Oncopathology in Ancient Egypt
Modern humanity is losing 100:1
Maria Myasnikova, Vesti
Reports about new ways to detect and treat cancer appear almost every week. Scientists demonstrate the wonders of ingenuity and the fantastic possibilities of modern technology, but the resourcefulness of the old enemy is even more striking – only recently people have learned to win individual battles, but perhaps the final victory in this war is still far away. Meanwhile, the losses of humanity in the fight against cancer are growing: the annual mortality from cancer is approaching 9 million.
Some researchers, by virtue of their profession, decided to go the other way: not forward to nanoparticles and cell reprogramming, but back to the distant past. These scientists – archaeologists, anthropologists, paleopathologists – asked a simple question: how often did people get cancer in ancient times? When, where, who and why did this disease first manifest itself?
The first large–scale oncohistorical study was published in 2010 in the publication Nature - "Cancer: an old disease, a new disease or something in between?". Its authors, Professor Rosalie David of the University of Manchester and Professor Michael Zimmerman from Villanova University (USA), studied the history of the disease and many facts from the "biography" of cancer, made hundreds of analyses of a wide variety of remains – from fossil edmontosaurs to chimney sweeps of the XVIII century, before coming to the conclusion: cancer is a disease of industrial society, people themselves have created the conditions for the development of this disease.
In particular, David and Zimmerman studied hundreds of ancient Egyptian mummies stored at the Manchester KNH Center (the center specializes in Egyptology and biomedicine). Among the huge array of data is the first oncological diagnosis made based on the results of histological examination of the tissues of an ancient Egyptian mummy: Professor Zimmerman discovered a malignant tumor of the rectum in an unnamed mummy of a 50–year-old Egyptian who lived in the oasis of Dakhla in the Ptolemaic era (IV-I century BC).
As of 2010, this was the only identified case in hundreds of ancient Egyptian remains studied by specialists. "Taking into account the insufficient level of development of surgery in ancient communities, the bodies of the deceased had to somehow preserve traces of oncological diseases. However, the almost complete absence of malignant formations in the studied mummies suggests that cancer was a rare phenomenon in ancient times, and the factors causing it are limited to communities affected by modern industrialization," Michael Zimmerman said at the time.
His co–author, Professor Rosalie David, echoes him: "In industrial society, cancer is the second most common cause of death, after cardiovascular diseases. However, in ancient times, oncopathology was extremely rare. There is nothing in the natural environment that can cause cancer. We have come to the conclusion that oncopathology is a human–induced illness associated with environmental pollution and changes in our diet and lifestyle."
The work of two world–class specialists formed the basis of all subsequent ones - new research somehow echoes it, it is quoted, corrected or supplemented.
One of the mummies of the Dakhla oasis. Photo: Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities
Another study of 1087 Dakhla mummies for the presence of oncopathologies was conducted by Canadian specialists – anthropologist El Molto and doctor Peter Sheldrick. They published their findings in the International Journal of Paleopathology: to the only previously identified case (rectal cancer in a 50-year-old man), the Canadians added five more.
In the first case, discovered by Michael Zimmerman, there were no problems with the diagnosis: the malignant tumor was completely preserved in the body of the mummy. To identify "new" cancer patients, Molto and Sheldrick studied bone injuries with precision. For example, they found a 6.5 cm diameter cavity in the pelvic bone of a woman aged 40-50 years – according to the researchers, this is a trace of a cancerous tumor.
Three more identified cases – two women and a man who died at the age of 20-30 years. The cause of death, according to scientists, is cervical and testicular cancer, respectively. "When we first presented cancer cases from Dakhla to our colleagues, many objected to us: "the deceased are too young for such a diagnosis," Molto and Sheldrick write in their work. They remind that modern medical research has confirmed a direct link between the human papillomavirus (HPV) and many types of cancer, including those that affect young people. Scientists were unable to conduct genetic studies for the presence of HPV in mummies, however, it is known that this virus is much older than humanity and it is likely that it was also present in the Dakhla oasis: "HPV is a proven cause of some forms of cervical and testicular cancer, and it existed in Africa long before the appearance of Homo Sapiens."
