Can I get an Anthropologist's or Archeologist's input?

Question

When an ancient tomb containing an individual, not a room, is opened after thousands of years, do the skeletal remains immediately desintegrate?

I watched the documented search for Vlad Tepes, (aka Vlad III the Impaler, Vlad Dracula), and someone claiming to have discovered a tomb that is believed was connected to him, also claimed the skeletal remains just turned into dust immediately after opening it. Sunlight and air were blamed for this.

Does this really happen when ancient tombs are opened that are not mummified?

Answer 1

Most sealed tombs are stable in regard to temperature, humidity and organisms. As soon as the seals are broken everything changes. Deterioration is very common.

As an aside, was this TV? Perhaps some dramatic license as 'everybody knows" vampires crumble in sunlight? At the same time, most remains would be extremely fragile and would crumble if suddenly  moved.

A number of the King Tut tomb objects have had to be repeatedly conserved since they were found in the 1920s. One tour of the artifacts was done to raise money for better storge conditions for the collection.

The Declaration of Independence would not have survived the abuse it took in "National Treasure." Even rolling it would have harmed the parchment. (see it's current condition below)

Answer 2

when organic remains have been sealed or buried for a long time, they come to be in a state of near equilibrium with their environment.. once removed from that environment, the process of decay is initiated again...

would it be possible for remains to INSTANTLY turn to dust from sunlight and air? no... but if dust was already inside, and they opened the tomb, this could have stirred up the dust inside making it SEEM like the bones just exploded into dust

Answer 3

OK, if you found a sealed air tight tomb in which the dry air had preserved the remains, decay could become quite rapid if something with moisture was introduced. For instance in Dublin, Ireland, there is the famous St Michan's church, where there are amazing well preserved bodies (natural mummies rather than man-made  ones) from medieval times, and someone placed a bouquet of flowers down and they started suddenly to rot.

However, you seem here to be talking about completely excarnated remains. They would need to be handled with care,but no, they wouldn't immediately disintergrate unless for some reason they were especially fragile and were handled innapropriately. I live in an area of heavy population during the neolithic and bronze age,and there are always skeletons popping up all over the place (lol).Some are in excellent condition, one I can think of has the most amazingly perfect teeth, I'm jealous and he's over 4000 years old!

   Even if the burial is in a cist or stone coffin etc, a lot will depend on local soil conditions. A stone cist in say derbyshire will produce reasonably preserved bones, but on Dartmoor,where the soil is acidic, there are few bones to be found as the acid destroys them, but in some cists they have found Bronze Age hanks of HAIR, which survives better in acid conditions!

Answer 4

Absolutely it does.  You have to consider the minute amount of erosion taking place over long periods of time continuously; flesh and bone are far from resilient materials and without proper moister they become quite brittle.  All nutrients are dried up within a matter of years, all that's left behind quickly takes on the consistency of an abandoned beehive.  (Best analogy i could come up with at 3am)  Now take that, let rampant insects invade and burrough through it, then wait a few millenia and blast it with some light and a draft and poof!  You've just witnessed the world's oldest magic act.  

Seriously though, successful mummification processes (pioneered to preserve the world's most important people, right?) should be considered nothing less than miraculous and the results should make the long dead practitioners some of the proudest craftsmen in all of history, lol.

Answer 5

It's not exactly like the "Hollywood movies" portray, and it depends on many other variables, so I would say, "immediate disintegration" would be a little drastic!

However, if you've ever visited "Living Museums", where you can watch archaeologists working behind glass, in a climate controlled environment, there are necessary precautions that must be taken, to preserve these various rare finds...