 | This article needs additional citations for verification .(August 2017) |
A plummet amulet is an amulet created by Ancient Egyptians in the shape of a plumb bob or plummet.
They included these plummet amulets in the mummification process because they believed it would bring balance to the deceased in their next life. [1]
Anubis, also known as Inpu, Inpw, Jnpw, or Anpu in Ancient Egyptian, is the god of funerary rites, protector of graves, and guide to the underworld, in ancient Egyptian religion, usually depicted as a canine or a man with a canine head.
Horus, also known as Heru, Har, Her or Hor in Ancient Egyptian, is one of the most significant ancient Egyptian deities who served many functions, most notably as god of kingship, healing, protection, the sun and the sky. He was worshipped from at least the late prehistoric Egypt until the Ptolemaic Kingdom and Roman Egypt. Different forms of Horus are recorded in history, and these are treated as distinct gods by Egyptologists. These various forms may be different manifestations of the same multi-layered deity in which certain attributes or syncretic relationships are emphasized, not necessarily in opposition but complementary to one another, consistent with how the Ancient Egyptians viewed the multiple facets of reality. He was most often depicted as a falcon, most likely a lanner falcon or peregrine falcon, or as a man with a falcon head.
Khepri is a scarab-faced god in ancient Egyptian religion who represents the rising or morning sun. By extension, he can also represent creation and the renewal of life.
The Duat is the underworld in ancient Egyptian mythology. It has been represented in hieroglyphs as a star-in-circle: 𓇽. The god Osiris was believed to be the lord of the underworld. He was the first mummy as depicted in the Osiris myth and he personified rebirth and life after death. The underworld was also the residence of various other gods along with Osiris.
Nehebkau was the primordial snake god in ancient Egyptian mythology. Although originally considered an evil spirit, he later functions as a funerary god associated with the afterlife. As one of the forty-two assessors of Ma’at, Nehebkau was believed to judge the deceased after death and provide their souls with ka – the part of the soul that distinguished the living from the dead.
The ancient Egyptians believed that a soul was made up of many parts. In addition to these components of the soul, there was the human body.
The Book of the Dead is an ancient Egyptian funerary text generally written on papyrus and used from the beginning of the New Kingdom to around 50 BC. The original Egyptian name for the text, transliterated r(ꜣ)w n(y)w prt m hrw(w), is translated as Book of Coming Forth by Day or Book of Emerging Forth into the Light. "Book" is the closest term to describe the loose collection of texts consisting of a number of magic spells intended to assist a dead person's journey through the Duat, or underworld, and into the afterlife and written by many priests over a period of about 1,000 years. In 1842, the Egyptologist Karl Richard Lepsius introduced for these texts the German name Todtenbuch, translated to English as 'Book of the Dead'.
In ancient Mesopotamian religion, Pazuzu is a personification of the southwestern wind, and held kingship over the lilu wind demons.
The djed, also djt is one of the more ancient and commonly found symbols in ancient Egyptian religion. It is a pillar-like symbol in Egyptian hieroglyphs representing stability. It is associated with the creator god Ptah and Osiris, the Egyptian god of the afterlife, the underworld, and the dead. It is commonly understood to represent his spine.
The Eye of Horus, also known as left wedjat eye or udjat eye, specular to the Eye of Ra, is a concept and symbol in ancient Egyptian religion that represents well-being, healing, and protection. It derives from the mythical conflict between the god Horus with his rival Set, in which Set tore out or destroyed one or both of Horus's eyes and the eye was subsequently healed or returned to Horus with the assistance of another deity, such as Thoth. Horus subsequently offered the eye to his deceased father Osiris, and its revitalizing power sustained Osiris in the afterlife. The Eye of Horus was thus equated with funerary offerings, as well as with all the offerings given to deities in temple ritual. It could also represent other concepts, such as the moon, whose waxing and waning was likened to the injury and restoration of the eye.
The was sceptre is a symbol that appeared often in relics, art, and hieroglyphs associated with the ancient Egyptian religion. It appears as a stylized animal head at the top of a long, straight staff with a forked end.
