I have been so interested in the Ancient Egyptian way of art since we began the chapter in the book! The people's dedication to religion and their structured way of life is very intriguing. This is a piece from the Ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead. Although we learned about the Book of the dead in our textbooks, we studied a different part of it. In this picture, Hunefer's mummy is undergoing the "opening of the mouth" ritual in front of a funerary stela and a chapel. Three priests to the left are about to open his mouth so that he can speak, eat and drink in the afterlife. There are two mourning women in front of the mummy, and another priest wearing the mask of Anubis is holding the mummy. In this piece I see the gender differentiation with the women having lighter colored skin and the men having darker skin. Also, inside of the funerary stela, there are registers of hieroglyphs that tell a story. It is also seen that all of the men in this picture are portrayed as powerful or royal because of their royal stance.
