Egyptian embalming techniques were like preserving pears in sugar

Categories: Comparisons

An example of an analogy used in science:

"'The mummy itself was 1.6 meters [sic] (5.2 feet) long, and the inner winding sheet (of three) was stained with 'a blackish and gummous substance'. From this, [Nehemiah] Grew deduced that 'the way of embalming amongst the Aegyptians [sic.], was boiling the body (in a long cauldron like a fish-kettle) in some kind of liquid balsam; so long, till the aqueous parts of the flesh being evaporated, the oily and gummous parts of the balsam did by degrees soak into it, and intimately incorporate therewith'. It was much like preserving pears in sugar, he suggested."

Adrian Tinniswood

Tinniswood, A. (2019). The Royal Society & the Invention of Modern Science. Basic Books.

Read about analogy in science

Read examples of scientific analogies

Many examples of science analogies are listed in 'Creative comparisons: Making science familiar through language. An illustrative catalogue of figurative comparisons and analogies for science concepts'. Free Download.

Author: Keith

Former school and college science teacher, teacher educator, research supervisor, and research methods lecturer. Emeritus Professor of Science Education at the University of Cambridge.