The ancient Egyptians had an elaborate set of funerary practices that they believed were necessary to ensure their immortality after death. These rituals included mummifying the body, casting magic spells, and burials with specific grave goods thought to be needed in the afterlife.
Ancient Egyptian art refers to art produced in ancient Egypt between the 6th millennium BC and the 4th century AD, spanning from Prehistoric Egypt until the Christianization of Roman Egypt. It includes paintings, sculptures, drawings on papyrus, faience, jewelry, ivories, architecture, and other art media. It was a conservative tradition whose style changed very little over time. Much of the surviving examples comes from tombs and monuments, giving insight into the ancient Egyptian afterlife beliefs.
A hypocephalus is a small disk-shaped object generally made of stuccoed linen, but also of papyrus, bronze, gold, wood, or clay, which ancient Egyptians from the Late Period onwards placed under the heads of their dead. The circle was believed to magically protect the deceased and cause the head and body to be enveloped in light and warmth, making the deceased divine. It replaced the earlier cow-amulet.
An amulet, also known as a good luck charm or phylactery, is an object believed to confer protection upon its possessor. The word "amulet" comes from the Latin word amuletum, which Pliny's Natural History describes as "an object that protects a person from trouble". Anything can function as an amulet; items commonly so used include statues, coins, drawings, plant parts, animal parts, and written words.
Scarabs are beetle-shaped amulets and impression seals which were widely popular throughout ancient Egypt. They still survive in large numbers today. Through their inscriptions and typology, they prove to be an important source of information for archaeologists and historians of the ancient world, and represent a significant body of ancient Egyptian art.
Portraiture in ancient Egypt forms a conceptual attempt to portray "the subject from its own perspective rather than the viewpoint of the artist ... to communicate essential information about the object itself". Ancient Egyptian art was a religious tool used "to maintain perfect order in the universe" and to substitute for the real thing or person through its representation.
The heart scarab is an oval scarab artifact dating from ancient Egypt. Mostly an amulet, it was also used as jewelry, a memorializing artifact, or a grave good. The heart scarab was used by referring to Chapter 30 from the Book of the Dead and the weighing of the heart, being balanced by Maat, goddess of truth, justice, order, wisdom, and cosmic balance. The function of the heart scarab was to bind the heart to silence while it was being weighed in the underworld to ensure that the heart did not bear false witness against the deceased. As in many current religions, the individual had to show 'worthiness' to achieve the afterlife. The heart was extremely important to ancient Egyptians as the seat of intelligence and the storehouse of memory. It was the only organ left in place during mummification. Heart scarab amulets were meant as substitutes for the heart should the deceased be deprived of the organ in the afterlife. For example, when a person died, a heart scarab was often placed on their heart and bound underneath the bandages of the mummy. This was to ensure that it could not be physically removed from their person.
The Wadj amulet is an Ancient Egyptian amulet in the shape of a papyrus stem. These amulets were made out of turquoise feldspar or Egyptian faience, as is indicated in the Book of the Dead.
Ancient Egyptian afterlife beliefs were centered around a variety of complex rituals that were influenced by many aspects of Egyptian culture. Religion was a major contributor, since it was an important social practice that bound all Egyptians together. For instance, many of the Egyptian gods played roles in guiding the souls of the dead through the afterlife. With the evolution of writing, religious ideals were recorded and quickly spread throughout the Egyptian community. The solidification and commencement of these doctrines were formed in the creation of afterlife texts which illustrated and explained what the dead would need to know in order to complete the journey safely.
Other amulets included the headrest amulet, to ensure the head of the deceased would be eternally raised up, reflecting the path of the sun; the animal-headed was-scepter amulet, which granted wellbeing and prosperity; the mason's plummet amulet, which guaranteed perpetual equilibrium; and the carpenter's square amulet, which guaranteed eternal righteousness., as quoted in Nefer, Djed. "~~Ancient Egyptian Religion~~Egyptology Page: Book of Thoth~~Updated: 5.26.09~~". egyptologypage.tripod.com. Archived from the original on 2018-03-15. Retrieved 2018-03-19.; no access to original source.
 | This article about subjects relating to Ancient Egypt is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |