25: Book of the Dead Summing up
Papers

Ancient Egypt courses for next term:

ACABS 382 (survey of Egyptian Archaeology)
ACABS 487 (seminar on gender and society in ancient Egypt)

Extra office hours for me:
Friday December 9 2-4pm in Frieze 2078
In-class paper session, Wednesday Dec. 7

Papers due at the beginning of class Monday, December 12
NO EXCEPTIONS!

Book of the Dead: Summing up

Book of coming forth by day

Life, Death and the Afterlife

"Coming forth by day"

Sun gods

Gods of dead:
Osiris: divine precedent, ruler, title
Anubis: Embalmer, mediator
Sokar: ancient associations

Other gods: judges, gatekeepers, protectors

Text of Book of the Dead:

"Chapters"
No absolute order or selection
Not a direct narrative sequence, but not random

Kinds of writing (genres):
Hymns, rituals, magical spells, dialogues,
Exegesis/explanation, etc.

Rubrics

Summary:

Plates 1-6
Hymn to sun/sunrise
Hymn to Osiris
Weighing of heart
Ani true of voice
Chapter of coming forth
by day//funeral
procession

Plates 7-11
Chapter 17: Exegesis and long string of vignettes
Chapters 147, 146: Gates & guardians

Plates 12-17
Exegesis (Chapter 18)
Gods/Judges in councils
Opening the mouth
Preventative/protective chapters
Freedom of
movement

Plates 23-28
Chapter 18 again: Exegesis, judges in councils
Not eating excrement (fear of disorder)
Transformations
Divine Falcon (78): dialogue between gods and Ani
More transformations

Plates 30-35
Entering the hall of the two truths (Anubis speaks)
The Hall: declarations of innocence (125)
Equation of body parts with gods
125 Rubric
Amulets
Embalming/burial chamber
Field of Offerings
Provisions

From Book of the Dead to paper about the Book of the Dead

Basic assignment

Sources:

This is NOT a research paper: use notes,
lectures, and textbooks.

No need for outside sources.

No Budge books!

Stay off the internet.

Citation style:

You can cite textbooks by author’s name, page #

Example: Shafer 111-114

You may do this in-text (Shafer 111-114) or as footnotes.¹

¹Shafer 111-114

Citation style for myths, stories, etc.:

-If you are citing a myth or story in general, you
may just refer to it by title ("We remember that in the myth of the Destruction of Humanity, Re sent out his eye in the form of Hathor...")

-If you are citing an author’s opinion on a myth or story, you should cite the author ("According to John Taylor (Taylor 125), the myth of Osiris is aparallel that the dead person hoped to follow...")

Academic integrity and the writing of papers

Plagiarism and how to avoid it

Typical paper pitfalls:

Underkill
-Paper as list
-Excessive spacing to fill pages
-Excessive quotations to fill pages
-Repetition

Overkill
-Overambitious papers
-Too fixated on a specific point
-Illegible fancy fonts....
-Multimedia extravaganzas....

A Good Paper:

-Answers the questions asked in narrative form
-Tells us what you have learned
-Tells us your informed ideas about what you've learned
-Is interesting for us to read
-Can be creative if you address the points above
-Is "mechanically" sound (legible, well-spelled, well-written)
-Has been edited and typewritten or printed
-Is handed in on time at the beginning of class on December 12