THE LIVING MUMMY (1910) – Written by Australian author Ambrose Pratt. Dr. Pinsent, a two-fisted young archeologist, is running an expedition in the sands of Egypt. The beautiful May Ottley and her father, an accomplished archeologist himself, ask Pinsent to lend them some of his workmen for a few days.
Dr. Ottley has found the tomb of the priest Ptahmes from the 18th Dynasty. Pinsent lends Ottley some workers, but mostly so he can try courting May. At length the mummy of Ptahmes is found, but an examination of it reveals that it was not mummified in the traditional way – after death. Instead, it appears that Ptahmes was placed in suspended animation while still living.
Dr. Pinsent and the Ottleys try to bring the mummy back to life. Pinsent eventually meets the vile Dr. Belleville, a colleague of Dr.Ottley who leads the older man around by the nose. Belleville knows far more about occult matters than Ottley and he has been manipulating that older scholar to lead him to Ptahmes.
The mummified Ptahmes is restored to life and begins attacking people at Belleville’s secret bidding. From Egypt to the Ottleys’ home back in England the horror continues, as Belleville proves capable of using black magic to turn invisible and commit murder and other crimes in furtherance of his plans.
The villain intends to master the eldritch science behind suspended animation and refine it into literal immortality. He foresees that such a secret will make the wealthy and the powerful come crawling to him to prolong their lives.
Belleville and his enslaved mummy kill off several victims, including Dr. Ottley and May’s fiance back in England. The mummy’s dismembered hand is compelled to try murdering our hero Dr. Pinsent at one point, too.
Ptahmes eventually rebels against the villainous Dr. Belleville and takes steps to drag Belleville and all of the secrets of suspended animation down into destruction with him.
Dr. Pinsent’s understanding of ancient Egyptian helps keep him and May Ottley alive.
Overall, The Living Mummy often has more in common with old fashioned theatrical serials than horror fiction, but for readers who are hungry for more mummy material for Halloween Season this is worth a read.
The story’s early use of what would later become tropes of mummy films is interesting as well.
Balladeer's Blog 
Mebbe I need ta srtudy up on horror n such? Seems a market.
Maybe so. Just please don’t ever write anything like the Twilight series.
Erm, ah, I never seen “Twilight.” I’ve an aversion to Hollywood’s sense of macabre. Well, lately, just an aversion to things Hollywood. Finding more and more ferrin films and (television) series are more palatable. Some (ferrin flicks, tv) are boldly terrible, but now and again, with greater frequency than with Hollywood they are entertaining.
That is certainly the truth! And luckily, more and more people are getting into the foreign films available through streaming services.
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Thank you!
Great article. I have to say that I’m not a huge fan of mummies. I do find them to be creepy but they are rarely portrayed with respect in movies. I find the movies about the mummy to be a chore to sit through. For instance, I really didn’t care for “The Mummy” which came out back in 2017. Tom Cruise was fantastic as he always is, but even he couldn’t save this disaster of a movie.
Here’s my thoughts on “The Mummy”:
I know what you mean! The Tom Cruise movie didn’t know what it wanted to be.