The skull of a young woman from the Dakhla oasis with traces of the spread of cancer. Scientists suspect the presence of HPV. Photo: El Molto
The sixth case is the remains of a child whose bones are literally eaten away by leukemia. Total: 6 cancer patients per 1087 mummies from the Dakhla oasis. The conclusion of scientists is that the risk of "catching cancer pathology" in the ancient Egyptian oasis was 0.5% (5 people out of 1000). Compare with modern statistics: in Western countries, this figure has reached 50%. "In other words, cancer risks in the modern Western world are 100 times higher than in ancient Dakhla," Molto and Sheldrick write.
Researchers admit that some inhabitants of Dakhla could have died from cancer, which left no traces on the remains and, as a result, undetectable. Another indisputable fact is the shorter life expectancy of the ancient Egyptians compared to the modern one. However, even with these reservations, the researchers believe that the incidence of cancer was much lower than it is today. This is completely consistent with the conclusions made by David and Zimmerman in 2010.
They (David and Zimmerman) once put forward several tough arguments in response to the most common objections. Indeed, the low life expectancy in ancient times did not allow cancer pathology to develop, there were many other reasons for early death. However, a 2010 oncohistorical study showed that the inhabitants of ancient Egypt and Greece lived long enough for diseases such as atherosclerosis, osteoporosis and Paget's disease (bone disease), whereas in the modern world malignant bone tumors are increasingly observed in very young people.
The remains of a 3-5-year-old child from the Dakhla oasis. The damage to the bones is caused by leukemia. Photo: El Molto
Or such an objection: the absence of traces of cancer on ancient remains can be explained by their poor preservation. However, researchers of this topic drew attention to the fact that during mummification, all signs of malignant formations are preserved, and tumors are preserved even better than healthy tissues. It is enough to rehydrate tissue sections and study them under powerful modern microscopes.
Despite the extremely low, by modern standards, incidence of cancer, oncopathology still existed in the ancient world. Why – researchers don't have an answer yet. "We don't know exactly what caused it. The ancient Egyptians heated their homes and, accordingly, inhaled smoke from the hearths, incense was burned in temples, but sometimes the disease just appeared, out of nowhere and for no apparent reason," Rosalie David said in 2010.
A separate aspect of the 2010 and 2018 studies is the attempts to treat cancer in ancient times.
"Ancient Egypt left behind a lot of human remains and written sources, which gives us a unique opportunity to study the diseases themselves and how to treat them. The Egyptians are considered the fathers of pharmacology, so many of their methods really worked. They were very inventive, and some drugs that were considered magical actually had a therapeutic effect. For example, they used celery to treat rheumatism, and modern medicine is also interested in the healing properties of this plant. The level of ancient Egyptian surgery and traumatology (for example, the treatment of fractures) was the highest – because they knew the anatomy perfectly well: thanks to the tradition of mummification, there was no ban on working with corpses in Egypt. In this they reached the heights of mastery and, importantly, acquired a different way of medical thinking compared to the ancient Greeks who came to Alexandria to study medicine," Professor David said in 2010.
At the same time, it was the Greeks, according to Zimmerman and David, who were the first to isolate cancer into a separate disease and began to distinguish between benign and malignant tumors. Whereas mentions of oncopathology in ancient Egyptian texts are very rare, and often the described symptoms have only an external resemblance to cancer: modern scientists believe that in many cases such symptoms could be caused by completely different causes, from leprosy to varicose veins.
Molto and Sheldrick also paid attention to this problem. However, neither in the ancient Egyptian texts, nor on the remains from Dakhla, they found obvious signs of attempts at treatment. "They knew that something very bad was going on. And yet we did not find indications of any special cancer therapy, because they hardly understood what it was," he said. El Molto told Live Science, adding that the Egyptians could still try to treat the external manifestations of cancer, such as neoplasms on the skin.
Molto and Sheldrick (both Canadians, by the way, are currently "retired" and devote all their time to excavations and research in Dakhla) hope that in the future the collected data will be useful for comparison with modern statistics on cancer and other diseases in Dakhla. The opportunity to trace how diseases and their frequency have changed in one region over the centuries can be very valuable for all mankind.
This task and its importance were briefly formulated by Rosalie David back in 2010: "A lot of data collected on Ancient Egypt, together with other similar studies from different places and millennia, can be considered an unambiguous message to modern society: cancer is a disease created by man himself. Therefore, only we can and must find a solution."
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