There was the risk, however, that despite all precautions, something might happen to the embalmed body, that it might be destroyed by some accident quite unforeseen and unforeseeable. The Egyptians must have considered this danger long and earnestly before they arrived at a method of averting it.
The method was simplicity itself. What could serve the purpose better than a statue of the deceased? If the mummy became damaged, there was always the likeness in stone for the double to inhabit. Then somebody decided that two statues would provide two chances for the double to survive in case of accident to the mummy, and once the idea was fully established the number of statues multiplied until there was a dozen or more, all the same, carved in stone, to represent the dead man. To avoid the possibility of the double making any mistake, the likeness of the dead man was portrayed. This accounts for the finding of so many statues of kings; each statue gave the king a chance in the afterlife.
To provide sustenance for the double before it reached the Egyptian equivalent of Paradise, jars of water, meat and bread were buried with the mummy. It would not do for the dead to go hungry. Theoretically the foodstuffs should have been replenished from time to time, and no doubt for long this was done, but the Egyptians finally found that it was difficult enough to provide for the living, without toiling to feed the dead.
There is no doubt that the offerings to the dead became somewhat of a drain on the resources of these ancient Nile dwellers, so again they solved the problem in quite a simple way. If they painted all the offerings on the walls of the tombs, and prayed to the gods to provide the departed with the things needed in the afterworld, such painted offerings would last for ever, and relieve the living of the demands on their foodstuffs. Consequently, all over the tombs, these pictures of offerings may be found, to serve the deceased if he should need food during his wanderings to the Egyptian Paradise.
The little images known as Ushabti were placed in the tomb, in case the deceased were called upon to work in the next world. They were his servants, who would labour for him and save their master from performing menial tasks. The boats or barges that are found were to ferry the dead man over the sacred waters to the Fields of the Blessed.
The Egyptians, indeed, considered that everything required in this life would be needed in the next. It is well for us that they had these ideas, for they have resulted in many remarkable relics being found in the tombs, relics which help the scientists to reconstruct the life of these wonderful ancients, to revive the romance of their lost civilization.
In order that the dead man might not lose his identity, his name was graven within the tomb, and in time the outstanding features of his life were also mentioned, so that the gods should be conversant with all he had done. Some of these notes are short, others long, but all of them are of importance as showing us what happened while the dead man was alive. We have our own National Biography printed on paper, and carefully bound to place on our shelves, but the National Biography of Ancient Egypt is carved upon mountains of stones in the tombs of the land. They are the books of the distant past, but there is the possibility that they will survive when many of our modern books have perished utterly from the earth.
By courtesy of the British Museum
A SCENE FROM THE FAMOUS BOOK OF THE DEAD, PAINTED 3,000 YEARS AGO ON PAPYRUS, SHOWING KING HER-HERU AND QUEEN NETCHEMET PRAYING TO OSIRIS WHILE THE HEART OF THE QUEEN IS BEING WEIGHED IN THE BALANCE