Book of the Dead

Also Known As: Egyptian rw nw prt m hrw, “Spells of Coming Forth by Day”; the modern name is from the German Todtenbuch, given by Karl Richard Lepsius in 1842
Region/Culture: North Africa
Mythos: Egyptian Mythology
Primary Type/Nature: Mythological Objects
Mythical Attributes: The Book of the Dead is a collection of spells that give a dead person the words, names and passwords needed to cross the underworld, pass the judgement of Osiris and live again.
Role in Mythos: It is the guide and the defence brief of the dead, and it holds the best-known account of the weighing of the heart against the feather of Maat.
Relation to Humans: Egyptians who could afford one had a copy made and buried with them, in the coffin or the burial chamber, from about 1550 BC to the first century BC. Its spells were spoken for the dead person and, in the tomb, were meant to work for them without any living reader.

Somewhere in Thebes, around 1250 BC, a painter finished a picture of a pair of scales. On one pan he set a small jar, the sign for a human heart. On the other he set a single ostrich feather. A jackal-headed god kneels to steady the plumb line, an ibis-headed god stands by with a reed pen, and behind them crouches a thing with a crocodile’s head, a lion’s chest and the back end of a hippopotamus. Then a scribe went along the roll and wrote one name into the gaps that had been left for it. The name was Ani.

That roll is the most famous copy of what is now called the Book of the Dead. The Egyptians did not call it that. Their name for it was the Spells of Coming Forth by Day, which says what it was for: getting a dead person out of the tomb and into the light. The grim modern title came in 1842, when the German scholar Karl Richard Lepsius published a late copy kept in Turin under the name Todtenbuch. He numbered its spells from 1 to 165, and the numbers have been used ever since.

It was never one book. About 190 spells are known, and no copy holds them all. A buyer chose, or a workshop chose for him. Many rolls were made ahead of time with blanks for the owner’s name, and in Ani’s roll the name is squeezed in by a different hand. A rich man got a long roll with painted scenes. A poorer one got a short roll, or a few spells on a strip of linen.

A full copy is a handsome thing. The papyrus is the colour of pale straw, made of sheets glued edge to edge and rolled tight. The writing runs in narrow columns of black, in a quick, simplified form of hieroglyphs, with the titles of the spells and the names of dangerous beings picked out in red. Along the top or set into the text are the paintings, in blue, green, white and ochre. Ani’s roll was about twenty-four metres long before a museum cut it into thirty-seven sheets. The longest known roll runs to nearly forty metres.

The spells are much older than the papyrus. Around 2400 BC, kings had prayers and charms carved into the walls inside their pyramids. Some centuries later, nobles had the same kind of words painted inside their wooden coffins. Around 1600 BC a new set appears, on the coffin of a queen named Mentuhotep and then on linen shrouds, and by the start of the New Kingdom it had moved onto papyrus. It stayed in use for some fifteen hundred years. Under the kings who ruled from Sais, in the seventh and sixth centuries BC, the spells were at last put into a fixed order.

The use of it was simple. On the day of burial, the roll was laid in the coffin or tucked beside the wrapped body, sometimes inside a hollow wooden statue. The lid went on. The tomb was sealed, and the air inside went still and dry and smelled of resin. Nobody was ever meant to read it again. It was there for one reader only.

That reader had a long way to go. The spells gave him back the use of his mouth, his legs and his memory. They told him the names of the gates and of the keepers who sat in front of them with knives, since a keeper whose name is known has to let a traveller pass. They let him turn into a falcon, a heron, a swallow, a lotus flower, a snake or a crocodile. One spell called the little servant figures in his tomb to do his farm work for him. Others were plainer. There is a spell for not walking upside down in the land of the dead, and one for not having to eat dung there.

The heart of the book is Spell 125. The dead person comes into the Hall of the Two Truths, where Osiris sits enthroned and forty-two gods sit in rows as judges. He greets each one by name and tells each of them one thing he has not done. He has not stolen. He has not killed. He has not told lies. He has not taken the cakes of the gods. Then Anubis sets his heart on the scales against the feather of Maat, which is truth. Thoth writes down the result. If the heart is level with the feather, the dead man is declared true of voice and Horus leads him to Osiris. If it is heavy, the crouching beast, Ammit the Devourer, eats it. There is no second chance after that.

The book’s power is knowledge. In the Egyptian underworld, to know a name is to have a hold on its owner, and the roll is a list of names and of the right words to say. It turns a frightened newcomer into someone who knows the place. It promises that he will come and go as he likes, eat bread and drink beer in the Field of Reeds, and ride with the sun god in his boat.

It also has a way round the one thing its owner could not control. Spell 30B is spoken to his own heart, and asks it not to stand up and give evidence against him at the scales. It was cut into the flat underside of a green stone scarab and laid on the mummy’s chest. A note with the spell says it was found long ago by a prince, Hordjedef, under the feet of a god’s statue.

Its limits are plain enough. The book works only for the person whose name is written in it. It had to be bought, and most Egyptians could not buy one. A badly copied roll, with spells cut short or mixed up, gave its owner the wrong words at the gate. And papyrus rots in the damp, burns, and is eaten by insects. Thousands of copies were made. Most are gone.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the Egyptian Book of the Dead?

The Book of the Dead is an ancient Egyptian collection of funeral spells written on papyrus and buried with the dead. The spells were meant to guide a dead person through the underworld, past its gates and its judges, and into a new life. It was used from about 1550 BC to the first century BC.

What did the Egyptians call the Book of the Dead?

The Egyptians called it the Spells of Coming Forth by Day. The name Book of the Dead is modern. It comes from the German word Todtenbuch, used by the scholar Karl Richard Lepsius when he published a copy in 1842.

What is the weighing of the heart in the Book of the Dead?

The weighing of the heart is the judgement scene in Spell 125 of the Book of the Dead. The dead person denies a list of wrongs before forty-two judges, and Anubis then weighs the heart against the feather of Maat while Thoth records the result. A heart level with the feather means new life with Osiris, and a heavy heart is eaten by Ammit the Devourer.

How many spells are in the Book of the Dead?

About 190 spells of the Book of the Dead are known, and no single copy contains all of them. Each roll held a selection chosen for its owner. Lepsius numbered 165 of them in 1842, and his numbers are still used.

What is the Papyrus of Ani?

The Papyrus of Ani is the best-known copy of the Book of the Dead. It was made in Thebes around 1250 BC for a scribe named Ani and was about twenty-four metres long. It is now in the British Museum, cut into thirty-seven sheets.