Article:
During routine restoration, researchers discovered a surprise hidden in an ancient gold-painted Chinese Buddha statue: a mummy hidden inside. The mummy was once the Buddhist monk Liuquan, according to text found with the statue. 
  
 Editor's Note: This story was updated on March 3 at 10:10 a.m. E.T. 
  
 A Chinese statue of a sitting Buddha has revealed a hidden surprise: Inside, scientists found the mummified remains of a monk who lived nearly 1,000 years ago. 
  
 The mummy may have once been a respected Buddhist monk who, after death, was worshipped as an enlightened being, one who helped the living end their cycle of suffering and death, said Vincent van Vilsteren, an archaeology curator at the Drents Museum in the Netherlands, where the mummy (from inside the Buddha statue) was on exhibit last year. 
  
 The secret hidden in the gold-painted statue was first discovered when preservationists began restoring the statue many years ago. But the human remains weren't studied in detail until researchers took scans and samples of tissue from the mummy late last year. 
  
 The mysterious statue is now on display at the Hungarian Natural History Museum in Budapest. [Image Gallery: Inca Child Mummies] 
  
 Mysterious history 
  
 The papier-mâché statue, which has the dimensions, roughly, of a seated person and is covered in lacquer and gold paint, has a murky history. It was likely housed in a monastery in Southeastern China for centuries. It may have been taken from the country during the Cultural Revolution, a tumultuous period of social upheaval in Communist China starting in 1966 when Chairman Mao Zedong urged citizens to seize property, dismantle educational systems and attack "bourgeois" cultural institutions. (The current owner bought the statue legally.) 
  
 A gold-painted papier-mâché statue of the Buddha contained the mummified remains of an ancient Buddhist monk who lived during the 11th or 12th century. Here, a researcher inspects the statue. Credit: © Drents Museum 
  
 The statue was bought and sold again in the Netherlands, and in 1996, a private owner decided to have someone fix the chips and cracks that marred the gold-painted exterior. However, when the restorer removed the statue from its wooden platform, he noticed two pillows emblazoned with Chinese text placed beneath the statues' knees. When he removed the pillows, he discovered the human remains. 
  
 "He looked right into the bottom of this monk," van Vilsteren told Live Science. "You can see part of the bones and tissue of his skin." 
  
 The mummy was sitting on a rolled textile carpet covered in Chinese text. 
  
 Researchers then used radioactive isotopes of carbon to determine that the mummy likely lived during the 11th or 12th century, while the carpet was about 200 years older, van Vilsteren said. (Isotopes are variations of elements with different numbers of neutrons.) 
  
 In 2013, researchers conducted a CT scan of the mummy at Mannheim University Hospital in Germany, revealing the remains in unprecedented detail. In a follow-up scan at the Meander Medical Center in Amersfoort, Netherlands, the researchers discovered that what they thought was lung tissue actually consisted of tiny scraps of paper with Chinese text on them. 
  
 The text found with the mummy suggests he was once the high-status monk Liuquan, who may have been worshipped as a Buddha, or a teacher who helps to bring enlightenment after his death. 
  
 Last year, the mummy was on display at the "Mummies – Life Beyond Death" exhibit at the Drents Museum in Netherlands, before moving to the Hungarian Natural History Museum in Budapest. 
  
 Common practice 
  
 Mummies from this period are fairly common in Asia. For instance, researchers in Mongolia recently found a 200-year-old mummified monk still in the lotus position, the traditional cross-legged meditative pose. 
  
 It's not clear exactly how Liuquan became a mummy, but "in China, and also in Japan and Laos and Korea, there's a tradition of self-mummification," van Vilsteren said. 
  
 In some cases, aging Buddhist monks would slowly starve themselves to eliminate decay-promoting fat and liquid, while subsisting mainly on pine needles and resin to facilitate the mummification process, according to "Living Buddhas: The Self-Mummified Monks of Yamagata, Japan," (McFarland, 2010). Once these monks were near death, they would be buried alive with just a breathing tube to keep them holding on so they could meditate until death. 
  
 "There are historical records of some aging monks who have done this practice," van Vilsteren said. "But if this is also the case with this monk is not known." 
  
 Editor's Note: This story was updated to note that the current owner of the Buddha bought the statue legally. 
  
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 It seems Mexico isn't the only place in the world where you can find human body parts incorporated into religious statuary: a Chinese statue of the Buddha has been discovered to contain the entire mummified body of a monk, folded into the same position. 
  
 The Buddha, exhibited at the Drents Museum in The Netherlands last year, was taken to the Meander Medical Centre in Amersfoort, where it was subjected to a full CT scan and had samples taken with an endoscope, under the supervision of Buddhist art expert Erik Brujin. 
  
 The mummy inside the statue -- the only one of its kind ever found -- is believed to be a Buddhist master named Liuquan of the Chinese Meditation School, who died around 1100 AD. 
  
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 The CT scan and endoscopy revealed more than just the mummified remains of Liuquan. Samples of a material that has yet to be identified were taken from the thoracic and abdominal cavities, and something else extraordinary was discovered: in the spaces once occupied by organs, the team found scraps of paper scribed with ancient Chinese characters. 
  
 The team believes the mummy may be an example of self-mummification in order to become a "living Buddha", a gruelling process that involved a life of extreme austerity. It was believed by some that mummification was not death, but a highly advanced spiritual state, and by others as a state of higher enlightenment. 
  
 Meander Medical Centre 
  
 In Japan, monks seeking self-mummification would begin a 1,000-day diet of water, seeds and nuts, followed by a 1,000-day diet of roots, pine bark and a special tea made from the sap of the Chinese lacquer tree -- a toxic substance usually used to lacquer bowls and plates, used by the monks to repel maggots and bacteria. Then they would be sealed in a stone tomb to await death. 
  
 A further 1,000 days after the monk's death, the tomb would be unsealed; those monks who had achieved mummification would be venerated in temples, while those who had not would remain entombed, respected for their attempt. 
  
 Whether those mummies had their organs removed and paper inserted is not known, however, it seems unlikely. 
  
 Liuquan has since moved on from Drents Museum, and will be on display at the Hungarian Natural History Museum until May 2015. |||||Summary:

– Look inside a 1,000-year-old Chinese Buddha statue, and what do you find? Why, a mummified body, of course. At least that's what Dutch researchers saw when performing a CT scan on a statue shown last year in the Netherlands at Drents Museum, Discover reports. The body is believed to be that of Buddhist master Liuquan, who perhaps died while undergoing "self-mummification." In this tradition, old Buddhist monks ingested mostly resin and pine needles until they were nearly dead, reports LiveScience. Then they were buried alive while breathing through a tube so they could meditate until the end. "There are historical records of some aging monks who have done this practice," says an archaeology curator. "But if this is also the case with this monk is not known." However he got in there, the monk's presence wasn't a total surprise. The statue—which was likely kept in a Chinese monastery for centuries—somehow ended up in the Netherlands, where a private owner discovered a body inside in 1996 while repairing a few cracks and chips. Then a CT scan in Germany in 2013 showed the remains in great detail. The latest scan reveals what appears to be lung tissue along with little bits of paper in place of bodily organs. On the scraps is Chinese text suggesting that the monk was Liuquan, who may have been revered after his death as a "living Buddha," CNET reports. He's not alone, however: Mummies from this period, around the 11th or 12th century, are fairly common in Asia. (A 200-year-old mummified monk in Mongolia may still be alive, Buddhism experts say.)