CT Scan Reveals Something Incredible in 1,000 Year Old Buddha

It is truly fascinating what you can find inside of many antique sculptures.

Quite the amazing find was discovered in the Netherlands recently after a CT scan was taken of a 1,000-year-old Buddha sculpture. The scan revealed that a mummy was hidden within, still sitting in a meditation pose – but that’s not all.

The sculpture is from the 11th or 12th century and was part of the Mummies exhibition at the World Museum in Rotterdam earlier last year. It was recently analyzed at the Meander Medical Center, where, along with the CT scan, samples were taken from the mummy with an endoscope.

The CT Scan revealed the remains of a mummified monk encased inside, still sitting in what appears to be a position of meditation and said to be in immaculate condition. This Is Colossal further reports that “[a]mong some practicing Buddhists it’s been said that similar mummies ‘aren’t dead’ but are instead in an advanced state of meditation.”

According to the NL Times, the body belonged to Buddhist master Liuquan of the Chinese Meditation School. Along with being the only one of its time, it is the only Chinese Buddhist mummy available to the west for scientific study.

Surprisingly, the corpse wasn’t the only thing contained within the statue. During the endoscopic procedure, scientists made another discovery. As reported by the NL Times, gastrointestinal and liver doctor Reinoud Vermeijden “found paper scraps that are printed with ancient Chinese characters.”


The Liuquan mummy has since been taken to Hungary where it is set to be put on display in the National Museum of Natural History in Budapest until May 2015.

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