewerx

I seem to recall reading that somewhere, too.

Something about an amphora of wine found elsewhere that was still good--though I have trouble believing that one.

But properly sealed, honey might, only might, last a good long time under the right circumstances...

a reply to: randomtangentsrme

I need a source on how from a million or so years from now honey will turn into crude oil?
I get that you are preaching honey can last for a long time, I understand that, and agree. But on this planet, everything dies, everything will break down and be used as energy eventually. To say it lasts forever is a bold statement, even if it doesn't turn into an energy rich source it will eventually break down or turn into stone, fossil, or sand or what ever.

originally posted by: strongfp
a reply to: randomtangentsrme

I need a source on how from a million or so years from now honey will turn into crude oil?
I get that you are preaching honey can last for a long time, I understand that, and agree. But on this planet, everything dies, everything will break down and be used as energy eventually. To say it lasts forever is a bold statement, even if it doesn't turn into an energy rich source it will eventually break down or turn into stone, fossil, or sand or what ever.

I'm not convinced oil is "spoiled condensed organic material," so yes to your former statement, I would like something to back it up.
I've already said it crystallizes, which turns it into a stone like substance (like rock candy). But if you are going to call me out, I want to know where I was wrong.
Again thanks in advance.

Mmmm let me devour it maybe I'll gain
Super mystical powers.

originally posted by: CaptainBeno
Mmmmmmm delicious!

Source[/qu ote]

A couple of things:
* RT is not a very reliable source
* That's not a photo of a wheel of cheese. That's a stone column.
* It's not actually bacteria/germs. It's trace amounts of the products (possibly toxins) of brucellosis (the scientific paper) and the paper describes a methodology.

So chalk it up to Serious Overstatement of some research.

a reply to: CaptainBeno

It could have been in the tomb because that is what killed him. We will never know, leaving unanswered the age old question, "Who cut the cheese?"

a reply to: strongfp

I’d like a source too please

a reply to: toms54

That was pretty cheesy

a reply to: Imagewerx

I believe so yes!

a reply to: Byrd

Nope, I beg to differ. That is the pale coloured jar the cheese was found in.



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originally posted by: seagull
a reply to: Imagewerx

I seem to recall reading that somewhere, too.

Something about an amphora of wine found elsewhere that was still good--though I have trouble believing that one.

But properly sealed, honey might, only might, last a good long time under the right circumstances...

Well id have to say your wrong honey will crystallize. Once its crystallizes it can't decay.

Now if you were dilute it with water eventually it would become so diluted that it would allow bacteria to form.

2,000-year-old lump of butter found in Irish bog

Yes, and a bloody big bit too. "in a wet marshy bog for 200 years"

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