Mummification Research Paper

The practice of mummification began around 2600 BC. It began in Ancient Egypt, where dead bodies were prepared for the afterlife. Many people today perceive mummification as a simple process in which the body is wrapped in cloth and buried, however, it was much more complicated than that. Altogether, preservations took roughly seventy days for each body. During those seventy days, there were many necessary alterations to the body that needed to be completed before the final step of wrapping. The talented people that performed these tricky tasks were called “embalmers.” They needed a vast amount of knowledge regarding the human body and how it worked in order to complete the first step of mummification: removing all of the blood and organs

These burial rituals were especially important for pharaohs who were desperately trying to please the gods and make it to the afterlife. These rituals were often performed by professionals, making them so expensive and only able to be purchased by royalty. Burial ceremonies were thought of as a way to guide the spirit from one life to the next. They believed that each and every person’s soul was composed of many different parts. To name a few, the Khat was the physical body, the Ren was their hidden name, and the Shuyet was known to be the shadow form of oneself. It was believed that after death, the soul would voyage on the ship of Ra (the sun God) through the underworld, eventually ending up in the afterlife. The ancient Egyptians documented many rituals and ceremonies in what are known as “pyramid texts.” Experts today have translated some of the recitations used during burial ceremonies, for example, “You are the lord of the entire earth, in control of the Ennead and every god as well. As you exercise control, may you drive everything bad far away from this Osiris Nemtyemsaf Merenre and not let it come against him again, in your identity of Horus who does not repeat his work. You are the ka of all the gods. As you have gotten them that you might take them and give them life, may you give life to [Osiris] Nemtyemsaf Merenre" This text demonstrates