Daily Life – Burial Practices

Matthew Logel

Embalming

• The first step of embalming is to take a dead body to an ibu which means tent of purification.
• Next you will need to save up lots of linen to use in your mummification.
• Then use oils to make you smooth and sweet-smelling.
• You need priest wearing the mask of Anubis, the god of embalming, to act as a chief embalmer at your death.

Materials

• You will need a knife to cut your body open.
• They needed Natron salt to dry the body up.
• Also a hooked instrument will be used to take your brain out through your nose.
• You will need jars with different heads to store each organ.
• The human god Imesty for your liver, a head of the baboon Hapy to store your lungs, a jar with a jackal head of Duamutef to store the stomach, And the intestines go in a head with head of the falcon god Qebehsenuef.

People

• There is a priest who watches over the embalming and he wears a Jackal mask of the god Anubis.
• There are also embalmers who remove all the organs except the heart and dry the bodies with natron salt.
• There would be a high priest to oversee the embalming of a pharaoh but he would not appear for a regular embalming.

Types of Royalty

• Cheap means the body is injected with cedar oil, which makes its insides liquefy and drain out. Then it is dried out with natron salt.
• Mid-range means organs are removed and embalmed. The body is dried out by natron salt and then completely wrapped up in linen.
• Luxury means the same as mid-range but with a portrait mask that is made of cartonnage (a mix of plaster, linen, and resin) or even solid gold.

Citations:

1. (Image).http://www.reshafim.org.il/ad/egypt/funerary_practices/embalmers.htm.9/16/15.Web
2. (Image).http://carlos.emory.edu/ODYSSEY/EGYPT/mastaba.html.9/16/15.Web
3. Funerary Practices and Embalmershttp://www.reshafim.org.il/ad/egypt/funerary_practices/embalmers.htm.9/15/15.Web