Communist mummies

Since Lenin, a series of Communist and state-socialist heads of state have been similarly preserved and displayed, often encased in glass and available for public viewing in mausoleums.

[1] Preservation technologies improved rapidly during the 18th and 19th centuries, with Dutch anatomist Frederik Ruysch innovating a chemical embalming solution (liquor balsamicum) containing mercury oxide, Prussian blue, and clotted pig's blood.

His anatomical museum was visited by Peter the Great, who said "I saw boys and girls 4 years old, visibly well vascularized, with open eyes and soft little bodies, and they were not even in alcohol."

[2] Anatomists continued to make advances in embalming chemicals, significantly in 1859 with the identification of formaldehyde by Russian chemist Aleksandr Butlerov.

A Soviet team of specialists informally known as the "Lenin Lab" (now known as the Russian Biomedical Technology Research and Training Centre) was responsible for the body.

[11] Czech leader Klement Gottwald was embalmed and preserved in a mausoleum at the National Monument at Vítkov from 1953 to 1962 before finally being cremated.

[12] While not a head of state, Argentine First Lady Eva Perón was embalmed in 1952[13] and her blood was replaced with glycerine to preserve the organs and lend an appearance of "artistically rendered sleep".

Before the monument was completed, Juan Perón was overthrown in a 1955 coup, and the military dictatorship secretly transported her body to Italy, where it remained until 1971.

[14] Following the death of Ho Chi Minh in 1969, Soviet scientists from the Lenin Lab were flown into Vietnam to assist in the preservation of the body.

After denial of President Cory Aquino of the return of his remains, his body was interred in Byodo-In, a Japanese Buddhist temple, on the island of Oahu.

After Kim Jong Il died in 2011, he joined his father on display after being embalmed by scientists from the Lenin Lab in a laboratory that was built into the mausoleum.

[16] Following the death of Venezuelan leader Hugo Chávez in 2013 plans to embalm and permanently display his body in a transparent sarcophagus[20] were abandoned after German and Russian scientists concluded that too much time had passed to properly preserve it.

In the case of Lenin's remains, his blood vessels and arteries were removed during autopsy, so he wears a double-layered rubber suit and scientists use microinjection techniques to deliver embalming fluids.