of vessels, of implements. Poorer people must be contented with
poorer things, down to the peasant who is buried with the few
little necessary pots and pans of his daily life. But always, in
every grave, the chapel, small or great, is there. The endowment
of funerary priests continues. Every man, I suppose, however
poor, had some one to make at least one offering at his grave.
And so it was down to the New Empire.




VI. THE MIDDLE EMPIRE


During the Middle Empire, the burial and offering customs show
the persistence of the old belief in life after death as on
earth. Pots, vessels, tools, weapons, ornaments, clothing, and
models of scenes from life, continue to be placed in the burial
chamber. The walls of the offering chambers of the nobles, at
this time cut in the rock, still bear representations from life
carved in relief. The symbolical doors and the offering formulas
still mark the spot where the dead receive the necessities of
life from the living. All graves of every class testify to the
faith in a life after death similar to life on earth. Yet certain
modifications are apparent which are significant for the future
development of the conception of immortality: (1) the pyramid
texts are used by the provincial nobles for their own benefit;
(2) Abydos assumes a great importance as the burial place of
Osiris; (3) the swathed mummy comes into general use in burials.