The Egyptian Afterlife: What to Take with You and Why (original) (raw)

Burial and the dead in ancient Egyptian society: Respect, formalism, neglect

Ancient Egypt offers a paradigm contrast between ideals of respect- ful care for the dead, on the one hand, and realities of medium- and long-term neglect, destruction and reuse on the other. Ideals are expressed in normative mortuary monuments and in texts; the archaeological record, together with relatively few skeptical texts, tes- tifies to realities. Death was as socially riven as the realm of the living. Vast amounts were invested in royal and elite monuments, while cemeteries as a whole cannot account for more than a fraction of the population. Preservation of the body was essential for conventional conceptions of an afterlife – often envisaged to take place away from the tomb – but embalming practices cannot have been required for all. The contradictions implied by divergences from the ideal were negotiated over very long periods. They emphasize that, even if the actors may present the matter otherwise, treatment of the dead relates as much to the living as to the deceased.

Neglect Burial and the dead in ancient Egyptian society

Ancient Egypt offers a paradigm contrast between ideals of respectful care for the dead, on the one hand, and realities of medium-and long-term neglect, destruction and reuse on the other. Ideals are expressed in normative mortuary monuments and in texts; the archaeological record, together with relatively few skeptical texts, testifies to realities. Death was as socially riven as the realm of the living. Vast amounts were invested in royal and elite monuments, while cemeteries as a whole cannot account for more than a fraction of the population. Preservation of the body was essential for conventional conceptions of an afterlife -often envisaged to take place away from the tomb -but embalming practices cannot have been required for all. The contradictions implied by divergences from the ideal were negotiated over very long periods. Such processes of accommodation may at Oxford University Libraries on

neglect Burial and the dead in ancient Egyptian society: Respect, formalism

2010

Ancient Egypt offers a paradigm contrast between ideals of respectful care for the dead, on the one hand, and realities of mediumand long-term neglect, destruction and reuse on the other. Ideals are expressed in normative mortuary monuments and in texts; the archaeological record, together with relatively few skeptical texts, testifies to realities. Death was as socially riven as the realm of the living. Vast amounts were invested in royal and elite monuments, while cemeteries as a whole cannot account for more than a fraction of the population. Preservation of the body was essential for conventional conceptions of an afterlife – often envisaged to take place away from the tomb – but embalming practices cannot have been required for all. The contradictions implied by divergences from the ideal were negotiated over very long periods. Such processes of accommodation may 01 Baines (JG/d) 8/1/02 1:05 pm Page 5 at Oxford University Libraries on March 17, 2010 http://jsa.sagepub.com Downl...

Ancient Egyptian Tombs: The Culture of Life and Death

2011

Relationships with the Dead A devoted son visits his mother's grave on Christmas Day every year, before returning to celebrate the season's festivities with his living family. Why? Does he expect some form of meaningful communication with her, in a cold village churchyard? Who can say-it is between him and her. What is very clear, though, is that this is an occasion of remembering, but, in some ways, a curious form of remembering. There is a paradox here in that the

Death, Funeral Rituals, and Afterlife in Ancient Egypt

Ancient Egypt was a prosperous and a strong kingdom that developed along the Nile River and lasted more than 3000 years. This civilization was headed by a series of powerful pharaohs whose empire encourage people to settle down and farm their lands instead of wondering around looking for food. When people settled on the banks of the Nile, cities, towns, properties, and temples were constructed; art, writing, and religions were invented. This civilization developed a new way of life that hadn't existed before. According to, Hinnell, people of the North African desert, which was dry and sweltering, regarded The Nile River as a source of life; their lives and their civilization depended on it. The Nile flooded every year and revived the dry lands; after every flood, Egyptians planted their crops. This yearly flooding of the Nile made Egyptians see life as a cycle. 1

Accessing the Afterlife in Ancient Egypt

Herodotus has called Egypt "Gift of the Nile," owing to the Egyptians' abundance of resources gifted to them by the annual flooding of the Nile's river banks. This abundance is thought to have allowed the Egyptians the opportunity to flourish in the arts and to devote a great deal of time and resources to the development of Egyptian culture, much of which appears to be associated with funerary cults and the perpetuation of life after death. Despite parasitic diseases and other hardships caused by living in a sandy, arid climate, John H. Taylor writes that "it was… out of a love of life that ancient Egyptians derived their firm belief in a life after death," 1 and moreover that "it was… [this firm belief] which provided the motivation for the building of the pyramids [as well as] the spectacular funerary monuments which have drawn visitors to the banks of the Nile from the classical era to the present day." 2 It is this belief in the afterlife as well as the gradual assimilation of afterlife accessibility by the Egyptian people which I shall treat in this paper, paying close attention to the changing mythological emphases involved through the course of the development of the Egyptian funerary texts (sakhu). I will especially examine the role of the mythological cycle of Osiris as it allows for an

The Egyptian tomb as a House of Life for the Afterlife?

The Egyptian tomb as a House of Life for the Afterlife?, 2002

The aim of this article is to identify the significance of the "tomb library", in other words of those "literary" texts which have come to light inside tombs and which accompanied the deceased in his journey to the next world together with texts relating specifically to funerary rites. How can the presence of these literar texts be accounted for?