Subject: [agade] NEWS: Book of the Dead exhibit at the BM

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British Museum to recreate Egyptian journey to the afterlife

Museum to stage first international exhibition of Egyptian books of the dead
Adam Gabbatt


Egyptian afterlife exhibition to be staged at British Museum The heart
of the scribe Ani is weighed by Anubis, the jackal-headed god of
embalming, c 1275 BC, one of the challenges that a person's spirit
faced on the journey to the afterlife in ancient Egypt and featured in
the British Museum's main exhibition this autumn. Photograph: British
Museum/PA

It doesn't sound like an ideal day out: a journey punctuated by
encounters with crocodiles, snakes and demons, which culminates with
your heart being weighed against the balance of good and evil.

These were the ordeals the ancient Egyptians believed they faced en
route to the afterlife. Now the route is being recreated for visitors
to the British Museum.

Announced today, the museum's showpiece autumn exhibition will draw on
its "unparalleled" collection of Egyptian books of the dead,
collections of spells provided to help the departed find their way.

The exhibition, Journey Through the Afterlife, which is supported by
BP, will include pieces from museums in France and the US in what its
curator said was the first international exhibition of such
manuscripts.

The collection, including items used for more than 1,500 years between
1600BC and AD100, has never been exhibited in its entirety before,
despite the British Museum having owned it for more than 100 years.
Some of the papyrus scrolls may never be shown at the museum again, Dr
John Taylor warned today.

"In recent years, we've learnt a lot about Egyptian pigments and how
sensitive they are," the curator said. "It used to be thought that
they were pretty indestructible, but we've been carrying out tests now
and what we find is that some of them are very, very subject to
fading, so we really have to consider the long-term future of these
objects - our first duty is to protect these things for the future.

"If that means that, for the moment, we don't display them, then we
might hope that at some future date, a solution to this issue might be
found, but we have to make sure that we do not expose them to
unnecessary light."

A highlight of the exhibition will be the opportunity to follow the
journey taken by an Egyptian after death. Luckily, visitors will face
nothing more daunting than video and audio recreations of the
challenges. They will be guided by the longest book of the dead in the
world - a full 37 metres (121ft) of papyrus - believed to have been
written to accompany the daughter of a high priest on her journey to
the afterlife.

Egyptians believed this was a treacherous journey where one could
encounter all manner of adversaries.

The book of the dead would act as more of a manual than a complete
text, complete with diagrams of the potential foes the deceased could
come across and the spells that could defeat them.

The critical point in the journey would come with the ritual of the
"weighing of the heart", in which the organ would be measured against
the principle of truth and justice. This process was known as maat. If
the heart weighed in favourably, the deceased would be allowed into
the afterlife - an Egyptian idyll with flowing rivers, bright sun, and
several helpers, called shabtis, to attend to each arrival. If the
heart's mass was deemed to be substandard, the individual's soul was
condemned to destruction at the hands of the monstrous "devourer".

This eventuality could be avoided, however, by paying a scribe extra
to write a spell into one's book of the dead that would trick the
scales, tipping the balance in one's favour - raising interesting
questions about the importance Egyptians placed on ethics and morality
during life.

The exhibition runs from 4 November until 6 March.