depicts detail from Nefertari’s tomb, located in the Valley of the Queens."/>
NPL - DeA Picture Library / Bridgeman Images
FIGURE 6-6: Detail from Nefertari’s tomb, located in the Valley of the Queens.
Decoding Books of the Dead
In the Old Kingdom, pyramid texts, used to resurrect pharaohs, were inscribed on pyramid walls. They included resurrection spells, charms, passwords, and prayers. During the New Kingdom, similar spells were published in papyrus scrolls called Books of the Dead, which were readily available. Now anyone who could read was resurrectable.
But New Kingdom resurrection came with a hitch. The books weren’t cheap, and you had to be good to be resurrected. Although Books of the Dead were individualized for the owner, they all include a goodness test called the weighing of the heart (see Hu-Nefer’s Book of the Dead in Figure 6-7 — Hu-Nefer was a royal scribe who lived during the 19th dynasty).
The Weighing of the Heart against Maat's Feather of Truth, from the Book of the Dead of the Royal Scribe Hunefer, New Kingdom, c.1275 BC (papyrus)/Egyptian 19th Dynasty (c.1292-1187 BC)/British Museum, London, UK/Bridgeman Images
FIGURE 6-7: This narrative scene from the Book of the Dead illustrates the weighing-of-the-heart ritual, the Egyptian version of the Last Judgment.
The visual narrative in Hu-Nefer’s Book of the Dead shows the rigorous journey through the goodness test to resurrection:
The first test: Anubis, the jackal-headed god of the underworld, leads Hu-Nefer’s ka (soul) to the judgment scales. In his right hand, Anubis holds an ankh, the symbol of life. Things look hopeful for Hu-Nefer. At the scales, Anubis shows up again, this time to weigh the heart, which is contained in a jar on the left scale. The feather of truth (symbol of Maat, the goddess of truth) rests lightly on the right-hand scale. The heart had to be very light not to outweigh a feather!The court reporter, ibis-headed Thoth, records the weight while a monster named Ammit watches greedily. If the heart is heavy, Ammit gets to eat it. But on this occasion, Ammit goes hungry. Hu-Nefer moves on to the next stage.
The second test: The hawk-headed Horus leads Hu-Nefer’s ka to the temple of Osiris to face a second test. To be admitted into paradise, Hu-Nefer must recite secret prayers to Osiris that he memorized while alive — or he could have had the prayers inscribed on his coffin lid if his memory wasn’t up to snuff. Inside Osiris’s temple, Hu-Nefer encounters the four miniature sons of Horus standing on a lotus blossom, a symbol of resurrection.The four sons of Horus are the guys whose heads cap the jars that contain the deceased’s organs. Maat, the goddess of truth, hovers overhead, confirming that Hu-Nefer’s heart is light. Osiris’s wife, Isis, the goddess of life, and sister-in-law Nephthys, goddess of decay, stand behind Osiris.
Too-big-to-forget sculpture
Rameses II, who ruled Egypt for 67 years and supposedly sired 100 children, had a pharaoh-sized ego. This 19th-dynasty egomaniac (1304 BC–1237 BC) wanted to be remembered — maybe he feared he’d get a bad rap from the Bible, if indeed he was the “Pharaoh” of Exodus and Cecil B. DeMille’s The Ten Commandments, where he’s portrayed by Yul Brynner. In any case, Rameses erected colossal monuments to himself throughout Egypt, especially at Abu Simbel, Karnac, and Luxor, the temple districts near Thebes. Four 65-foot statues of Rameses guard the entrance to his massive temple in Abu Simbel, where he could be worshipped as a god. Smaller statues of family members, wives and his chief queen, Nefertari, stand at attention between his knees and feet.
Rameses II also used art as political propaganda. He barely survived the Battle of Kadesh against the Hittites, yet he touted it as a great victory on a war monument.
Chapter 7
Greek Art, the Olympian Ego, and the Inventors of the Modern World
IN THIS CHAPTER
Everything that grows great also decays. But the memory of our greatness will be bequeathed to posterity forever … the admiration of the present and succeeding ages will be ours, since we have not left our power without witness, but have shown it by mighty proofs … we have forced every sea and land to be the highway of our daring, and everywhere … have left imperishable monuments behind us.
—PERICLES (Athenian Statesman, Fifth Century BC)
Pericles was right. The world he helped create did decay. But its memory and influence have lasted for nearly 2,500 years, reaching across the ages into our day-to-day lives.
Whether you’re watching a play or movie; cheering your country at the Olympics; debating an ethical question; visiting the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C.; wrestling with an abstract math problem; or voting for your local mayor, your actions are rooted in Ancient Greece. The Greeks wrote the blueprint for the modern world. They invented democracy, logic, ethics, drama, the Olympics, the study of history, theoretical math, and rational inquiry (the precursor of modern science). They also laid the foundations of Western art and developed architectural styles that we still mimic today.
We owe our Western heritage to all of Ancient Greece, but especially to Athens (located on the coast of the Aegean Sea), which may be the most creative city in history. (Florence, Italy, runs a close second — see Chapter 12.)
How did a tiny city-state the size of Toledo, Ohio, launch the modern world two and a half millennia ago? Read on.
Mingling with the Minoans: Snake Goddesses, Minotaurs, and Bull Jumpers
Aegean culture (civilization around the Aegean Sea) didn’t begin with the Greeks — it started with the Minoans in the late third millennium BC. The Minoans lived on
