Monkeys or Dolphins as Mummies or Zombies

[Tor]

Is there anything actually restricting the use of mummy or zombie rituals to sentient humanoids?

I'm reading the spell descriptions in multiple books and nothing is jumping out at me to prevent the creation of a horse-zombie or a monkey-zombie or a dolphin-zombie or other similar fun variations.

When you (ab?)use the corpses of sentient humanoids people tend to think you're all evil and get all offended like 'no, that's my relative' but I'm wondering if I simply made zombie-cows if people might be a little more accepting of it since they like hamburgers.

I know necromancers can explicitly animate the skeletal (or sometimes a lil fleshy) remains of non-humanoid animals, so I figured perhaps the standard Animate/Control Dead spell could do that too, but that doesn't last all that long so it sure would be nice if we could make mummy or zombie cows or horses or monkeys or dolphins or something along that line.

For zombies, the corpse does need to have a forehead, a mouth, and a chest, but most animals have those.

Even though I by default picture humanoids being animated by this, the text seems broad enough to include other species... so I figure if they're about to die from their super-short lifespans, why not animate them with these rituals? It will usually make them smarter and tamer, and in many cases stronger beasts of burden, better guard animals, etc.

[ShadowLogan]

Zombies Ritual w/animals I am not so sure on.

Mummie animals I can see though since there is historical precedent for mummification of animals (real life) The main question here though is if one uses the Mummy stats as is, or if they are modified for the animal in question.

You might want to check Land of the Damned (#2). There is what is described as an undead horse in one of the monster sections.

[Tor]

Rereading the rituals, there might be more in favour of zombie-animals than mummy-animals when I look at it...

Mummy includes the phrase "the incantation brings to life a sort of humanoid robot" which might be used to argue against non-humanoid animals being used.

Of course, a lot of apes are humanoid, so I guess I could still make chimp-mummies or gorilla-mummies. I'm not sore how far down the family tree we can go before Simians cease to be considered humanoid though. I might have to look at examples of various aliens that PB has called 'humanoid' and compare them to see how many differences can exist before they cease to be humanoid.

Of course, I could still get mini-mummies by using the corpses of tinier species like Gnomes... or minimize some moral issues by buying mindless clones from Atlantis and making mummies out of those. Although if I had death-on-demand I would probably opt for Zombies.

Far as I recall there is no 'humanoid' term used in the Zombie ritual so I'm thinking it may be allowed for animals. In which case you could be enhancing their intelligence and having tiny pidgeon-zombies or something.

Makes me wonder if the animal you make a zombie out of can fly, if the zombie would be able to or not.

Since zombies regenerate you could even nearly vape them to mostly skeleton with MD weapons. So long as there's enough flesh left to bleed then you could complete the ritual and regen their flesh.

[Killer Cyborg]

There MIGHT be a spell/ability/power somewhere that is specifically about zombifying/mummifying animals.
If so, the text of that might includes some mention of the original spell being restricted.

Barring that, I don't know of any reason off-hand that it wouldn't work, although I don't believe that's the way either spell was intended.

[Tor]

Psh, intentions. I think we're expected to exceed those.

Beware mine zombie caterpillars.