When the body was finally prepared, the mummies were delivered to their families ; but it sometimes happened that a considerable time elapsed before they were finally committed to the tomb, and they were till then retained at home (Cicero,' TuaeuL,' i. 45; Tacit. ' Inst.,' v., 5, 7; 31cLa, c. 9), and sometimee produced at festive entertainments (Lucian, 'de Luctu,' 21). Even as late as the days of St. Athanasists, A.D. 325, mummies were kept at home on couches (Athan. ' Vita Anton.), a custom which was reproved by the fathers of the church. (1)arnase. Or. i. 'do Imag.;' St. Hieronym., vita St. Ifilarion, c. 40.) During time period of their embalming and mourning the relations abstained Inuit the use of the bath, of wine, and of delicate food, and arrayed them selves in mourning or coarse garments. When finally committed to the sepulchre, the:mummies were confided to the care of the Cholehytte, clam of priests of higher rank than the tarickmt(c, or embalmers ; they were deemed a respectable fraternity, admitted ioto the temple, and enjoyed the privilege of sanding the floor. (Peyron, 'Papiri Creel.; i. p. 62.) It has been supposed that they wrapped the mummies in linen ban dages, 'after the model of Osiria (Athenagoras, Legat. pro Christ.,' 29 ; Dansasc. in' Ph ot. Bibl.' cod. ceil ; Suidas, ' met II emiskos), but this is hardly probable, as females belonged to the class. (Pe)yron, ' Pap. Greci; 1827, ii. p. 48-64.) They rather appear to have inhabited the Tlsynabouna, and the Mettmoneirs or necropolis on the western bank at Thebes, and to have been engaged in celebrating the funeral masses of the mummies, to which certain emoluments were attached, and which they sold with the houses they occupied and the mummies under their charge. Many papyri contain their plaints : one, A.D. 127, records the injuries and thefts perpetrated by resurrectionists on the funeral paraphernalia of their mummies to the amount of about 28/. or 721. (Letronne Nouvelles Annales,' p. 273; Kosegarten, ' Benterkungen ueber ein !tEgypt. Text. doers I'apyrua,' 4to, Greisf. 1824); and it appears from the document that the doers of the sepulchre had been left oleo, and the mummies themselves become the prey of prowling jackals. The mummies were sent in funeral barges or &aria down the Nile to their sepulchres, the poorer shipping them on board the publics vessels, and merely attaching to them a tessera or ticket of wood ; while richer individuals hired a private bath, and despatched a messenger with a letter describing the privates marks ou the bandages by which they might be recognised. (l'eyron, 13., l'apiri Greci,' p. 40.) Not only were the bodies of the Egyptians thus embalmed, but those also of persons who died in the country were subjected to the same process. One of the earliest embalmments on record is that of the patriarch Jacob, who was prepared in this manner for 40 days. (Gen. 1. 3.) Joseph was also, according to the rabbiuical writings, embalmed and buried either in the bed or on the banks of the Nile. (Gen., L 26 ; Isaiah, lxv. 4.) The body of Alexander the Great was embalmed with honey (Statists, Silv.,' iii., 2, 116), and existed at Alexandria till the ago of the Emperor Severus, and was seen and handled by Augustus on his visit to that city. (Dio.,1i. 10.) The bodies of Antony and Cleopatra were embalmed in the Egyptian manner, and deposited in the same sepulchre, and that of the unfortu nate queen was subsequently found entire by the Emperor Heraelitts. (' Ephst. ad Sophoel.) Embalmment was also the right of the poorest Egyptians, even of malefactors; and those who were injured by crocodiles were treated with remarkable honour, and buried at the expense of the nearest city. The "Ethiopians, according to Ilerodottis (iii. c. 24), embalmed in nearly the same manner as the Egyptians ; they appear to have coated tho body with lime, and to have placed it In a 'sarcophagus of glass or some other transparent substance, and after keeping it about a year in their houses, and offering and praying to it, to have finally placed it outside the city.
