The lids of such vases represent the four genii of the dead:

Ȧmset, ,
man-headed;		Hāpi, ,
cynocephalous
Dûamûtef, ,
jackal-headed;		Qebhsenûf, ,
hawk-headed.

The second immortal part of man was his heart (

àb).[20] The heart was removed from the body by the embalmers, and the texts give no definite explanation as to what became of it. During certain periods of Egyptian history, but still comparatively rarely, it was enclosed, as were the rest of the viscera, in special alabaster, limestone, or wooden vases, of which four were placed with the mummy in its grave. These vases are generally but most erroneously called “Canopic” vases. They usually date from the times of the New Empire, but we have some few dating from the Ancient Empire. In other cases the viscera were replaced within the body after its embalmment, and with them waxen images of the four genii of the dead as their guardian divinities. But for the most part documents do not afford us any information as to what was done with the material heart. Perhaps the priests took measures for its disappearance in order to furnish some tangible foundation for their doctrine concerning the heart. Certain statements of Greek writers seem to imply some such proceeding. According to these authorities the viscera, which must have included the heart, were cast into the Nile, because they were designated as the source of all human error. Porphyry gives us even the form of the prayer which was repeated when the chest containing the intestines was presented before the Sun; and if the text of this prayer has not hitherto been confirmed from original documents it is yet so thoroughly Egyptian in character that its authenticity cannot be doubted.[22]

But the immortal heart of a man, which stood in a similar relationship to his material heart as his Ka to the whole body, left him at death and journeyed on alone through the regions of the other world till it reached the “Abode of Hearts.” Its first meeting with the deceased to whom it had belonged was in the Hall of Judgment, where it stood forth as his accuser; for in it all his good and evil thoughts had found expression during his lifetime. They had not originated there, for the heart was essentially divine and pure, but it had of necessity harboured and known them,[23] and therefore it was called upon to testify concerning the man's former thoughts and deeds before Osiris, judge of the dead.