The sacred junk food diet of the pharaohs

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The sacred junk food diet of the pharaohs

Post by DJKeefy »

The food of the gods in Ancient Egypt was more likely to guarantee an early grave than immortality, scientists have discovered.

Delicious banquets offered to the deities and eaten by Egyptian priests and their families, were laden with artery-clogging saturated fat, research published in The Lancet has shown.

The evidence comes from inscriptions on temple walls and from computer X-rays of the priests' mummified remains - which show signs of damaged arteries and heart disease.

Fresh translations of hieroglyphics, the picture language of ancient Egypt, revealed sumptuous meals of beef, wild fowl, bread, fruit, vegetables, cake, wine and beer were given up to the gods three times a day, before being taken home and eaten.

Much of what the priests ate was rich in saturated fat and would be classified today as junk food.

They ate a type of bread fortified with fat, while cakes were typically made with animal fat or oil.

Goose, which was commonly consumed, provided 63 per cent of its energy from fat, 20 per cent of it saturated.

Doctors today say our daily intake should contain no more than 30 per cent fat, with just seven per cent of it saturated.

This incredibly unhealthy diet inevitably took its tool on the ruling classes.

Recent scans of 16 priest mummies whose hearts or arteries could be identified, showed nine suffered from vascular calcification.

This is the stiffening of the muscles that line the blood vessels, which means the heart must pump harder and increases the risk of heart disease.

Professor Rosalie David, from the University of Manchester's Faculty of Life Sciences, who led the study, said the evidence showed 'that blocked arteries caused by rich diets are not just a modern malaise'.

However, it is likely that poorer Egyptians did not suffer to the same extent, because their diet was mainly vegetarian. Unfortunately mummification was reserved for the elite and the remains of the lower classes are far less well preserved.


Source: Associated Newspapers Ltd


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Ebikatsu
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Post by Ebikatsu »

High cholesterol is a big problem here in Egypt. Nothing has changed :mrgreen:
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Post by Christine »

and stomach dissorders IE ulcers reflux etc becuase they still eat lots of fat, litterally, pull the fat off of the meat and offer it to you to eat(yuk) and then fill up with stodge when meat is not affordable :)
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Post by Ebikatsu »

The fat thing is gross :?

They call it 'white meat'!!

YUCK!

seems like Fawar Fruit and Viagra are the two top selling drugs in Egypt from all the sachets and packets you see lying around :mrgreen:
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Post by Christine »

:lol: true , but down in good old luxor most of the time , antbiotic, cure everything , each time one of my lot has had anything wrong he/she comes back from local quack with bloody antibiotic :)
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