Pyramid Texts Of Ancient Egypt That Charted Journey Of Pharaohs Into Afterlife

A. Sutherland  – AncientPages.com – Pyramid Texts represent the oldest known collection of ancient Egyptian hieroglyphic inscriptions containing religious texts, elaborate spells (or utterances), hymns, prayers, thousands of lines of fragments of myths and legends, references to mortuary and funerary rites, historical events, festivals.

Some of the Pyramid Texts of Ankhenespepy II. Photo Jaromír Krejcí. Source

There are also references to astronomical lore and cosmology (the king was destined to join the “imperishable stars”, and the goddess Isis was associated with Sirius, the Dog Star).

The texts were meticulously recorded on the walls of the pyramids of the kings Unas of the 5^th Dynasty, and Teti, Pepi I, Merenre and Pepi II of the 6^th Dynasty. All these rulers of Egypt from the 2400 BC to 2200 BC were buried at Saqqara, the ancient necropolis of Memphis.

See also:

Ushabti: Servants Who Worked For Their Owners In Afterlife In Ancient Egyptian Beliefs

Maat – Ancient Egypt’s Most Important Religious Concept

Canopic Jars: Funerary Tradition Of Ancient Egyptians And Their Beliefs In Afterlife

At first, the texts were intended to protect a dead king or queen and ensure life and sustenance in the afterlife. By the end of the Old Kingdom, specific chapters of the texts were used in non-royal tombs belonging to regional governors and other men of high status.

Unlike later texts, they did not include images but consisted only of purely hieroglyphic writings, divided into paragraphs called Utterances (spells) and meant to be chanted by those who were reciting them.

The Underworld described in the Pyramid texts was very similar to the landscape of Egypt with rivers and fields, richly covered with crops. Ancient Egyptian beliefs focused on the rebirth and the cycles of the Sun in the centuries that followed. This rebirth or resurrection referred to being reborn into the afterlife, and not into a physical form back on Earth.

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