700 year old china mummy found

These incredible pictures show a 700-year-old mummy, which was discovered by chance - by road workers - in excellent condition in eastern China.


The woman, discovered two metres below the surface in a wooden tomb, was wearing a Ming Dynasty dress and is thought to have been at a high-ranking level


The corpse of the high-ranking woman believed to be from the Ming Dynasty - the ruling power in China between 1368 and 1644 - was stumbled across by a team who were looking to expand a street.


And the mummy, which was found in the city of Taizhou, in the Jiangsu Province, along with two other wooden tombs, offers a fascinating insight into life as it was back then.


Immersed: The mummy was found by road workers, and had been preserved in a brown liquid


Discovered two metres below the road surface, the woman's features - from her head to her shoes - have retained their original condition, and have hardly deteriorated.


When the discovery was made by the road workers, late last month, Chinese archaeologists, from the nearby Museum of Taizhou, were called into excavate the area, the state agency Xinhua News reported.


They were surprised by the remarkably good condition of the woman's skin, hair, eyelashes and face. It was as though she had only recently died.