You should be able to embalm bodies in the game. Helps necromancers keep corpses around longer and also can be given one more thing to do. I'm also very interested in the act of embalming itself.
There are some ways they embalmed people! I'm drawing my suggestions primarily from
this page, but embalming to me is fascinating. Apologies for the eurocentrism of my source--if people have suggestions about how other cultures embalmed their corpses that you think might be doable, I'd welcome them! I know this has come up a few times, but I've rarely if ever actually seen embalming methods discussed in detail telling from a search in the forums. I’ve taken it on myself to do some research to see how it can be incorporated into the game.
There are multiple ways to embalm, like evisceration where you take out the organs and pack the body with cloth and herbs. In terms of actual embalming herbs I would not bother, at least with the way the game it is now. Hunting down all those herbs feels like unnecessary work for the players (Plus most of them arent in the game, like mint) but the cloth is doable.
There’s excarnation but I don’t feel its something that would be useful in the game since it involves defleshing the bones and burying them. Then there’s immersion (less effective but easier to pull off in dwarf fortress) where they just put the corpse in a specific material like honey.
There's more than one way to embalm that's possible with existing dwarf fortress mats already, I believe. If it were possible, I’d make it so that the most of the following you did the longer the body would keep. (So it would make the rot timer in the code go back) Here are a few of my suggestions. (+ some misc ones)
Honey and Beeswax Immersion In Burial ReceptacleAll you needed to do is to have a dwarf put honey in a burial receptacle at a workshop. (No idea which one--farmer's workshop? I feel like there doesn't have to be a separate workshop to do this) This is my primary suggestion (Next to one other that will come up) that I will suggest, because it is fairly easy to do and also gives players a reason to use the beekeeping industry.
It also allows you to prep a coffin ahead of time!
Honey has been used as a way to embalm corpses in ancient times. Alexander the Great was embalmed in a honey and beeswax mixture when he died, and honey has well-known antimicrobal properties. The people in the past might not have known what microbes are, but they knew honey kept the bad stuff away.
Boil the corpse in wine or alcohol[/b]
This would probably be the most dwarfy and easiest way of doing it.
Rock Salt ImmersionPacking a coffin with a block or boulder of rock salt!
For people who don't want to get a beekeeping industry set up or can’t (Gotta stay off the surface in evil biomes!) and still want to prep a coffin ahead of time.
Rock salt is underutilized in the game currently, and sometimes people packed salt in coffins instead of honey. Salt, while not as effective as honey, dehydrates stuff easily and that includes microbes.
Bury in Lead CoffinMuch like the above suggestions, would give players a reason to use something that isn't often used. When smelting galena you get more lead than silver, resulting in a bunch of lead bars you have no use for outside. They would put the dead in lead coffins before putting them in the outside coffins, which could be done in the game in case you want to appease nobles who want a fancy tomb.
Boiling in alcoholJust like it says. Take five units of alcohol and boil the corpse. That’ll help newer players.
Misc Suggestions
Mummify organ/body part[/b]
Middle age nobles would mummify their organs as well, a holdover from the old days of egypt. French nobles would mummify their hearts. I think it would be a really cool scenario in adventure mode where you had to hunt down the mummified heart of a demon or cursed king that was stolen by a sorcerer. (Okay maybe that’s a huge reason I want this.) Or maybe you killed a particuarly nasty beast and you want a gristly trophy of your triumph on display. Doesn’t only have to apply to organs, could apply to stuff like the head of a forgotten beast one of your dwarves sliced clean off.
But seriously, a mummified heart or organ from a noble could be an artifact in of itself, depending on how important that person is. Or maybe your champion dies in battle so you decide to mummify their heart and put it on display. You’d do it by wrapping it in Cerecloth.
Make Cerecloth[/b]
Cerecloth is a cloth infused with beeswax and turpentine. Since dwarf fortress doesn’t have turpentine yet but beeswax I’d just have Cerecloth be made of cloth + beeswax. (Or maybe you can collect resin from trees to make turpentine at a still). You would wrap bodies and organs in it.
Grinding up Cinnabar DustThere is evidence to suggest that cinnabar dust was used as a rudimentary embalming method by prehistoric peoples! You can grind up cinnabar blocks or boulders at a craftdwarf’s workshop and have the dwarves scatter them on corpses if nothing else.
Aqua VitaeIf players don’t want to devote precious alcohol at any time, they can make aqua vitae from alcohol (presumably made for this purpose) and have the dwarves use that to boil the corpses instead of precious drinking alcohol. You’d be able to use the detail menu to pick which alcohol you want to use. Aqua vitae was also used a lot in alchemy too, in case Tarn wants to still do stuff with it.
