It’s important for the grieving to have proper closure to their loved one. Think about it, if there were no funeral directors, what would people do with their dead? Mortuary science is not a new concept and can be traced back to ancient times (“Mortuary Science”). The first written record of mortuary science and funeral directing comes from the Ancient Egyptians who embalmed their deceased. Mummifications are nearly the same, if not better than, current embalming procedures.
Did you know that a normal burial in ancient Maya was very similar to a normal burial today? The Mayan people were a people of religious beliefs, and the rituals that they were accustomed to really weren’t much different than what you might see today, just with a little Mayan “twist” to it. The same basic layout we use today was used for their dead, in other words, the person dies, a funeral is arranged, and then the deceased is buried. The Mayan people had strong religious beliefs, so strong that they were willing to kill and be killed for them, but after a while, they realized they preferred killing others for their gods instead of themselves being killed. Their gods were very angry and violent gods, which required blood.
The Etruscan believed that every physical phenomenon was a clear act of divine power and this power could be dissuaded or persuaded to favor human acts. The Etruscan had a god for everything: The sun, Catha and Usil; a civil god, Selvans; Turan, the goddess of love; there was a god for war, a god for the moon, etc. The Etruscan afterlife was negative, gods were hostile and were said to bring misfortune, so their religion was centered on interpreting the will of the gods and satisfying it. The Egyptian's had a large belief in the afterlife, and also believed heavy in divine right. They believed that every human being was composed of physical and spiritual parts or aspects.
The Funerary Texts are one of the burial rituals that are performed during the ceremony. I feel that this showed that even through death and beyond, the bonds between the family, friends and community were so strong that nothing could come between. Funerary texts were written for the deceased to help their Ka, the spirit of the deceased, move on from their bodies and into the afterlife, and to be able to navigate their way through the afterlife when they got there. Most funerary literature consists of lists of spells and instructions for navigating the afterlife. The earliest known of versions Funerary text are from the 16th century BC during the 18th Dynasty (ca.
Both religions are often thought to be henotheistic, meaning they recognize a single deity, and view other Gods and Goddesses as manifestations or aspects of that supreme God. In the Ancient Egyptian religion, this is untrue due to the fact that the pharaoh, who is believed to have been descended from the gods, can choose when to shift the focus of the supreme deity. Because the concerns of the population in both areas were different, gods held contradictory roles due to landscape, social, and climatic variation. Worship in both religions also has similarities, with a temple dedicated to a particular deity, and shrines within that temple dedicated to other gods correlated with the main deity. Both religions believed in the afterlife.
The side panels depict a religious sacrifice and an offering being made to the dead. From this it can be seen that burial (at least for the rich) was accompanied by the sacrifice of animals and the presentation of offerings. [xviii] The pictures of sacrifices made to and for the dead, show that the Minoans did indeed believe in an afterlife and did what they thought was necessary to proved for the departed person’s journey. It must be noted that these are all merely assumptions based off the evidence provided (some of which is very clear and strong), since there is effectively no contemporary textual evidence regarding Minoan religion. Part of this problem lies in the nature of the sources - much of the contents of Linear A tablets remain indecipherable and many of the Minoan frescos are incomplete.
To properly remove the brain the embalmer took a hook and pulled as much of the brain out that was possible through the nose. After this was completed the brain was put in water to dissolve, and according to who you talked to and what they believed the water was either thrown out or carried to the burial chamber to be left with the pharaoh or whoever. The fourth step was probably the most important step to be done right to be able to go into the afterlife. This step was the removal of the internal organs. The liver, lungs, stomach, and the intestines all had to be removed.
In the early days of ancient Egypt, the deceased were placed in a hole in the ground. This was good, because the heat and sands of the desert would eventually dehydrate and preserve the bodies. Later, they decided to start putting them in coffins. But, without the sands and heat of the desert, the body just decayed. Thus, the mummification process came around.
Pyramids in Egypt were also used as a burial site for pharaohs, because they strongly believed in life after death. Egypt and Mesopotamia were also constructed differently. In Mesopotamia, they had small, cramped city-states. Because of the lack of natural defense, they were required to build walls around their cities to protect against invasion from hostile nomads and natural discrepancies, such as the flooding of the Tigris and Euphrates. In Egypt, there was a lack of urbanization due to “the ease of farming on the banks of the Nile” (A Tale of Two Rivers), and the
Sumerians produced The Epic of Gilgamesh describes the wanderings of Gilgamesh in search for eternal life. Egyptians produced The Book of the Dead which describes after death the soul becomes a part of the divine. Religion and authority and Egypt were closely related. In Mesopotamia each city state had different own god while in Egypt everyone followed the same thing. In Mesopotamia, they established patterns for civilization to take place.