Dating back to the New Kingdom period of Ancient Egyptian history, the Book of the Dead, whose original title translated variously as “Book of Coming Forth by Day” or “Utterances of Going Forth by Day”, is a funeral text that remained in use until well into Biblical times. There is not a single Book but rather a wide variety of them based on recoveries with varying religious and magical texts (and spells) and different illustrations. The Book of the Dead is the descendant of the Pyramid Texts of the Old Kingdom and the Coffin Texts of the New Kingdom.
It should be remembered that the Egyptian concepts of death, the soul, and the afterlife were complex with complicated interactions. Funerary rituals, including mummification, were intended to preserve and unify the body and various aspects of the soul as a purified form in the afterlife, granting various abilities. The Book of the Dead was part of this process, including spells for accomplishing these various aims. It also included a spell to make statuettes work on the desceased’s behalf in the “Field of Reeds” that comprised the Egyptian afterlife.
The Book of the Dead was discovered after the use of the Rosetta Stone allowed the translation of recovered specimens. Initially thought to be equivalent to the Bible, its lack of religious tenets is a significant difference, as is the fact that it was not treated by the Egyptians as a subject of divine revelation. Frequently produced in funerary workshops by multiple authors, the name was left open for later insertion of the name of deceased. Imagery to explain the text was considered necessary and frequently more important than the text itself.
Souce: Wikipedia; the image itself has an expired copyright.
