CONGRESS
The Autonomous Organism of Museums and Centers of the Island Council of Tenerife—the government of the island of Tenerife—, through the then called Tenerife’s Archaeological and Ethnographic Museum, organized the 1st World Congress on Mummy Studies and the international exhibition “Mummies: Secrets of the Past” in 1992. It was the first of nine successful congresses from that date to the present. Since Tenerife, the WCMS has met in Cartagena, Colombia (1995); Arica, Chile (1998); Nuuk, Greenland (2001); Torino, Italy (2004); Lanzarote, Spain (2007); San Diego, USA (2011); Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (2013); and Lima, Peru (2016).
To commemorate the 25th anniversary of the WCMS, the same institution—now through the Canarian Institute of Bioanthropology and Tenerife’s Archaeological Museum—is celebrating this milestone with an “Extraordinary World Congress on Mummy Studies: 25 years of advances in mummy research. In memoriam Arthur C. Aufderheide (1922-2013)”. This event started on November 24th 2017 with the opening of an international exhibition called “Athanatos. Immortal. Death and Immortality in Past Populations.” This exhibition shows the most relevant funerary rituals in Antiquity and summarize the
advances made in the scientific study of ancient human bodies during the past 25 years, and will come to a close on June 3rd 2018.
2018 will be special. It was chosen for the Congress to honor and remember the 5th anniversary of the passing of a man who was key for the expansion and impact of mummy studies at the end of the 20th century: Arthur C. Aufderheide (Professor at the University of Minnesota-Duluth Campus).
Through these two events, we wish to remember Arthur as a person, scientist, medical doctor, but especially as a colleague and friend; and no doubt also his wife, Mary: it is impossible to remember Art without Mary. The year 2018 will also be important because it marks the 25th birthday of the Canarian Institute of Bioanthropology.
The congress will be held in 21-25 May 2018, and the venue will be the International Auditorium of Tenerife “Adán Martín”. The international exhibition ATHANATOS can be visited at the Museum of Nature and Man in Santa Cruz de Tenerife (the institution that joins together Archaeology, Bioanthropology, Natural Sciences and the famous mummies of the Guanches).