The Getty Book of the Dead

The Book of the Dead evolved from a variety of sources, including earlier funerary inscriptions, priestly oaths, and oral traditions. 

By around 1550 BC, professional scribes starting copying Book of the Dead spells on papyrus scrolls, where the text was often accompanied by drawn vignettes. At this time, scribes experimented with different formats and designs for this new genre of funerary literature. 

Webennesre's papyrus is written in the hieratic script, a cursive version of hieroglyphs. In an unusual choice, the scribe wrote the vertical columns of text in retrograde, meaning that although the signs face to the right, the individual columns are read from left to right. . .

. . . Imagine reading the lines on the page of a book from bottom to top. 

Webennesre's manuscript records spell 149, in which the deceased encounters 14 hills. The hills represent places in the afterlife, each with its own inhabitants. 

The vignette on the far right is spell 150, illustrating the hills and naming their guardians. Spells like this one inform the deceased about dangerous places and communicate secret knowledge to help them navigate the terrain and open doors that would otherwise be closed.

This papyrus belonged to Ankhesenaset ("may she live for (the goddess) Isis"), a ritual singer and priestess of the god Amun in Thebes. 

The text is organized into columns of horizontal lines and includes spell 23, which was meant to open her mouth so that she could breath, communicate, eat, and drink. 

Ancient Egyptian texts do not make use of punctuation or spacing between words. For modern readers, this can make manuscripts like these challenging to decipher.

At the bottom of this illustration, Pasherashakhet and his wife receive offerings of incense and drink under a roof-like structure symbolizing his tomb chapel.

The middle section shows four baboons and two ba-birds (human-headed birds representing ancestral spirits) praising the morning sun.

In the top register, the rising sun's rays fall between two kneeling women who represent the eastern and western horizons.

This vignette from spell 125 shows the deceased appearing at the court of the netherworld god Osiris, who sits underneath an ornamental canopy surrounded by 26 divine judges. They watch the weighing of Pasherashakhet's heart against the feather of justice. 

Ammit, a monster with the head of a crocodile, the forepart of a lion, and the hindquarters of a hippopotamus, waits in anticipation. She sits ready to gobble down any heart the fails the test.

The deceased is ushered by the goddess Maat when he appears before Osiris, along with four entities with human heads that embody fate, birth, and upbringing (seen here as two seated figures followed by two sphinx-like figures, facing left).

According to ancient Egyptian belief, these qualities form a person’s character, and they make sure that during an individual’s lifetime they do not deviate from the path of rightfulness.

Some vignettes include direct speech, like speech bubbles in a comic book or manga. When Pasherashakhet's heart passes the test, Thoth, the ibis-headed god of writing, communicates the result to Osiris, saying "His heart is safe upon the scale without fault found."

As on the papyrus of Pasherashakhet, this fragmentary mummy wrapping of Petosiris ("the one whom Osiris has given") shows scenes that accompany hymns to the sun. The text on this wrapping is from spell 15. 

A second set of mummy wrappings in the Getty's collection belonged to another man also named Petosiris, whose mother was Nanesbastet ("may [the goddess] Bastet be kind to her"). 

Petosiris stands to the right of an offering table, holding an elaborately beaded collar in his hands. At left, the goddess Isis shakes a ritual rattle known as a sistrum. 

The third set of wrappings belonged to a man named Nanefbastet ("may Bastet be kind to him"). These wrappings have vignettes that appear rather schematic and the artistic expression is somewhat stifled.

The repertoire depicted includes offering scenes, libations, and burning of incense.

Three hundred and thirty six ushabtis, including this one, were buried with a man named Neferibresaneith in a tomb in Saqqara, Egypt, which was excavated from 1928 to 1929.

Neferibresaneith (whose name appears in the top line of the hieroglyphic inscription on the figure’s body) held the titles of wab-priest, Royal Chancellor of Lower Egypt, and Administrator of the Palace during the reign of Pharaoh Ahmose II (ca. 570–526 BC).