It is clear that in tho apace of more than 2000 years the mode of preparing mummies must have greatly differed, and that individual caprice must have been often exercised in so empirical an art. The older writers (Lauren., 'de Balsamatione,' 12mo, 1693) divided them into six kinds, but the more recent, observers have considered the art as :-1. Drying the bodies in the sand, chiefly employed for the poorer classes (Magnus, 1, dam Einbalsamiren,' p. 20; Belzoni,' Discoveries,' p.170); 2. Salting in matron, and then drying ; 3. Boiling in resins and bitumen ; 4. Preparing with fine resins, and removing the brains and viscera. A division, purely arbitrary, has been made between mum mies having the flank incision, and those without. Of the 1st class they make :-1. Those prepared with an aromatic resin, having the skin like tanned leather, sometimes partially gilded ; 2. Those prepared with bitumen, the skin hard and shining like Japan varnish, the body filled with bitumen, the mummy to unrol. Of this class some are salted and then daubed with resinous substances, others with pitch, having the skin hard and smooth. The mummies without the flank incision are either salted and prepared with impure masses of bitumen, or salted only ; the first kind have their form utterly destroyed, being covered with a mass of pissasphalt which has penetrated through the skin, muscles, and bone, owing to their having been boiled or suffused with bitumen. They are hard, and give forth a pleasant smell, and they chiefly come from Sakkara, and date; from the 7th to the 2nd century, s.c. The salted mummies are usually in bad condition, the skin like parchment, and easily broken. Some anomalous examples have been found prepared with wax, and in those prepared by pissa sphalt the skin has been sometimes removed. (Magnus, das Einbals. d. Leichen,' p. 26-27.) Great difference of opinion exists about the substances employed, waren or litron is supposed to be Glauber's salts, common salt, salt petre, or soda (Dioscorides and Galen), kedrion, or oil of cedar, turpen tine, or pyroligneous acid (Pliny, N. H.' xvi, c. 21 ; Mach, die mgypt. Mum.' 12mo. Nurenb. 1827.) Asphalt came from the Lacus Asphaltitcs of ldumna (Diodor., xix. 99 ; Strabo, xvi. 526), the pissasphalt was a mixture of the same substance with pitch. Myrrh and cinnamon (the bark of the Laurus cassia, (Herod., ii. 87 ; Magnus, p. 33.) The syrman was an alkaline preparation. All these materials have been found in different mummies, either within or without the bodies, and some mummies have been found strewn with the drier materials, such as myrrh, cinnamon, and cassia, which retained their fragrance. (Osburn,
` Leeds mummy,' p. 6.) Considerable difference prevails as to the treatment of the various portions of the body : the brain was generally removed through the nose, or orbits of the eyes, or base of the cranium. The cavity of the skull when removed is found sometimes hollow, at others filled with pissasphalt, or earthy matter. The nostrils are generally plugged with linen pads to exclude the entrance of the air, or of destructive insects, which nevertheless have sometimes penetrated the skull and body. The eyes have sometimes been removed and the cavities filled with artificial ones of ivory and obsidian or coloured porcelain. The hair of men has generally been left in its natural condition, but that of females has often been cut off, wrapped up in separate linen bandages, and deposited either in the coffin, or placed on the body. Sometimes these masses of hair are made up in an oval shape and covered with bitumen, at others merely folded in linen. The flank incision varies in position and length, being placed in some mummies beneath the ribs, but in others under the arm-pits. This incision in mummies of the 26th dynasty, and under the Ptolemies and Romans, has a square rectangular thin plate of tin, on which is incised in out line the right symbolical eye, emblem of the sun, in accordance with the 140th chapter of the Ritual. (Lepsius, Todt. ' taf. lvii. c. 140.) The entrails, which have been removed through this incision, have been treated in different manners, according to the care with which the embalmment has been performed, or the epoch at which the body has been mummied. At all epochs the most costly funerals had four large jars of zoned, alabaster, calcareous stone, terra cotta, porcelain, or wood modelled in shape of the four genii of the dead,—Amsct, Hari, Tuaut mutt and Kabhsenuf ; mummied, and having the heads of a man, ape