Tuesday, November 6, 2012

OSIRIS

"They conceived of a literal resurrection of the body which made them mummify it with desperate care, and preserve all the vital organs in canopic jars near the corpse; whilst besides the body they believed in two other elements, the soul, which after its weighing and approval by Osiris dwelt in the land of the blest, and the obscure and portentous ka or life-principle which wandered about the upper and lower worlds in a horrible way, demanding occasional access to the preserved body, consuming the food offerings brought by priests and pious relatives to the mortuary chapel, and sometimes—as men whispered—taking its body or the wooden double always buried beside it and stalking noxiously abroad on errands peculiarly repellent."
H.P. Lovecraft & Harry Houdini, Under the Pyramids

"Osiris was represented as a dead kin, with only the hands emerging from the mummy wrappings to grasp the emblems of his supreme power, the shepherd's crook and whip. His body was colored red for the earth or green for vegetation, and on his bearded head he wore the atef crown, composed of the white crown of Upper Egypt and the two feathers of Busiris, to which were sometimes added a pair of horns."
Veronica Ions, Egyptian Mythology 

  

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