| Anubis
Egyptian
Jackal-headed god of the funeral cult, inventor of embalming, judge of souls, and guide to the underworld. By most accounts, he was the son of Osiris and Nephthys, though some say that this dog-faced boy was the progeny of Bastet, the cat goddess. He first practised embalming on his father Osiris, whose scattered body parts were collected and reassembled by Isis. Anubis probably employed the form of mummification used on the Phaorohs. It began with a dissection of the corpse. The four most important organs in Egyptian eyes -- the liver, the lungs, the stomach, and the intestines -- were extracted, washed in palm wine, and placed in herb-filled canopic jars. The embalmer then filled the body cavities with aromatic resins such as myrrh before stitching the incisions shut. The corpse spent the next seventy days buried in salpetre. When this period elapsed, the embalmer removed the body from the potassium nitrate, washed it, wrapped it in cotton bandages, dipped it in glue, placed it in the coffin, and then secreted the coffin in the tomb. The Egyptians thought this complicated act of butchery would prepare the corpse for reanimation. It worked for Osiris, after all!
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