Waubonsee Community College

An ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead, the Papyrus of Sobekmose, translation, introduction, and commentary by Paul F. O'Rourke

eng

Includes bibliographical references (pages 205-207)

illustrations

no index present

non fiction

An ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead

bibliography

964071743

translation, introduction, and commentary by Paul F. O'Rourke

the Papyrus of Sobekmose

The Book of the Dead of Sobekmose', in the collection of the Brooklyn Museum, New York, is one of the most important surviving examples of the ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead genre. Such papyrus scrolls were composed of traditional funerary texts, including magic spells, that were thought to assist a dead person on their journey into the afterlife. This publication is the first to offer a continuous English translation of a single, extensive, major text that can speak to us from beginning to end in the order in which it was composed. The papyrus itself is one of the longest of its kind to come down to us from the New Kingdom, a time when Egypt's international power and prosperity were at their peak. This new translation not only represents a great step forward in the study of these texts, but also grants modern readers a direct encounter with what can seem a remote and alien civilization. With language that is, in many places, unquestionably evocative and very beautiful, it offers a look into the mindset of the ancient Egyptians, highlighting their beliefs and anxieties about this world as well as the next. The papyrus itself is reproduced in its entirety and the translation is prefaced by a fully illustrated introductory essay which, along with a brief chronology of ancient Egypt and a glossary guiding the reader through the religious and mythological terminology that they will encounter, grounds it in its historical context

Foreword / Anne Pasternak -- Preface: translating an ancient text -- Introduction. The worlds of the living and the dead -- The purpose of the book of the dead -- Background and earlier traditions -- The emergence of the book of the dead -- New funerary texts -- Other texts in the tomb complex -- Book of the Dead of the gold worker of Amun Sobekmose. Description of the papyrus -- Translation of the recto texts --Translation of the verso texts -- Translation of the offering formulae -- Notes on the translation -- Reproduction of the papyrus. Recto -- Verso -- Reference list -- Glossary of Egyptian terms and names -- A brief chronology of Ancient Egypt -- Picture information

Egyptian Book of the Dead : the Papyrus of SobekmosePapyrus of Sobekmose