Funerary Texts in Ancient Egypt

Prof. Randa Baligh

27 April 2017

12:00 PM

Bilbiotheca Alexandrina, Fourth Floar Floating Room

 The Bibliotheca Alexandrina Antiquities Museum is holding a lecture entitled Funerary Texts in Ancient Egypt. The lecture will be held on Thursday, 27 April 2017, at the Bibliotheca Alexandrina Main Building, Fourth Floor Floating Room (F4 level), at 12:00 noon, and will be given by Professor Randa Baligh, Head of Ancient Egyptian Archeology Department, Faculty of Arts, Mansoura University. The Researcher will discuss the funerary texts which played an important role to protect the deceased from the dangers of the afterlife. At the beginning, funerary texts were dedicated to helping the deceased pharos and members of the royal dynasties. The Pyramid Texts—of which 715 spells were taken—were inscribed on the inner walls of the pyramids of the Fifth Dynasty kings and queens. They continued through the end of the Old Kingdom, and then coffin texts appeared. The use of coffin texts flourished during the Middle Kingdom; they were inscribed on rectangular wooden coffins. The themes of the texts tackled the relationship of the deceased king with god Osiris, the king of the dead, and Ra, the Sun god. Coffin texts derived from the Pyramid Texts which also derived from much older texts. At the early New Kingdom, the Book of the Dead appeared on the walls of the kings' tombs in Western Thebes. Around 1450 BCE, coffin texts were copied on commercial papyri, and they included around 200 spells. The Book of the Dead was also copied on papyri. Other funerary texts include Amduat Book, Book of the Gates, Book of the Caverns, Book of the Celestial Cow, and Book of the Two Directions.