The –est Health & Medicine

Oldest traces of smallpox virus found in child mummy

Variola DNA in 17th century remains is more direct evidence than earlier mummies’ pockmarks

Mummy in Lithuanian crypt

ANCIENT POX  This mummy was found in a crypt in Lithuania, along with a child mummy that held genetic remnants of variola virus, which causes the pustular rash disease, smallpox.

Kiril Cachovskij/Lithuanian Mummy Project, 2015

By Meghan Rosen

- More than 2 years ago

A child mummy buried in a church crypt in Lithuania could hold the oldest genetic evidence of smallpox.