the Kings of Ancient Egypt … The ancient Egyptians were interested in death since the dawn of history, and they imagined it as a stage of life, and everything and the goal of every thought were to reach the deceased a new life that guarantees him immortality in peace, starting with building his tomb or the house of eternity and inscriptions on its walls, and embalming it to ensure the preservation of his body and features, and the establishment of special funeral rites And read texts and prayers, all the way to resurrection and immortality.
The pre-dynastic era in the history of the Kings of Ancient Egypt is known primarily through its cemeteries.
During the first half of the fourth millennium BC, funeral customs were affected by two styles belonging to two forms of early civilization: the “Naqada” civilization in the south, and the “Bhutto” civilization. in the north.
The civilization of the North did not pay much attention to placing funeral belongings with the deceased in that ancient era, while the placement of funeral belongings flourished in the civilization of the South, as vessels and utensils were placed to accompany the dead on the journey of immortality, and the purpose of which was to put in them some foods that the deceased would need in his eternity.
It indicates the belief of the Egyptian since those ancient times in the existence of another world in which he lives and is provided with needs that are the same as his needs in this world.
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Royal Mummies
The Journey of the Kings of Ancient Egypt from Death to ‘Immortality’
The Egyptians imagined death within the order of the universe, and death became an issue of life.
The Egyptian civilization did not consider death a state of absolute annihilation, but rather considered it a state of life that a person goes through, living only in the position of the deceased.
The Egyptians described death in their texts as like convalescence after illness, and this conception indicates a belief in another life in which a person will be absolved of all worldly problems and moral diseases, in which he will enjoy a life of convalescence after leaving the life of the earth.
The Egyptians also viewed their kings as a state of merging with the Creator God, and Ibtihal says in the texts of Al-Ahram: “This king was born, while heaven was not, while the earth was not, while humans were not… Whereas death itself was not born.
Death for the ancient Egyptians was part of the process of creation, and the way in which they realized death was dominated by fear, and this is evidenced by a call to the living dating back to the era of the Middle Kingdom, declaring: “You who love to live and hate to die.”
Then the modern state comes to continue this meaning, and the deceased is addressed in a text that says:
“You who were surrounded by a large number of servants, you are now in a country that loves solitude, and whoever used to walk with his legs, is now shackled, swaddled in his coils and static without movement.
Whoever had an abundance of fabrics, and liked to wear clothes, now lies in the clothes of yesterday, and whoever loved to drink is now in a country without water.”
The French scientist Marie Bonheim and the scientist Luke Perch in their study “The World of the Egyptians” believe that death in ancient Egyptian thought “delivers man to loneliness and isolation”, but it is a situation that “does not express fear in the face of an end, which is death, but rather the end of a positive situation and the beginning of a long negative situation.
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mummification secrets of the Kings of Ancient Egypt
The presence of “natural” mummies, due to the environmental conditions and the dry soil of Egypt, the development of religious thought, perceptions of the other world, and the doctrine of resurrection and immortality, created an opportunity for the Egyptians that prompted them to think about the possibility of preserving the body from decomposition, to preserve the material and moral components of the human being, so that the soul inhabits it once again as one of the components of the resurrection and immortality.
Attempts by the ancient Egyptians to learn about mummification began at the end of the Second Dynasty, the First and Second Dynasties, or at the beginning of the Third Dynasty, according to the division of ancient Egypt’s eras, and mummification methods during historical periods passed through different stages of development and complexity until they reached the peak of their progress by the era of the modern state.
The ancient Egyptians did not leave a text that talks about the steps of the manner in which the embalmers performed the task, and despite all the studies that were conducted on human or animal mummies, mummification remains a secret of ancient Egypt.
The practice of mummification secures the body of the deceased and guarantees him the possibility of reaching a new life. The Greek historian Herodotus provides a description of the process that is summarized in the extraction of the brain and then the viscera, to remove the degradable organs, except for the heart, and finally the process of drying, then washing and wrapping tapes impregnated with essential oils.
The heart “Eb” was left in the body in its place connected to its arteries because it is the source of human thoughts, feelings, and emotions and will play a role, according to the ancient Egyptian belief, during the trial of the deceased, for the continuation of life, either the deceased will take him to the paradise of bliss, the fields of “Yarrow”, if They vomited, or were preyed upon by a mythical creature with the head of a crocodile “Amemet” if it was evil.
Studies confirm that drying the body was one of the main steps of the mummification process, either through sunlight, or through heating at a certain temperature, or the use of materials such as salt, lime, natron, resin, beeswax, henna, onions, palm veins, and others.
Mummification was limited to kings and dignitaries, and the process was carried out on the western bank of the Nile near the tombs in a temporary tent called the “Idol tent”.
The second method was limited to injecting the body with cedar oil through the anus, then it was treated with natron. As for the third, an enema was used to clean the bowels, then the body was treated with natron.
“Immortality Parade” the Kings of Ancient Egypt
The funeral ceremonies take place and are divided into three rituals, the stage of mourning days around the funeral bed, with the screaming and wailing of specialized mourners, and it lasts the mummification period, after which the procession proceeds towards the shore of the Nile River, carrying the deceased and his belongings, accompanied by members of his family, friends, and mourners of course, then the procession crosses the river on boats.
