Mummygate!

A village postman was detained by police yesterday after offering for sale a lock of hair and other items from the mummy of the Pharaoh Rameses II.

Jean-Michael Diebolt, from St Egrève, near Grenoble, was facing possible charges of receiving stolen property after he put an advertisement on the internet offering the hair, samples of the embalming resin and fragments of bandages from the 3,200-year-old remains of the Egyptian ruler.

The affair was being taken seriously because the 50-year-old postman, who is a part-time journalist and writer, said that his father was a member of a team of experts who analysed the mummy in France in 1976. . .

While police were trying to check the authenticity of the items, Mr Diebolt’s action sparked a diplomatic incident between Paris and Cairo. Zahi Hawass, the head of Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities, said: “If these elements are authentic, it would be a scandal that would risk harming relations between France and Egypt.”

The French Foreign Ministry said that it was following the affair closely.

I see no active listing on eBay France matching the description noted above, although one joker is proclaiming himself the modern Ramses and offering his own hair for sale, eliciting some banter from questioners.

Posted by David on November 29, 2006 9:07 PM