Entry into the Afterlife was not, however, merely dependent upon good examination technique. As has already been noted, the Egyptians were an intensely practical people who preferred to leave nothing to chance. They therefore took care to equip their tombs with a complete set of those questions and answers which they knew would be posed on the journey after death, effectively providing themselves with a passport to the delights of the next world. As the gods did not disapprove of this rather blatant form of cheating, rebirth in the Field of Reeds became assured for the wealthy. During the Middle Kingdom, this guide to the Afterlife took the form of spells and incantations which had evolved from the Old Kingdom Royal Pyramid Texts, and which were either engraved or painted on the sides of the coffins. By the New Kingdom the deceased were provided with their own personalized copy of The Chapters of Coming Forth by Day, an illustrated papyrus scroll containing a lengthy collection of spells, rituals, questions and answers which is now known more familiarly as The Book of the Dead.5 Affluent members of society had their individual copy of The Book of the Dead custom-written, while the less wealthy purchased mass-produced male or female scrolls which had gaps left at appropriate intervals so that the correct name and titles could be inserted. Occasionally there were mix-ups, and several women were buried with scrolls which were originally written for men.
The following is the way in which they conduct their mourning and their funerals. On the death in any house of a man of consequence, forthwith the women of the family plaster their heads, and sometimes even their faces, with mud. Then, leaving the body indoors, they sally forth and wander through the city with their dress fastened by a band and their bosoms bare, beating themselves as they walk. All the female relations join in and do the same. The men too, similarly dressed, beat their breasts separately. When these ceremonies are over, the body is carried away to be embalmed.
Herodotus
The Egyptians were by no means the only people of the ancient world to envisage an Afterlife. Indeed, there is an almost universal reluctance to accept that death might be the absolute end of all things. However, they were the only people to believe that the survival of the physical remains of the deceased was a virtual prerequisite for the survival of the spirits or life-force. Two spirits, the Ka and the Ba, would be released from the body at death; the Ka stayed close to the corpse in the tomb while the Ba was free to leave the tomb in the form of a human-headed bird. At the same time a third and entirely different aspect of the soul embarked upon the lengthy journey to the Afterlife. Both the Ka and the Ba, however, needed to be able to return to the body. If the corpse was destroyed these spirits were also destroyed and there could be no further hope of continuing life, although in an emergency they could take up residence in a substitute body such as a statue or even an illustration on the tomb wall. It was this deeply held belief which led to the development of elaborate mortuary rituals, including mummification, which were all designed as a practical means of preserving the body for all eternity.
Ironically, it was those who tried hardest and paid the most to protect their bodies who faced the greatest threat of decomposition. The poorer people, who throughout the Dynastic periods continued to be buried without coffins in the simple graves of the desert cemeteries, became naturally desiccated in the hot sand and were relatively well-preserved in a lifelike, if somewhat shrivelled, form. It was the introduction of the wooden coffin and the wood- or brick-lined tomb – probably initially intended to protect the body from the grave filling – which stopped the direct contact between the corpse and the sand, trapping moisture in close proximity to the body and encouraging putrefaction. Unfortunately, both coffins and tombs soon became essential components of a fashionable burial; the tomb served as protection against robbers, as a storehouse for grave-goods and, most importantly, as the permanent home of the soul, while the coffin carried the vital spells necessary to bring the deceased back to life. The resulting decomposition of the deceased was obvious, and led to ingenious attempts to preserve the body in a recognizable form.
Mummification techniques improved throughout the Dynastic period so that, although at the start of the Old Kingdom the majority of the embalmed bodies continued to decay, by the middle of the New Kingdom most professional undertakers could produce a remarkably lifelike embalmed corpse. The earliest attempts at preserving the body failed because no attempt was made to remove the soft tissue; the semi-dried corpses were simply wrapped in linen bandages complete with their already decomposing internal organs. As the bodies treated in this way simply disintegrated, resin or plaster was used to harden the bandages – although the body within the wrappings quickly rotted the hard outer shell retained a fairly natural appearance. It was only during the 4th Dynasty that the undertakers started to experiment with the removal of the viscera and the drying and stuffing of the now empty body cavity. This experimentation continued until, by the 21st Dynasty, the art of mummification had reached its peak.