Egyptian culture
Gods and Goddesses
Osiris, Isis and Horus |
Osiris introduced civilization into Egypt however after this happened his brother Seth chopped him up and scatter him across Egypt. Isis the wife and sister of Osiris found all of these pieces and resurrected Osiris. later they had a child named Horus. Osiris replaced Anubis as the judge of the dead, Isis became the goddess of nature and renewal and Horus became the first king of Egypt.
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Thoth |
god of wisdom
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Religious practice
Temples were built to provide honor and provide homes for the gods. Many of these temples were huge and featured obilisks in these temples priests performed rituals to fulfill the god's needs. Every morning the priests would place a statue of a god on an alter and clean it with incense. They then put clean clothes on the statue and gave it food. Regular Egyptians took no part in these rituals and they never even enter the temples. The regular Egyptians did worship the gods in annual festivals.
Mummification
Mummification was a process used by the Egyptians to prevent the breakdown of dead bodies. The only people who were mummified were people who were either kings or members of the royal family. To mummify people they would drain out their internal organs. Most of this was done from a cut in the persons side but the brain may have been removed through the nose. the heart was left in the body and all of the organs were packed in jars and buried with the mummy. people were dried out using special salts before they wrapped them in linen strips. Artists then painted the people on the body so that Ka could identify the bodies.
Afterlife/Burial
Egyptians believed that when someone died the ka left their body. the ka was the personality of the person. people believed that the ka would travel to the land of the dead and that it needed water and food. They also believed that if the body decomposed the ka would shrivel up and vanish. This is why they mummified people. After mummified the bodies were buried with all of their possessions. For regular Egyptians this would only be food and water for the ka, but for pharaohs this was a lot of treasure and statues of servants who were thought to come to life to serve the pharaoh. They also had statues of animals and boats to serve as transportation in the afterlife. Egyptians would also draw figures on the wall which they believe would come alive and serve the ka.