Search Manuscript - Find Wisdom

In 1898 French egyptologist Victor Loret made an invaluable discovery in the Valley of the Kings. He found the remains of the ancient mausoleum and the tomb of  the pharaoh Thutmose III and his vizier Useramun.  Loret found complete funerary texts that were reserved only for the pharaohs and the highest nobility. For example, the vestibule of Thumose’s tomb was ornamented with the full ancient story of the Book of Amduat. And two pillars in the middle of the burial chamber contained another important Egyptian reference document called ”Book of Praying to Ra in the West, Praying to the United One in the West”. It was later abbreviated by scientists to the name “Litany of Ra”. 

Throughout the years archeologists found Litany of Ra in the entrance of most royal tombs starting from the time of Seti I who like Thutmose III belonged to the 18th Dynasty. They all with the exception of rebellious pharaoh Akhenaten worshipped the solar cult of Ra.

The whole funerary text of the Litany of Ra consists of two parts, obviously written in different times. The first part of the Litany invokes the sun god Ra in no less than seventy five various forms. And the second part of the composition serves as the funerary reference for the soul of the deceased pharaoh. In this series of prayers the soul unties with parts of nature and gods, including Ra.  The pharaoh is praised for his successful end of the journey in the underworld and  his union with the sun god Ra.  

Among funerary pieces of literature found by archeologists in the Valley of the Kings there is an ancient funeral text called Amduat. Specialists discovered many excerpts of it in the tombs of New Kingdom pharaohs. Until they found the complete ancient document in the tomb of Thutmose 3 in the Valley of the Kings.

For many centuries this ancient manuscript was reserved exclusively for pharaohs only. The story in Amduat follows the journey of the Egyptian sun god Ra, who travels through the underworld, from sunset till dawn. After his death, says the text, pharaoh is taking this same journey. And in the end of it dead pharaoh becomes one with Ra and live forever.

Amduat tells us in details about gods and monsters of the underworld. Some of them are allies of the pharaoh and some are great enemies. In order to achieve his objective and become one with Ra, dead pharaoh must know the names of all good and evil in the underworld which is divided into twelve hours of the night.

So, this is when the Amduat comes handy as a reference for the pharaoh: it names all of these gods and monsters. With the help of Amduat he can call upon them for help or use their name to defeat them.

In the middle of 19th century European learned about very complex and sophisticated concept of afterlife that existed in ancient Egypt.  In 1842 when German Egyptologist Karl Richard Lepsius published the selection of texts that included Egyptian collection of funeral hymns, spells, and instructions to allow the deceased to pass through obstacles in the afterlife. The book became an instant bestseller and part of its fame belongs to the title that Lepsius gave to the selected manuscripts. He simply called them - “The Book of the Dead”, deriving the name from the one of the most important spells in the ancient texts.

The original texts that were included in the book of the dead were most commonly found in the coffin or burial chamber of the deceased ancient Egyptian. There were written on the papyrus scrolls. Archeologists learned that these “prequels” of funeral poems were created in advance with with spaces being left for the name of the deceased to be written in later.  There were the product of collaboration of various scribes and artists whose work was pasted together and then produced in some kind of funerary workshops, that predate funeral homes. It seems that the book of the dead was extremely expensive and had to be prepaid before the persons’ death.  It is interesting to note that the value of the book was so high not because of the spells pasted there but due to high value of the blank papyrus.  No wonder, that some of the discovered papyrus funeral resolutions were reused.

When specialists started finding in quantities the book of the dead, they mistakenly assumed that it had extreme religious importance to ancient Egyptians. Some even proclaimed that it was the “Bible” of ancient Egypt.  However, this was not the case.  Ancients did not consider it a divine source, which led to the changes of some texts as the time went by.  But it was popular reading for them because it remained an ancient bestseller until ancient Romans conquered Egypt.