As soon as the procession reaches the other mainland, it goes in the direction of the cemetery, and the priests perform the required rites, most notably the “opening the mouth” rite, which aims to activate the senses of the deceased and restore life to him, according to ancient Egyptian religious thought.
And the Egyptian scientist Ramadan Abdo Ali says in his study that the priest used to perform the ritual of “opening the mouth” by touching the mummy’s face twice as well as his mouth with a special tool called “Step”, meaning (the chosen one), and he said to him: “Now you see with your eyes, you hear with your ears, and you open your mouth to speak.” You eat, you move your arms and legs, you live, you are alive now, you are young again and you will live forever.”
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Tutankhamun Of the Kings of Ancient Egypt
The novel says: The young boy stood with his donkey, who was carrying water from the Nile River to his family who works in excavations in the Valley of the Kings in Luxor early last century after he discovered that water was falling from the jars he was carrying, so he decided to reconnect it, and when he put one of the jars on the ground, It hit something hard, and he revealed it with his little axe, and it turned out to be a rung of a ladder.
The boy immediately informed the British man who had nearly despaired from searching for Tutankhamun’s tomb for five long years, “Howard Carter,” who Lord George Carnarvon threatened to withhold funding for his expedition.
Immediately, Carter headed to the place the stairs, and 16 steps were revealed that descend into a cemetery. When Carter put his head, on November 4, 1922, inside a niche overlooking the cemetery from the inside, he said, “It is the day of all days.”
Carter and his team went down in history with the biggest discovery ever, as they made their way inside the tomb through untouched and unprecedented amounts of golden treasures for a king in the world.
At the door of the burial chamber stood two life-size wooden statues of the Kings of Ancient Egypt Tutankhamun guarding the chamber, and inside the royal tomb of the young king Tutankhamun, the holy of discoveries throughout the ages stood out.
King Tut was sitting inside four gilded funerary coffins, and he was wearing a golden death mask on his face. The mask weighing ten kilograms depicts the king as a deity carrying a stick and a tortoise. It was polished from gold, lapis lazuli, and precious stones, amazingly in terms of the accuracy and splendor of the design. By polishing it, he used modern machines, not the hands of the Egyptians, three thousand years ago or more.
Bassam Al-Shammaa, a member of the Egyptian Society for Historical Studies, says that the mask is part of the physical and symbolic funeral ritual associated with death, resurrection, and the physical protection of the king at the same time.
The mask is made of pure gold and reaches a height of 54 cm and contains more than nine kilograms of pure gold.
King Tut’s mask consists of two stages or two layers of gold that have been linked by hammering, and it is engraved, polished, and inlaid with a number of precious stones.
Tutankhamun
the Kings of Ancient Egypt
“The most famous Egyptian pharaoh”
A new study confirmed the lineage of King Tutankhamun to Akhenaten, who united all the gods in one god, the god Aten, and moved the capital of the government to the middle of Upper Egypt in Tell el-Amarna instead of “Thebes” in Luxor, and the exclusion of the priests of Amon from the front of the government.
Therefore, the young King Tut assumed power after his father at the age of nine, and he died in the prime of his youth at the age of eighteen, and history has not revealed the death of King Tut and whether he was killed or not.
The researchers point out that the king was sick and weak, but Bassam al-Shamaa says that there are indications of the king’s strength and pictures indicating that he fought and was in good health.
A recent American study says that the young king died of a broken thigh bone, while other studies stated that the king died.
The assumption of his assistant, the chief priest Ay, after him, raises the suspicions of archaeologists, especially since he married his widow two years, and after them the second assistant and commander of Tutankhamun’s armies, Horemheb, who erased all traces of I and Tutankhamun from all walls and temples.
The story of the dismemberment of the body of the Kings of Ancient Egypt Tutankhamun
Dr. Zahi Hawass, an Egyptian archaeologist, tells in his book “Tutankhamun” the story of the dismemberment of the king’s body, and Hawass confirms that the process of examining the mummy for the first time came 3 full years after the discovery of the tomb, in 1925, and the main purpose was to try to extract the mummy from The coffin, after the king’s head appeared in front of them, covered with gold, hiding behind the golden mask, and even attached to it, and the mummy was also attached to the coffin.
Carter preferred to take the coffin out of the cemetery and put it under the sun, believing that “resin”, a resinous substance used by the ancient Egyptians, might melt and separate the mummy from the coffin.
But it seems that the paraffin wax that the ancient embalmers poured on the linen rolls led to its sticking to the mummy, which led to the doctor, “Douglas Deere” cutting the linen rolls, and forcibly removing the mummy from the coffin.
Carter and his team cut off the head from the neck and used a hot knife to separate the skull from the mask. And they separated the body parts from each other and put them together again with resin, and Carter did not mention in his memoirs or books that he had cut the mummy, but as a result of the mummy’s examination, it was discovered.
The traces of Golden the Kings of Ancient Egypt are still revealing secrets and increasing the world’s sedition with this king, whose biography roamed all over thanks to his funeral holdings.
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