Mummified Baby From Centuries Ago May Have Died From Lack of Sunlight

One of the oldest families in Austria has a crypt that has held a secret for hundreds of years. A boy, maybe no older than a year or two in age, died not from a lack of food or injury, but from something else. He wanted the sun to shine on his skin.

Between the 16th and 17th century, the Counts of Starhemberg reserved a family crypt for the mummified male child. His body is wrapped in a silk garment and he has small features.

Even though he lived a life of privilege, his short existence was not a good one.

There are malformations to the ribs that look like signs of malnutrition, and they were discovered using a virtual autopsy. The boy's bones weren't obvious due to the bow of the legs that is known as rickets.

The researchers kept an open mind and considered a second possibility, low amounts of vitamins C and D. The researchers were able to investigate further because of their similarities.

The 10- to 18-month-old was overweight when he was younger than other infants. The child was well-fed in his patrician life, which is thought to have made him less likely to be deficient in vitamins C and E.

The child was severely undernourished because of the lack of sunlight and because of the lack of vitamins D and D2 in our food.

The chemical is needed to build bones during childhood. The body can better absorb calcium and phosphorous.

An almost complete lack of sunlight exposure as well as a generally 'good' nutrition can only be explained by the combination of Obesity and a severe deficiency of vitamins.

Although rickets isn't a death sentence, a look at the child's lungs revealed signs of lethal pneumonia, an infectious disease that is common in infants with deficient vitamins.

It took until the 19th century for scientists to figure out that Sun exposure is needed for bone formation in Starhemberg infants.

Given how few infant burials have been found so well-preserved, the discovery of a mummified infant in Austria is an interesting insight into the living conditions of noble infants of the 16th and 17th century.

A sign of high rank in European society is to avoid the sun. Peasants and laborers were the only ones who were sun-kissed.

The Medici Chapels in Florence were home to many skeletons of noble children during the 16th and 17th centuries. According to the researchers behind the study, the risk of rickets could be increased by the delay in providing adequate amounts of solid foods.

The baby found in the Austrian crypt was well-fed and cared for. He has a high level of body fat. There is some recent evidence that shows a link between vitamins D and childhood Obesity, raising questions of just what role his privileged diet might have played in his illness.

The only baby in the family crypt was buried in a silk funerary coat and researchers think he was a firstborn. His body did not have an inscription.

"As we know that the early infant death rates were very high at that time, our observations may have considerable impact in the over-all life reconstruction of infants even in higher social classes."

There was a study published.