Did the ancient Egyptians sacrifice wild animals or domesticated pets?

CAIRO – 24 September 2020: French scientists, who conducted isotopic studies of bird mummies in ancient Egyptian tombs, declared that the ancient Egyptians hunted ibises in large numbers and offered them as sacrifices to their gods.

Scientific Reports Magazine reported that the Egyptians offered these birds as sacrifices to the gods Horus, Ra, and Thoth.

However, it is not yet known whether these birds were wild, or were raised specifically to be offered as sacrifices to the gods such as domesticated cats and other animals whose mummies were found in ancient Egyptian tombs by scientists.

For this purpose, scientists of the French National Center for Scientific Research conducted geochemical analyzes of the mummies in the Lyon Museum, and it turned out that they were wild birds.

The researchers came to this conclusion, by analyzing samples from the bones, feathers and tissues of 20 mummies and determined the isotopic composition of oxygen, carbon, nitrogen, sulfur, and strontium, comparing them with similar data from human mummies, according to what was reported by RT, because according to researchers, when raising birds, the isotopic composition should be uniform and close to human mummies, regardless of whether the birds have been given special food or have eaten the remains of human food.

The isotopic composition of the mummies showed great variety and strange properties. Therefore, the researchers concluded that the birds were wild, and this is confirmed by the paintings of hunting scenes on the walls of some ancient tombs.

Also, what is in favor of this hypothesis is the presence of adult birds, chicks and eggs in cemeteries, unlike cats, which are all adults.

Determining the age of mummies by radiocarbon dating revealed that the mummies date back to the third millennium BC.

According to scientists, the ancient Egyptians hunted ibis and other birds of prey, in large numbers, causing them to be on the verge of extinction.