An ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead : the Papyrus of Sobekmose /

An Ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead is a beautifully illustrated scholarly edition of an early-15th-century BCE funerary papyrus, held by the Brooklyn Museum, that belonged to a gold-worker named Sobekmose. Because the papyrus was discovered at Saqqara near Memphis, it is of particular interest as an example of the Lower Egyptian book of the dead tradition instead of the more familiar Theban tradition. The book consists of two parts: the first part, O'Rourke's lucid translation of Sobekmose's version of the Book of the Dead, with each spell introduced by a head note explaining its significance and accompanied by critical notes on the translation; the second part, a complete color reproduction of the papyrus itself, an inclusion that makes the text valuable for Egyptologists. What distinguishes this work from its principal rival, R. O. Faulkner's translation, The Ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead, ed. by Carol Andrews (1990), is its wealth of introductory material concerning Egyptian mortuary religion and the nature, history, and function of Book of the Dead texts and their relation to other funerary books. This scholarly but accessible rendering is appropriate for any person interested in Egyptian history. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Lower-division undergraduates and above. --Stanley M. Burstein, California State University, Los Angeles