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Tuesday, November 27, 2007 Mummies My keyboard appears to be British, but as I type it's conforming to an American layout. (Strange--though appreciated--since I haven't changed any settings on the software.) I'm in the basement of an internet cafe right next to the Young Vic, waiting to see their production of Brothers Size, which has garnered rave reviews. I spent most of today exploring the British Museum's extensive Egyptian collection, with minor detours into Assyria and Greece/Rome. Their placards are actually quite informative; I hadn't known that hieroglyphics were a formal form of writing reserved for monuments and art whereas Hieratic script was standard for everyday use (account keeping, letters, records). Eventually Hieratic became a formal script for religious texts, replaced by Demotic script in daily use. Looking at the mummies, while fascinating, feels a little odd--these were people, and they've been removed from their carefully prepared tombs. It's a different feeling than just walking through a cemetery or looking at tombs, in which you're a step removed from bodies, different even than wandering through Parisian catacombs. According to Ancient Egyptian beliefs about death, they needed to remain intact in order to be reborn into the afterlife. (Somewhat problematic from the standpoint of bodies moving hundreds and even thousands of years later--when would one enter the afterlife? Wouldn't they have already been reborn? Would one die again in the afterlife if the body here decomposed? Would servants be lost there, assuming they appeared in the afterlife to begin with, if their corresponding statues were destroyed in this life, though so much time has elapsed?) Moving the mummies seems problematic from that point, even though comptemorary people do not share those beliefs. Labels: Ancient Egypt, London, travel ^ Top | 12:36 PM | | | 
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