# Books on Egypt and Chaldaea/Collection 7/Volume 25/The Liturgy of Funerary Offerings Described

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CHAPTER II.
The Liturgy of Funerary Offerings Described.
The religious literature of all periods of Egyptian history proves that the Egyptians believed in a resurrection and in immortality, and that from the earliest to the latest times they performed ceremonies at, or in, the tomb, and recited formulae, which were part incantations and part prayers, with the view of assisting the dead to renew their life, to enjoy their existence in the Other World, and to escape from “dying a second time.” We have already seen that so far back as the beginning of the IVth Dynasty, about b.c. 3800, it was customary to offer series of gifts of food, and drink, and raiment to the dead, and there is every reason to think that the presentation of such gifts was made by priests, who recited over them forms of words which were believed to sanctify the things offered, and to make them to become suitable for the needs of the dead. We know that certain kinds of food and drink were offered in certain quantities, and in a definite order, and that every detail of the ceremonies connected with their presentation was performed according to a system ​which had then been in use for a very long time. The ceremonies and formulae of the liturgy of funeral sacrifice in their oldest forms belong, no doubt, to the earliest period of Egyptian civilization, and it is very probable that many of them were in existence in the Predynastic Period.
Among the oldest of the ceremonies which were performed for the benefit of the dead is that called the “Opening of the Mouth,” and its object is explained by its name. The Egyptians realized at a very early period that it was useless to load the tables for offerings in the tombs with bread, beer, meat, fruit, and vegetables unless the dead could in some way partake of them, and the priests invented a series of ceremonies and composed formulae which were intended to bring about this desirable result. The belief in the importance of “Opening the Mouth” for the dead has long been known to Egyptologists, in fact ever since the publication of the text of the Saïte Recension of the Book of the Dead by Lepsius in 1842. In the Saïte Recension, as in the Theban, the XXIIIrd Chapter is devoted to the opening of the mouth of the deceased, and in the Vignette a priest is seen standing before a statue of the deceased, to which he addresses certain words. In his left hand he holds a vase of unguent, which played a prominent part in the ceremony performed by the priest whilst he uttered the prescribed formula.
The XXIst and XXIInd Chapters were written with the view of “giving a mouth to a man in Neter ​Khert,” or the Other World, and in the Vignette the priest is seen standing and holding the Ur-ḥekau instrument in his right hand, and a vase in his left. He holds out the instrument towards the face of the deceased, and is, as we know from other sources, about to touch his mouth. In the text of the XXIIIrd Chapter the deceased says, “Ptah hath opened for me my mouth with his instrument of iron wherewith he opened the mouth of the gods.” This is an mportant statement, for it shows that in the Ptolemaïc Period a legend was extant that at some time during their existence the mouths of the gods needed opening, that the origin of the ceremony of “Opening the Mouth” was divine, and that it was performed in the mythological period.
The illustrated papyri which contain the Theban Recension of the Book of the Dead supply further details
and a stand on which are spread out a panther’s skin or leopard’s skin, and the instruments, vases, &c., which were used in the performance of the ceremony. Above these scenes are several short lines of text, which are entitled, “The Chapter of performing the Opening of the Mouth of the statue” [of the deceased]. This chapter contains two extracts from the “Liturgy of Funerary Offerings.”
text, and to describe the ceremonies which were there illustrated.
The first part of his work, i.e., the plates, appeared in 1881, and the two volumes of text in 1882 and 1890 respectively. In 1882 Professor Maspero publiched in his Reveil (tom. iii., p. 171 ff.) the first parts of the texts from the Pyramid of Unȧs, which contains the oldest known form of the Liturgy of ​Funerary Offerings, with a French translation of a portion of it. Another copy of this early form is found in the Pyramid of Pepi II. Nefer-ka-Rā, and this Professor Maspero published, with a translation of the whole, in a later volume of the same work, and in his complete edition of the "Pyramid Texts" entitled, "Les Inscriptions des Pyramides de Saqqarah," Paris, 1894. In 1884-5 Dr. J. Dümichen published the first two parts of his monograph on the tomb of Peṭā-Ȧmen-ȧpt, a high priestly official who flourished under the XXVIth Dynasty, containing copies of the scenes and texts with descriptions, translations, &c., in German. The first part contains the complete text of the Liturgy of Funerary Offerings, and the second a version of the Book of Opening the Mouth; both works have Vignettes.
A year later appeared the first volume of the great French work on the Royal Tombs of Thebes, containing all the scenes and texts in the Tomb of Seti I. Among these were accurate copies of the texts of the Liturgy of Funerary Offerings, as they are found in the tomb of Seti I. at Thebes, and the Bok of Opening the Mouth. In 1887 Professor Maspero published a valuable paper in the Revue de l'Histoire des Religions, tom. xv., pp. 159-188, in which he treated the Book of Opening the Mouth at con ​siderable length, and explained the Vignettes and the texts of the version in the tomb of Seti I. Since that time the texts of several tombs at Thebes have been published, and the material available for the study of the texts and Vignettes has been greatly increased.
The principal versions of the Liturgy of Funerary Offerings and the Book of Opening the Mouth may now be summarized. For the Liturgy there are two copies of the period of the Ancient Empire, one in the Pyramid of Unȧs, and one in the Pyramid of Pepi II. Nefer-ka-Rā. Several Lists of offerings, more or less complete, from the maṣṭaba tombs at Ṣaḳḳârah are also available. Of the XIXth Dynasty there are the Lists in the tomb of Seti I. at Thebes and in his temple at Abydos. Of the XXth Dynasty there is the List on the covers of the coffin of Butehai-Ȧmen; of the XXVIth Dynasty the List of Peṭā-Ȧmen-ȧpt; and of the Roman Period the List in the Papyrus of Sais, the priestess, in Paris. For the Book of Opening the Mouth there are: a copy, with Vignettes, in the tomb of Rekhmȧrā at Thebes, of the XVIIIth Dynasty; a copy, with Vignettes, in the tomb of Seti I. at Thebes, of the XIXth Dynasty; a copy, without Vignettes, written for Butehai-Ȧmen on the covers of his coffin, of the XXth Dynasty; a copy, with Vignettes, in the tomb of Peṭā-Ȧmen-ȧpt, of the XXVIth Dynasty; a copy, without Vignettes, written for the priestess Sais in the Roman period.
The reader who will take the trouble to compare ​the various versions of the Liturgy and the Book of Opening the Mouth will find that, in all essentials, they remained unchanged from the IVth Dynasty to about the end of the first century of the rule of the Romans in Egypt. The Vignettes, though we owe them to the funerary artists of the XVIIIth, XIXth, and XXVIth Dynasties, illustrate faithfully ceremonies which had been performed for many centuries before they were drawn, and the evidence which they afford may be used as a sure guide in determining the exact meaning of many obscure points in the rubrical directions and texts.
* ↑ Mélanges d'Archéologie Égyptienne, tom. i., p. 45.
* ↑ Monuments, plates 237, 243-248.
* ↑ Aeg. Zeitschrift, Bd. xi., 1873, p. 29 ff.
* ↑ Ti Libro dei Funerali degli antichi Egiziani tradotto a commentato da E.S., Rome, 1881-90.
* ↑ Der Grabpalast des Patuamenap, Leipzic, 1884-5.
* ↑ Les Hypogees Royaux de Thebes, by Bouriant, Loret, and Naville (Memoires de la Mission au Caire, tom. ii., Div. i., Paris, 1886).