The Mummy Thread! Contains pics:viewer discretion is advised

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Can't say I'm familiar with them...do they have any hits?

What about the process?

It was quite complex, and the Royal Embalmers must've had a lot of money for their workmanship.

No. And they broke up at least ten years ago.

Aut-zi? (He might have been Autistic--Otzi worked alone as a shepherd) topic

I thought this was a scene from the movie Awake
.

The earliest ancient Egyptians buried their dead, whether rich or poor, royal or common, in small pits in the desert. Mummification at that time, roughly prior to around 3400 BC, had not yet been established in their religious belief system.

The heat and dryness of the sand dehydrated the bodies quickly, creating lifelike and natural mummies:



When mummies were incorporated into their belief system, where preservation of the body for the afterlife became of utter importance, they bagan to experiment with techniques to better preserve the body and make it as "lifelike" as possible.

The Embalmers and Others Associated with the Mummification Process

In slightly more modern mummification, there were three distinct groups of practitioners. They included the cutter who made the incision in the flank of the mummy, the scribe who supervised this work and the embalmer himself, who belonged to a special guild or organization and was responsible for leading the mummification ceremonies and for wrapping the mummy in bandages. The latter actually supervised all of the stages of the mummification process and wore a jackal-headed mask to impersonate Anubis, the god of embalming, as he performed the rituals.



The embalmers were actually a special class of priest and were considered to be highly skilled professionals, probably with close ties with the medical doctors. Their office was hereditary. Under their charge might be others, including those who made coffins and wooden funerary figures, as well as other items for the tomb.

On the other hand, the cutters had one of the lowest statuses in society, because of the ritual "impurity" associated with the incision in the corpse and the removing of the viscera. They also obviously faced certain health risks. This class of individual in the mummification process may have even included criminals.

In charge of mummification was the "hery seshta" (overseer of the mysteries), who took the part of the jackal god Anubis.
The assistant was the "hetemw netjer" (seal bearer of the god) a title which had previously been held by the priests of Osiris.
The "hery heb" (lector priest) would read the magic spells during each ritual.
The "wetyw" (the bandagers) undertook most of the actual evisceration (removal of the internal organs) and bandaging of the body.

The process of mummification

Shortly after death the body would be taken to a tent known as the "ibw" the place of purification. There it would be thoroughly washed in a solution of natron (a naturally occurring compound of sodium carbonate and sodium bicarbonate) before being taken to another tent known as the "per nefer" the house of beauty. Here the actual mummification process would take place.

The viscera (internal organs) were removed and dried, rinsed, bandaged and then placed in canopic jars or parcels which were placed with the body. These canopic jars would be decorated with the images of the "four sons of Horus". From the 18th Dynasty onwards, the stoppers of canopic jars were fashioned into the forms of the heads of each of the four gods:


Imsety the human-headed god looks after the liver.


Hapy the baboon-headed god looks after the lungs


Duamutef the jackal-headed god looks after the stomach


Qebehsenuef the falcon-headed god looks after the intestines.

The brain was also removed through a hole that was punched through the thin bone at the top of the nostrils (the Ethmoid bone) * Sometimes an incision at the base of the neck would be used to removed the brain. Once the brain had been removed, a coating of resin was then applied to the face.

After the removal and preservation of the internal organs, dry natron would be moulded over the corpse and possibly also inserted into the body cavity, in order to assist desiccation. The body would be left to thoroughly dehydrate for some forty days.

Once dried out, the temporary stuffing would be removed, with any dried body parts being retained for burial, and the body cavity would be re-stuffed and packed out with bags of clean natron, resin soaked bandages and various sweet smelling aromatics. The brain cavity was filled with resin or linen, the openings in the skull packed and artificial eyes often added.

The whole body would be coated in resin, and cosmetics were sometimes added in order to give the body its final life-like appearance. Whilst the body was then completely bandaged up, amulets would be inserted between the wrappings in the appropriate places as described in the Book of the Dead. Bandaging the body would take around fifteen days.

A very important part of the outer mummy was a death mask, placed over the head to provide an idealised image of the deceased as a resurrected being. The mask played a crucial symbolic role, for it signified the elevation of the dead person to a higher plane of existence in the afterlife.

The entire process, from death to burial would take around seventy days.

* Modern experiments have shown that the brain needs to be 'whisked up' into a sort of liquid before the body is placed face-down allowing the brain then to pour out through the nose. I've posted a picture earlier with the hook used to do this.

I have been to this place. I went there in 2001.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mummies_of_Guanajuato

http://www.mummytombs.com/mummylocator/ ... ajuato.htm

http://www.donquijote.org/guanajuato/info.legends4.asp

Guanajuato is a beautiful city.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guanajuato

Thanks for posting the links, poopylungstuffing!:)

Wow, those mummies are incredible...some of them still have their clothes on!

