Mummification by Pietro Testa

“Ah, Unis! You certainly didn’t go dead, but you went alive!” This assertion addressed to the late King Unis of the 6th dynasty is a prelude to the content of this book: funeral rituals in ancient Egypt. The ancient Egyptians, loving life very much, tried to continue it after death. To fulfill this hope, they subtly and logically exploited the concepts of religion and magic based essentially on the myth of Osiris’ bloody death and rebirth united with the sun, the principle of light and life on earth and in the afterlife. The historical and cultural memory accompanied the problem of death during the historical arc of Egypt, providing a series of religious speculations of the myths expressed in written and oral canons that characterized the preparation for the journey to the mysterious world of the other life. We realize then that the origin of the mechanism of death and rebirth of the human being starts from the death and rebirth of the gods, from the animation of their painted or plastic images, the receptacle of their heavenly power and strength on earth.