Reply #38: That's from the Papyrus of Ani. Not quite the same thing.

[onager]

Allegedly taken from the Egyptian Book of the Dead, as every stupid, gullible visitor to Egypt knows, who was dumb enough to buy one of these overpriced papyrus artworks.

I still need to get mine framed.

According to some sources, the papyrus was based on wall carvings, but eventually became a piece of art often commissioned by middle-class Egyptians of A Certain Age - i.e., about to have personal knowledge of the afterlife. e.g., the Ani who allegedly commissioned this one was a scribe during the 19th dynasty of the New Kingdom, or the 13th century BCE.

Reproduced below so you can follow along...

1. The newly dead person could skip the whole "weighing" thing. Those folks at the top, holding the ankhs, could vote the Recently Croaked straight into the afterlife.

Those are gods. Some sources say the major Egyptian gods - Isis, Nut, and that gang. An AEP (Actual Egyptian Person) told me they were not Major Gods, but just the individual gods of Egyptian cities.

Some gods are holding their ankhs up. That meant - thumbs up, welcome to the Afterlife! Ankhs not visible = thumbs down, yank out the Dearly Departed's heart and weigh it.

Sometimes there are 12 voting gods, sometimes 14, but always an even number. This ensured frequent tie votes, as shown on the papyrus. Stupid gods...to quote the noted theologian Homer Simpson.

2. That charming jackal-headed fellow is Anubis, the Temporary Zombie's personal guide through the antechamber of the Afterlife.

Anubis takes the Ex-Person to a scale. On top of the scale is Ma'at, goddess of justice, light, etc. etc, with a feather coming out of her head. Supervising the whole business is Thoth, the ibis-headed god of writing, government bureaucracy, etc. etc.

3. The heart of the Unliving Person is removed and put on one side of the scale. Anubis borrows a feather from Ma'at and puts it on the other side.

4. If the heart weighs more than the feather, Ammut is standing by. She's the critter with the head of a crocodile, body of a lion, and butt of a hippopotamus. Ammut first eats the heart, then the rest of Dearly Departed.

Uh-oh. Sorry, Recently Gone Tango-Uniform Person - do not pass Go, do not enter Afterlife.

5. If the heart and feather balance, Dearly Departed gets to personally meet the god Horus, the hawk-headed guy. But the best was yet to come! Taking over from Anubis, Horus escorts the D.D. into the presence of that green-skinned dude - Osiris, god of the Afterlife. Accompanied by a couple of other major Egyptian theo-celebrities, the goddesses Isis and Nephthys.

Bonus Irrelevant Trivia - the Old Gods live on! When a modern Egyptian Mom is trying to feed a cranky baby, she will hold the food up to its mouth and say : "Mut-mut-mut..." That's a direct reference to ol' heart-chomping Ammut, according to one of my favorite Actual Egyptian People.