I have dozens of photos I took there...I should try..er...digging some of them up

Man...they sure have some lousy souveniers though.

I had a keychain of the "world's smallest mummy"...it broke shortly after I got it.

LOL. Well if you ever dig them up post them here! It's been a long time since I've taken a picture alongside a mummy, but I've stood close to one recently!

i have a pic of me standing in front of mummy who is so huge, he somehow doesn't seem to be real.

This post has real staying power. I can't contribute because this is a subject I know very little about. Thats why I like it though, is because the pictures, history and movie trivia cited are mostly new to me. Thanks Silver Proteus and other contributors to this thread. It's quite the Mummy geek fest!

Now you've really gotten me interested! Are you planning on going on a dig up soon?



Thanks, velodog!

I would like to take this chance to thank other posters who have contributed as well.

I've posted this clip before somewhere else, but I thought I'd add it here:

How to make a mummy.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vE01eglST2o[/youtube]

They should've just researched things a little more...

The Egyptian Afterlife

Egypt had a highly developed view of the afterlife with elaborate rituals for preparing the body and soul for an eternal life after death. Beliefs about the soul and afterlife focused heavily on preservation of the body. The Egyptians believed the ka aspect of the soul needed to be reunited with the ba, to support the akh, the part of each being which ascends to the heavens to take its place among the stars.
This is also why, in drawn depictions deceased pharaohs, each limb is represented.



From Wikipedia:

The Ba is in some regards the closest to the contemporary Western religious notion of a soul, but it also was everything that makes an individual unique, similar to the notion of 'personality'. (In this sense, inanimate objects could also have a 'Ba', a unique character, and indeed Old Kingdom pyramids often were called the 'Ba' of their owner). Like a soul, the 'Ba' is a part of a person that the Egyptians believed would live after the body died, and it is sometimes depicted as a human-headed bird flying out of the tomb to join with the Ka in the afterlife.


The Ba.

The Ka was the Egyptian concept of life force, that which distinguishes the difference between a living and a dead person, death occurring when the ka left the body.

The Egyptians also believed that the ka was sustained through food and drink. For this reason food and drink offerings were presented to the dead, although it was the kau within the offerings that was consumed, not the physical aspect. The ka often was represented in Egyptian iconography as a second image of the individual, leading earlier works to attempt to translate ka as double.

Ancient Egyptians believed that death occurs when a person's ka, leaves the body. Ceremonies conducted by priests after death, including the "opening of the mouth aimed, not only to restore a person's physical abilities in death, but also to release a Ba's attachment to the body. This allowed the Ba to be united with the Ka in the afterlife, creating an entity known as an Akh (meaning "effective one").




The Ka statue provided a physical place for the Ka to manifest


The weighing of the heart:





This scene depicts what occurs after a person has died, according to the ancient Egyptians.

Beginning with the upper left-hand corner, the deceased appears before a panel of 14 judges, some holding the ankh (the key of life) in their hands, to make an accounting for his deeds during life.

Next, below, the jackal god Anubis who represents the underworld and mummification leads the deceased before the scale. In his hand, Anubis holds the ankh.

Anubis then weighs the heart of the deceased (left tray) against the feather of Ma'at, goddess of truth and justice (right tray). If the heart of the deceased outweighs the feather, then the deceased has a heart which has been made heavy with evil deeds. In that event, Ammit the god with the crocodile head and hippopotamus legs will devour the heart, condemning the deceased to oblivion for eternity. An individual without a heart in the afterlife in essence, did not exist as Egyptians believed the heart to be the center of reason and emotion. If the feather outweighs the heart, meaning the heart was not heavy with sin, then the deceased has led a righteous life and may be presented before Osiris to join the afterlife. Thoth, the ibis-headed god of wisdom stands at the ready to record the outcome.

Horus, the falcon head god, then leads the deceased to Osiris. Horus also carries an ankh in his hand.

Osiris, lord of the underworld, sits on his throne. He holds the symbols of Egyptian kingship in his hands: the shepherd's crook to symbolize his role as shepherd of mankind, and the flail, to represent his ability to separate the wheat from the chaff. Behind him stands his wife Isis, in white, and her sister Nephthys. Together, Osiris, Isis, and Nephthys welcome the deceased to the underworld.





Another heart-weighing ceremony. Here, the goddess of truth and justice, Ma'at, depicted with a feather on her head, is present on both sides.

What about the mummified animals ??

There's baboon mummies ! !

I've taken your order, Prof_Pretorius, I'll get to that tomorrow.

On modern day pet mummies, I already posted this clip somewhere else, but thought I'd post it again, in case someone wants to see just how weird some people can be (no offense to anybody who thinks of mummifying their pets after they die, but mind you, it can get a little expensive. )

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8LKN4K8Y88[/youtube]