The ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead

In ancient Egypt wealthy Egyptians were buried with a Book of the Dead. This was a collection of spells to help the dead person to get into the afterlife successfully.

Find out more about the Book of the Dead

The images on this page were sent into us by John.

When he was snowed in, he entertained himself by creating his very own Book of the Dead, inspired by a talk he’d been to on Hunefer’s Book of the Dead.

Here you can see some of the images from John’s Book of the Dead.

Why not have a go at making your own
Book of the Dead?

John created his own Book of the Dead...
The Book of the Dead was used by the ancient Egyptians to help them on their journey from death to the afterlife.
In order to get to the afterlife they had to first travel through the netherworld, where they would face a series of challenges.
The spells in the Book of the Dead would help the person through the challenges on their way to the perfect afterlife known as the Field of Reeds.
When a wealthy ancient Egyptian died they were mummified and placed in a tomb along with their
Book of the Dead.
The final challenge was the weighing of the heart. To pass into the afterlife the heart had to weigh the same as the feather of truth.
Ancient Egyptians believed in many different gods and goddesses. Osiris shown here was the god of the dead and ruler of the netherworld.
Ra shown here was a god of the sun and creator
of the world.
Ancient Egyptians were buried with many things in their tombs which would help them in the afterlife, shabtis are one of these objects.
With a shabiti figure to do all the work, ancient Egyptians hoped to relax forever in the perfect afterlife.