jackal, and hawk. The thoracic and abdominal viscera were divided into four portions, embalmed in accordance with the process employed for the body, either by immersion in natron, or boiled in asphalt, made up into oval or cylindrical packets which are enwrapped in and one portion deposited in each jar. On the day of the funeral these jars were placed in a large box and transported on a sledge to the sepulchre, and finally arranged at the side of the coffin or under the sepulchral bier. The most elegant and costly jars have formula reciting that the four principal goddesses, Neith, Selk, Isis, and Nephthys, watch over and protect these embalmed portions. Ir mummies of a later period, where so much cost was not expended, the embalmers made the viscera into four oval packets, and either placed them on the body, or returned them through the flank incision intc the body, in which case they are usually accompanied by figures of red, yellow, or dark wax, or earth coated with that substance, repro renting the four genii. On a mummy opened at (Pettigrew ' Archicologia; vol. xxvii. pp. 262, 273), the portions attached to Anzac were the stomach and large intestines, Ilapi presided over the smal intestines, Tuautmulf the lungs and heart, Kabhaotuf the liver anc gall bladder. Mummies of the 26th dynasty have sometimes the fingers enclosed in stalls of silver, in order to prevent injury to the nails when the epidermis was destroyed, and the body subjected ti the boiling bitumen into which the body was immersed (Birch ' Archicol. Joum.; viii. 278); and in the days of the Ptolemies anc Romans, the tips of the nose, the nails, and extremities, and eves portions of the flesh were gilded, supposed by some to be those part where decay had commenced, or lesion appeared. (Gryphius, Mum Wratisl.' 12mo. 1662 ; Fabricius, Biblegr. c. xxiii. i, c. 7.) One iarticular custom,:not Egyptian but Greek, is found on mummies of the 'tolemaic and Roman period—the jaws are carefully closed and bound ip, while in those of the Pharaonic age the mouth is always open. (Cal laud,' Voyage ii Meroe,' iv. p. 13, and foil.) The mummy of Petem mophis-Ammonios, found by Cailliaud at Gournah, was discovered to lave the eyelids closed by a plate of geld in shape of an eye with its id, and a plate of gold in shape of the tongue over that member, while L crown of gilded copper encircled the head. (Cailliaud, pl. lxxi.) On he Wratislaw mummy, a plate of gold of 10 grs. weight was found under the tongue. (Gryphius, p. 46.) The limbs are differently dis posed, the legs, however, always straight and extended ; the hands if women are sometimes crossed upon the breast, and of girls on the groin ; those of men and women are often placed flat down the sides, with the palms inwards and fingers extended. (Cailliaud, Voy. Is liter.' iv. 13 ; Passalacqua, Cat.' p. 180.) Various small portions of the body, such perhaps as had become diseased, were embalmed sepa rately in the same manner as the viscera, and placed in recesses hol lowed in the pedestals of wooden figures, in shape of Osiris, or Ptah Socharis. (Rosellini, Mon. Civ.,' tom. iii.'p. 349). The hieroglyphical Ritual gives directions for various amulets to be placed about the body, the most remarkable of which are a scarabieus of hard stone inscribed on the base with the 26 or 64 ch. found on rich mummies ou the breast ; or when plain, sometimes discovered inside the body : this was to protect the heart. Another in shape of the index and middle finger is often found in the belly. (Pettigrew, "Hist. Eg. Mum.,' pl. iv. 5, p. 96 ; Herzog., Pl., fig. 34.) The other amulets, chiefly disposed ou the neck, are a pillow of hematite, emblems of life, of stability, symbolic eyes, and figures of deities strung as a necklace round the neck. Nine teen were found on the Jersey mummy, and seventy-four on that of Gotha. Plates of tin incised with the winged disk, or the flying hawk, and other symbols, have been found on the chest. Besides these amulets, the jewellery worn during life, the ear-rings, bracelets, finger rings, collars, and other valuables; have constantly been found. (Herzog, Mumiogr.' p. 16.) The bandages of mummies are invariably of linen, the use of wool being prohibited. (Herod., ii. 37.) The only woollen bandages dis covered were these of the supposed body of Menkhcres, and of the workmen of the Tourah quarries, rendering the age of these bodies uncertain. Neither cotton nor silk, as conjectured by some of the older writers, was ever used. (Thompson, Mummy Cloth,' Class.