Where is the original Book of the Dead located?

Question

I heard that there were several copies made and the original was made out of human blood and bound in human flesh

Answer 1

i read in one site (forgot the exact address) that every pharao has his own scroll tucked together with his corpse inside his sarcophagus. this scrolls which contains instructions on how he could get to the other world and instructions on how will they live again (in the other world). these scrolls where collected and bounded and that was what's called the book of the dead. if i remember correctly, there's one in egypt (cairo museum, i think?)

Answer 2

maybe in a museum in britian-

many museums in britian have artifacts stolen from egypt-

so that could be the best bet-

Answer 3

More likely written on papyrus and stuck in a wooden sarcophagus. At least if you mean the "Egyptian Book of Dead,"  which is the one which brought this phrase into common use.

If on the other hand you're just referencing some fiction, well I guess I didn't read that cheesy novel.  At least Lovecraft gave his evil book an original title.

Answer 4

Egypt. That's all I know about Book of the Dead.

Answer 5

Wikipedia or your local library. lol i really dont know i dont think the original book exist anymore.

Answer 6

Asking where the original is, is kind of like asking where the original Bible is.  The Book of the Dead is simply a list of Egyptian burial rights and procedures.  I believe there is a copy of that in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

However, if there was an original, and it was indeed bound in human skin and made out of blood, it would have deteriorated fairly quickly and would not have survived till today.

**Credit for this goes to my husband who, while it's annoying that he reads over my shoulder while I'm typing, is pretty knowledgeable in all things macabre**

Answer 7

If such a book ever existed it would have almost surely been lost to the burning and ransacking of the library in Alexandria. This event is precisely the reason why information about the ancient Egyptians is so hard to come by. Besides, if such a book did exist it would have literally decomposed thousands of years ago. Methods for preserving literature have only come about in maybe the past 200 years. I'm sorry, I don't mean to be a buzz kill. The "Book of The Dead" that you are familiar with is probably either part of a myth gleaned from heiroglyphics or a creation of the New Age or Wiccan movements that really originated within the past 50 years

I found this information on wiki: The book of the dead was a description of the ancient Egyptian conception of the afterlife and a collection of hymns, spells, and instructions to allow the deceased to pass through obstacles in the afterlife. The book of the dead was most commonly written on a papyrus scroll and placed in the coffin or burial chamber of the deceased.[1]

The name "Book of the Dead" was the invention of the German Egyptologist Karl Richard Lepsius, who published a selection of the texts in 1842. When it was first discovered, the book of the dead was thought to be an ancient Egyptian Bible. But unlike the Bible, The Book of the Dead does not set forth religious tenets and was not considered by the ancient Egyptians to be the product of divine revelation, which allowed the content of the book of the dead to change over time. The Book of the Dead was thus the product of a long process of evolution from the Pyramid texts of the Old Kingdom to the Coffin Texts of the Middle Kingdom. About one-third of the chapters in The Book of the Dead are derived from the Coffin Texts.[2] The Book of the Dead itself was adapted to The Book of Breathings in the Late Period, but remained popular in its own right until the Roman period.

So I guess it wasn't a formal book but sort of a Eulogy written on a piece of paper and buried with people. I'm shocked that examples of it survived. Later some English guy combined with some other "deathy" type stuff and published it as "The Book of The Dead". Maybe they have some of those papyrus scrolls available somewhere?