It's been a good week for ...

mummies

A mummified monk found has confounded experts because, apparently, he's not dead.

Senior Buddhists say the monk, found sitting in the lotus position, is in a deep meditative trance.

Forensic examinations are underway on the remains, found wrapped in cattle skins in north-central Mongolia. Scientists have yet to determine how the monk is so well preserved, though cold weather is thought to play a part.

But Dr Barry Kerzin, a physician to Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, explained that the monk was in a rare state of meditation called "tukdam". "If the meditator can continue to stay in this meditative state, he can become a Buddha," Kerzin said.

The monk was discovered after a man was arrested for stealing it, with the intention of selling it on the black market. Who the prospective buyers might have been is anyone's guess, but perhaps he'd make an interesting garden ornament. At least it wouldn't crack in the frost.

It's been a bad week for ... mummies

Two ancient Egyptian mummies have been found floating in sewage near the village of Minya in northeastern Egypt.

The mummies, which were wrapped in several layers of linen and still in their wooden sarcophagi, are thought to date back to the Greco-Roman era, from 332 BC to 395. "Although the coffins were decorated with colourful designs, they were missing any ancient Egyptian inscriptions or hieroglyphics," the Ministry of Antiquities said in a statement. A third (empty) sarcophagus was also found.

Experts are now trying to restore what remains of the two mummies, which will be displayed at Minya's Hermopolis Museum. How they came to be dumped is not yet known, but ministry officials believe it was the result of illegal excavations.

Tutankhamun will be turning in his grave.