Mummified bishop

Last week was fairly busy at work. This entire spring has been unusual when it comes to the number of meetings I have had to attend. I'm a member of several task forces and it's just incredible how many meetings I have been to the past few months. I'm booked almost every day. The most interesting thing that happened last week was something else - a visit to the History museum's storage. Last fall they opened a coffin where a mummified body from the 17th century was placed. It was the bishop of Lund, Peder Winstrup (1605-1679). He was the bishop there even after the Swedes won the war with Denmark and Skåne became Swedish. He was the one who suggested to the Swedish king that Lund should have a university. The museum curator told us that it's thanks to Mr Winstrup we have a job. The university was founded in 1666. His body was well preserved for being so old. It was remarkable to see it. We were given a thorough lecture about the bishop and his life, along with details of his health. They had run him through a CT scan and found that he had had dental caries, tb and gout. His body is a unique opportunity to study the living situation for the people in Lund at the end of the 17th century. The investigations will continue for quite a while.

The weekend was spent shopping at two different malls in the Malmö area, but the results were meagre. A scarf at a second hand store and two tunics. Today I had taken time off to go to Malmö city archive. I did research there occasionally when it was in another building, but they have since moved into a much better place. It's much more modern and easy to access now. I went there to look at a personal archive handed in by an in-law to my great grandmother's family. I knew there would be some information also about them, but it turned out that I already had those details. It was still interesting to see it, it was family history research done about 100 years ago.

Tomorrow I'm going to yet another archive. It's a much longer trip and I hope it will be worth while.