The Afterlife in Ancient Egypt
Ancient Egyptians believed in an afterlife. They believed that a person could continue to live if an embalmer mummified the body by drying and preserving it with salts. Coffins and sarcophagi were made to hold the mummified bodies of important people after their death.
The image shown here is a detail of a sarcophagus, or coffin, decorated with images from the Egyptian Book of the Dead. This book was buried with the body and contained instructions, spells, and passwords to help the deceased pass a series of tests so he or she could pass into the next life.
This image shows the Weighing of the Heart. In this trial, the heart of the dead person was weighed against the feather of truth. Anubis, the jackal-headed god of embalming, has put the heart on one side of the scale and the feather of truth on the other. If they did not balance, this meant the person made too many mistakes while alive. If the test was passed, the ancient Egyptians believed that the deceased was "true of voice," meaning that he or she was a good person. The heart and feather had to balance perfectly on the scale for the soul to enter the underworld.
You can see this sarcophagus in the ancient Egyptian art gallery on the third floor of the Ahmanson Building at LACMA.
Search Collections Online for more ancient Egyptian art.
Egypt, likely Thebes
Coffin, mid-21st Dynasty (about 1000–968 BCE)
Wood overlaid with gesso and polychrome decoration and yellow varnish
Base: 73 3/4 x 21 1/2 x 13 in. (187.33 x 54.61 x 33.02 cm); Outer Lid: 74 1/4 x 21 3/4 x 14 in. (188.59 x 55.24 x 35.56 cm); Inner Lid: 69 1/8 x 16 5/8 x 4 1/4 in. (175.58 x 42.23 x 10.79 cm)
Purchased with funds provided by Mr. and Mrs. John Jewett Garland (M.47.3a-c)
Photo credit: © 2008 Museum Associates/LACMA
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