The organization of the pyramid texts : typology and disposition / by Harold M. Hays.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Preliminary Material Volume One -- Introduction -- Chapter One Performance Settings and Structures -- Chapter Two Groups and Series of Pyramid Texts -- Chapter Three Categories of Pyramid Texts -- Chapter Four Interface of Groups and Categories -- Chapter Five Recapitulation -- Coda Types of Pyramid Texts and Their Interface with Groups -- Indices -- Preliminary Material Volume Two -- Listing One Pyramid Texts by Typology and Disposition -- Listing Two Sequences of Pyramid Texts -- Listing Three Subsequences of Pyramid Texts -- Listing Four Typological Motifs of Pyramid Texts -- Plans of Texts in Kingly Pyramids -- Charts of Groups of Texts in Kingly Pyramids -- References Cited.

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The ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts form the oldest sizable body of religious texts in the world. Discovered in the late nineteenth century, they had been inscribed on the interior stone walls of the pyramid tombs of third-millennium kings and queens. From their content it is clear that they were concerned with the afterlife state of the tomb owner, but the historical meaning of their emergence has been poorly understood. This book weds traditional philological approaches to linguistic anthropology in order to associate them with two spheres of human action: mortuary cult and personal preparation for the afterlife. Monumentalized as hieroglyphs in the tomb, their function was now one step removed from the human events that had motivated their original production.