Insane that this lead to and crossed the age of colonialism right? Super bright people, the lot of us.

The usage of mumiya as medicine began with the famous Persian mumiya black pissasphalt remedy for wounds and fractures, which was confused with similarly appearing black bituminous materials used in Egyptian mummification. This was misinterpreted by Medieval Latin translators to mean whole mummies. Starting in the 12th century and continuing until as far as the 19th century, mummies and bitumen from mummies would be central in European medicine and art, as well as Egyptian trade.

After Egypt banned the shipment of mummia in the 16th century, unscrupulous European apothecaries began to sell fraudulent mummia prepared by embalming and desiccating fresh corpses.