Funerary cult

Osiris, depicted as a mummy, receives offerings on behalf of the dead in this illustration on papyrus from a Book of the Dead.

A funerary cult is a body of religious teaching and practice centered on the veneration of the dead, in which the living are thought to be able to confer benefits on the dead in the afterlife or to appease their otherwise wrathful ghosts. Rituals were carried on for the benefit of the dead, either by their relatives or by a class of priests appointed and paid to perform the rites. These rituals took place at the tombs of the dead themselves or at mortuary temples appointed to this purpose. Funerary cults are found in a wide variety of cultures.^[1]

^ Yayoi Shirai, "Ideal and reality in Old Kingdom private funerary cults", in The Old Kingdom Art and Archaeology, Miroslav Bárta, ed.; (Czech Institute of Egyptology, 2004), pp. 325 et. seq. Archived 2013-01-29 at the Wayback Machine, accessed June 8, 2011

[1] Yayoi Shirai, "Ideal and reality in Old Kingdom private funerary cults", in The Old Kingdom Art and Archaeology, Miroslav Bárta, ed.; (Czech Institute of Egyptology, 2004), pp. 325 et. seq. Archived 2013-01-29 at the Wayback Machine, accessed June 8, 2011

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