In the 5th dynasty we have - in an raised number of mastabas and other monuments - evidence of the extension of religious ceremonies, including the solemnization of funeral rites, but a text fonning the Book of the Dead as a whole does not occur until the rule of Unas (B.C. 3333), the last king of the dynasty, who according to the Turin papyrus dominated 30 years. This monarch built on the plain of Saqqara a stone pyramid about sixty-two feet high, each side measurement about two hundred feet at the base. In the time of Perring and Vyse it was involved by heaps of grown stone and rubbish, the result of recurring attempts to open it, and with the casing stones, which consisted of little limestone from the quarries of Tura. In February, 1881, M. Maspero began to have the pyramid, and soon after he won in making an entrance into the innennost chambers, the walls of which were extended with hieroglyphic inscriptions, didst in perpendicular lines and painted in green. The condition of the home showed that at some time or other thieves had already won in making an entrance, for the address of the black basalt sarcophagus of Unas had beer turned off and moved good the door of the sarcophagus chamber, the pavement stones had been pulled in the vain set about to find buried treasure, the mummy had been broken to pieces, and nothing remained of it take out the right arm, a tibia, and some fragments of the skull and body. The inscriptions which addressed certain walls and corridors in the tomb were later published by M. Maspero. The appearing of the text of Unas marks an era in the history of the Book of the Dead, and its rendering must be seen as one of the greatest victories of Egyptological decipherment, for the want of detenninatives in many places in the text, and the archaic spelling of numerous of the words and passages represented difficulties which were not easily overcome. Here, for the first time, it was established that the Book of the Dead was no compilation of a comparatively late period in the history of Egyptian civilization, but a work belonging to a very remote antiquity; and it followed naturally that texts which were then known, and which were thought to be themselves direct ancient texts, raised to be only versions which had passed through two or more successive rescripts.
Related Posts:
Related Posts:
- What is the Book of the Dead?
- The History of the Book of The Dead
- The Book of The Dead in the First Dynasty
- The Book of The Dead in the Second Dynasty
- The Book of The Dead in the Fourth Dynasty