The Mummy! A Tale of the Twenty-Second Century
First English-language story with a reanimated mummy.
The Mummy! A Tale of the Twenty-Second Century is a novel from 1827, published in three volumes by Jane Webb, who later became Jane C. Loudon. The story is set in the year 2126 and follows the revived Egyptian mummy of Cheops. It depicts a future with advanced technology and holds the distinction of being the first English-language work to bring a mummy back to life.
After her father died, leaving her an orphan at seventeen, Webb realized she needed to support herself. She had already written a strange, wild novel set in the twenty-second century, attempting to predict the country’s future progress. Her inspiration may have come from the era's fascination with ancient Egypt, sparked by French research during Napoleon’s invasion, as well as public mummy unwrappings held in a theatre near Piccadilly in 1821, which she might have attended. Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel *Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus* was also a likely influence; Shelley’s creature was described as more hideous than a reanimated mummy, a line that may have sparked Webb’s idea. Webb’s novel engages with elements from *Frankenstein*—such as revulsion toward a desired object and immediate arrest for a crime—but treats them with greater clarity. Unlike Shelley’s monster, the revived Cheops is not a shuffling horror but offers wise political and life advice to his friends. Webb’s mummy explicitly states his life is granted by divine favor, not solely by human science, a contrast explored in detail in a 2003 essay by Hopkins.
Unlike many early science fiction works, Loudon did not simply project her own era with political changes. She imagined a world with foreseeable shifts in technology, society, and fashion. The hero, Edric Montague, lives in a peaceful, Catholic England under Queen Claudia. Court ladies wear trousers and hair ornaments made of controlled flame. Surgeons and lawyers are steam-powered automatons, air travel by balloon is common, and a kind of Internet is predicted. She attempted to explain the mummy’s revival through galvanic shock rather than magic, and her ideas of scientific progress later seemed prophetic to 19th-century readers. Many incidents in the book are satirical or humorous, and its social attitudes have led to its classification as a feminist novel.
*The Mummy!: Or a Tale of the Twenty-Second Century* was published anonymously in 1827 by Henry Colburn in three
- author
- Jane Webb (later Jane C. Loudon)
- published
- 1827
- field
- Science fiction / Gothic novel
- nationality
- English
- known_for
- First English-language story to feature a reanimated mummy; early feminist science fiction
Lore & Background
After her father's death, making her an orphan at the age of 17, Webb found that 'on the winding up of his affairs that it would be necessary to do something for my support. I had written a strange, wild novel, called the Mummy, in which I had laid the scene in the twenty-second century, and attempted to predict the state of improvement to which this country might possibly arrive.' She may have drawn inspiration from the general fashion for anything pharaonic, inspired by the French researches during the Napoleonic invasion of Egypt; the 1821 public unwrappings of Egyptian mummies in a theatre near Piccadilly, which she may have attended as a young woman; and, very likely, the 1818 novel by Mary Shelley, Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus. As Shelley had written of Frankenstein's creation, 'A mummy again endued with animation could not be so hideous as that wretch,' which may have triggered her later concept.
Reader's Guide
The Mummy! is significant as the first English-language story to feature a reanimated mummy, and it is often ranked among feminist novels due to its social attitudes. Unlike many early science fiction works, Loudon did not portray the future as her own day with only political changes; she filled her world with foreseeable changes in technology, society, and even fashion. The hero, Edric Montague, lived in a peaceful and Catholic England under the rule of Queen Claudia. Her court ladies wear trousers and hair ornaments of controlled flame. Surgeons and lawyers may be steam-powered automatons. Air travel, by balloon, is commonplace. A kind of Internet is predicted in it. Besides trying to account for the revivification of the mummy in scientific terms—galvanic shock rather than incantations—'she embodied ideas of scientific progress and discovery, that now read like prophecies' to those later in the 19th century. The novel drew many favourable reviews, including one in 1829 in The Gardener's Magazine on the inventions proposed in it. In 1830, the 46-year-old reviewer, John Claudius Loudon, sought out the 22-year-old Webb, and they married the next year.
Did You Know?
- The novel was published anonymously in 1827 by Henry Colburn in three volumes.
- The mummy Cheops is revived in the year 2126.
- The novel predicts a kind of Internet and steam-powered automatons as surgeons and lawyers.
- The author may have been inspired by Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and the 1821 public unwrappings of Egyptian mummies.
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