Kathlyn M. Cooney

Stanford University

The Conundrum of Female Rebirth: The Fragmentation of the Female Individual in her Funerary Equipment

Creation and rebirth in ancient Egypt is a masculine endeavor, and in mythological and funerary texts, rebirth is highly sexualized. The female stands as a vessel or protectress during the process of sexual regeneration, but she is not the source. The mythological cycles of creator gods Atum, Osiris, Re, and Amen are sexualized as rebirths made possible through their own male sexual agency. Creation and birth is a male prerogative in Ancient Egypt, and sexual activity is one of the main avenues to that rebirth.

Sexualized rebirth seems also to have been necessary for the human Egyptian after his or her own death. The deceased Egyptian is intimately associated with the Osirian and solar cycles, so that he or she can set rebirth into motion. The deceased is even named Osiris in the tomb and on the coffin. Not only does the dead individual hope to become an akh spirit with divine essence, but he or she must be intimately associated with the male divinity Osiris to do so.

Given this mythological foundation, where does this leave the Egyptian female with regards to her preparation for burial? My examination will focus on New Kingdom funerary equipment, including coffin sets, canopic equipment, and shabtis, some of which make clear gender re-assignments and others which are more ambiguous. Coffin and tomb inscriptions make it quite clear that, until very late in Egyptian history, the woman is named Osiris and was thus intimately associated with a masculine sexualized rebirth. The masculine singular personal pronoun =f is also retained on many of her funerary texts. How then does she retain her feminine nature as an akh?

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