But the practice of artificially preserving bodies shows up in archaeological records around the world. While there are some earlier possible examples of intentional mummification, archaeologists generally point to the Chinchorro culture, in what is modern-day Peru and Chile, as the first civilization to ritualistically preserve human bodies. “These patterns represent a coherent and intentional framework for treating the dead,” the researchers write, “embedded in belief systems that possibly date back” at least 10,000 years. Some peoples in the latter country mummified their dead using smoke as late as the 1950s. But the researchers also acknowledge that the similarities could be “purely coincidental.”