The medieval Egyptians trusted in the afterlife and the resurrection of the body. This idea was founded on what they saw every day. Every evening, the sun set in the west and rose in the east the next morning. The moon grew and faded as new life sprang from grains sowed in the dirt. Everything was trustworthy as long as order was maintained, and life after death was possible if specific circumstances were satisfied. For example, the body had to be mummified and placed in a fully equipped tomb with everything required for life in the afterlife.
Mummies were created by the Incas of Peru. Ancient Australians and some Pacific islanders made mummies as well. The ancient Egyptians, on the other hand, are the most well-known creators of mummies. Mummies were created by the Egyptians for about 3,000 years. The strategies they utilized evolved over time during the New Kingdom (1500s–1000s BCE).
The Egyptians did not employ this method for impoverished people's bodies. They just wrapped them in coarse linen and dried them with salt. The ancient Egyptians thought that deceased individuals need their bodies in order to enter the next world effectively. They believed that the soul could survive as long as the body was kept.
It takes around 70 days from start to finish to embalm a body. The priest in charge would wear a jackal mask depicting the deity Anubis.
Mummification aided someone in reaching the afterlife since they thought that an afterlife could only exist if the ka (soul) could reclaim after death. Egyptians thought that the only way to do this was if the body could be identified. That's why they spent so much time on the mummification process, and also why Pharaohs eventually built their tombs during their lives.
Mummification was for rich individuals since the poorer section of the society could not afford the procedure. When a family could not afford the whole embalming procedure, the embalmers would put oil into the body through the anus. After a while, the oil would leak out, followed by the disintegrated internal organs. As a result, the poor had to begin the hereafter without organs.
Whatever method was used, the mummy was ultimately put in a wooden or cartonnage coffin. The casket would be picked up and carried to the tomb by the family.
The principal embalmer was a priest who wore an Anubis mask. Anubis was the dead's jackal-headed deity. Priests used Anubis masks because he was linked with mummification and embalming.
The early embalmers used few tools and sometimes left them in or near the tomb once their operation was finished. A knife was used to make the abdominal incision, hooked bronze rods were used to retrieve brain tissue, a wooden adze-like instrument was used to remove internal organs, and a funnel was used to pour resins into the skull cavity through the nose.
The step-by-step procedure for mummification:
- Insert a hook into a hole near the nose and take out a section of the brain.
- Make an incision near the belly on the left side of the body.
- Remove any internal organs and allow them to dry.
- Fill canopic jars halfway with the lungs, intestines, stomach, and liver.
- Reintroduce the heart into the body.
- Rinse the insides of your body with wine and spices.
- For 70 days, cover the corpse with natron (salt). After 40 days, stuff the body with linen or sand to give it a more human shape.
- Wrap the body in bandages from head to toe after the 70-day period.
- Put it in a sarcophagus (a type of box like a coffin).
The mummy has been finally prepared to go on its journey to the afterlife.
The Egyptians mummified animals as well as humans, including bulls and hawks, cats, and snakes. Some have been discovered in enormous amounts, while others are extremely uncommon. Many different animals were grown in temples to be sacrificed to the gods. Autopsies on cats reveal that the majority of them had their necks broken when they were around two years old. Cats were highly esteemed household members in ancient Egypt. They exterminated rats and mice that would otherwise infest granaries, and they helped in bird hunting and fishing. Large numbers of cat mummies were brought to England in the nineteenth century to be used as fertilizer.
This tradition peaked in the eleventh and twelfth centuries B.C. at Thebes, which is home to the modern-day city of Luxor and Karnak. Mummification served the objective of keeping the corpse intact so that it may be conveyed to a spiritual afterlife.
