History of Embalming / and of Preparations in Anatomy, Pathology, and Natural History; Including an Account of a New Process for Embalming

by J.-N. Gannal

On these motives new efforts have been made, which have conducted to the following results: to demonstrate that all the salts with a soluble aluminous base, are decomposed; that those which are very soluble offer all the advantages of alum employed in very concentrated solution, and have not the same inconveniences.

For example, a solution of acetate of alumine at twenty degrees, injected the 16th of August, 1835, perfectly preserved a subject abandoned to the table without any other preparation; only, at the end of a month it was remarked that desiccation had commenced; when a part of it was covered with a layer of varnish, which preserved it from further evaporation. At the present day, 25th January, 1836, the varnished part may be dissected as easily as a fresh subject, whilst the other part offers resistance to dissection.

During the first days of September, another subject was injected with acetate of alumine at fifteen degrees; although this was the corpse of a woman who had died from abortion, it was very well preserved.

On the 12th of December, a subject was injected with the chloride of alumine at twenty degrees; this injection did not succeed well, and only three quarts could be introduced. Nevertheless, the body was perfectly well preserved. This want of success in introducing the liquid led to the following observation; that the chloride of aluminium at twenty degrees acts so powerfully on the arterial tubes and obliterates them to such a degree, that it prevents the passage of the liquid; but in order to remedy this inconvenience, it suffices to inject a first quart of the liquid at ten degrees, and the rest at twenty degrees. The chloride of aluminium has all the advantages of the acetate of alumine, and has further that of preserving the muscles of a bright red.

A mixture of acetate of alumine at ten degrees, and the chloride of the same base at twenty degrees, forms a good preservative injection. The use of one of these salts, or the mixture that has just been indicated, offers the advantage of preserving bodies, without its being necessary to subject them to any other preparation.

The density of the solutions of the acetate and chloride of aluminium must be graduated by the state of the atmosphere. When it is required to prolong indefinitely the preservation of the subject, it is essential to employ it at twenty degrees; it is equally necessary, in this case, to cover the subject with a layer of varnish, the sole object of which is to prevent the too prompt desiccation, which would prove an obstacle to dissection.

The first injections were made through the aorta. Subsequently, in order to avoid the laceration of the pectoral parts, the subject was injected through the carotid artery, which always succeeded very well when the liquid was forced both upward and downward.

After the saline injection, at the end of forty-eight hours, coloured grease may be injected; even after two months the same operation may be performed with the same success.

From the series of experiments which we have just exposed, it results:

1. That a solution of alum, of salt, and of nitrate of potash, injected at ten degrees, answers for preserving bodies at a temperature below ten degrees of the thermometer; that, for a more elevated temperature, it is necessary to carry the density to twenty-five or thirty degrees, and immerse the subject in a liquid of ten or twelve degrees.