COMMENT BOOKS & ARTS M MUSEU H S I T I E BR E H T F RUSTEES O RUSTEES T Ancient Egyptians believed that their lives would be judged by the gods when they died — as shown in the papyrus of Ani, part of a Book of the Dead from 1275 BC . HISTORY How to behave beyond the grave Instructions for the afterlife from Ancient Egypt reveal a step change in moral psychology, discovers Andrew Robinson. n 1819, the English physician and hieroglyphic, hieratic Journey Through idea that the benefits of eternal life depend polymath Thomas Young — known for and demotic scripts — the Afterlife: on an individual’s adherence to correct his discovery of the interference of light describe a bizarre Ancient Egyptian behaviour on Earth. The law of ancient Book of the Dead I— published a pioneering article on ancient universe of belief. Israel, and the Ten Commandments in the British Museum, Egypt in the Encyclopaedia Britannica. It They were first inter- London. Bible, were influenced by ancient Egyptian offered a partially correct translation of the preted as a funerary Until 6 March 2011. ethics. Rosetta Stone’s hieroglyphic and demotic ritual by Champollion Inscribed on stone sarcophagi, wooden texts and outlined the new science of Egyp- working from papyrus scrolls in the 1820s. coffins and stone amulets, but mainly tology. Young persevered in trying to under- Yet the intricately painted vignettes — painted and drawn on long papyrus scrolls stand the scripts, expressing impatience with featuring the deities, animals, chimeras, placed close to a mummified corpse, Books the “monstrously complicated Egyptian kings and scribes of Egypt more than 3,000 of the Dead collected up to 200 spells. They superstitions”. But he was overtaken. His years ago — have a disconcerting power. were intended to reanimate and protect the reluctance to engage with the bewilder- However fantastical the ideas depicted, the corpse of an Egyptian in the afterlife, in a ing pantheon of animal-headed Egyptian Book’s pages document the shift in human civilization where the average lifespan was gods and priestly mumbo-jumbo was a key thought towards judgements based on 35 years. Neither the number of spells nor factor in the ascendance of his French rival, moral behaviour. Ethical precepts were writ- their order and content were fixed, so there the philologist Jean-François Champollion, ten down in Egypt as early as 3000 bc. They is no definitive version of the Book; nor who deciphered the Egyptian hieroglyphic were followed more than a thousand years does it have a simple narrative, although the script fully in 1822–23. later by the Babylonian King Hammurabi’s exhibition does its best to provide one. Visitors to Journey Through the Afterlife, the famous law code. The dominant idea British Museum’s elegant exhibition on the The Book of the Dead, which appeared is that the ba (soul) of NATURE.COM ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead, may ini- before the beginning of the New Kingdom the deceased should For an exhibition on tially sympathize with Young. The displayed around 1550 bc and was commonly used fly during the daylight ancient Egyptian texts — not a single book but various com- until the Graeco-Roman era in Egypt in the hours from the grave body image, see: pilations of instructions for the afterlife, in first century bc, shows for the first time the of its mummified go.nature.com/1ebtdb 632 | NATURE | VOL 468 | 2 DECEMBER 2010 © 2010 Macmillan Publishers Limited. All rights reserved BOOKS & ARTS COMMENT corpse and continue to enjoy earthly TECHNOLOGY pleasures beside the fertile Nile, return- ing at nightfall — much as the Sun god Ra endlessly cycles through the sky. Indeed, the ancient Egyptians called these com- Libraries of the future pilations the ‘book of coming forth by day’; the modern name ‘book of the dead’ A hands-on exhibition shows how online tools are was coined by the German Egyptologist shaping the way we use knowledge, says Aleks Krotoski. Richard Lepsius in the 1840s, probably from the term used by Egyptian workers on excavations when they discovered he changing role of the library in Growing with the same data such manuscripts. scientific enquiry is explored in Knowledge: reliably. There are major collections of Books of Growing Knowledge, an interactive The Evolution of The British Library Research the Dead in museums in Egypt, Europe Texhibition at the British Library in Lon- is scheduled to host a British Library, London. and the United States. The British Muse- don. Through hands-on demonstrations Until 16 July 2011. public debate to con- um’s holding is among the finest, and this of the latest digital technologies — includ- sider how research exhibition is drawn almost exclusively ing the European premiere of Sony’s 360° will be reported as from it. Many of the papyri have not autostereo scopic (three-dimensional) authors seek to distribute findings to as been exhibited before, mainly because of display — the curators hope to stimulate wide an audience as possible. Funding the extreme sensitivity to daylight of the scientists to pursue new questions, tech- bodies increasingly require digital dis- paints used in illustrating them. Tests by niques and forms of collaboration. semination of results to maximize pub- British Museum conservationists on the Visitors can try out immersive video lic impact, and some researchers rush to pigments, such as realgar (red arsenic) and input technologies and interact with reveal results on blogs to claim priority. and orpiment (yellow arsenic), show online research tools on multiscreen work- Articles openly released on the Internet that fading begins within days of expo- stations. Touch screens demonstrate ways garner more citations than those in sub- sure to natural light. “Choosing items in which high-resolution images of scien- scription journals, but many scientists are which could be exhibited safely has been tific pheno mena, ancient texts or sculptures concerned that publicly posted content a lengthy process”, writes the exhibition’s can be stored, shared and manipulated by that has not been peer reviewed could be curator John H. Taylor in the magnifi- collaborators worldwide. Topics of debate used out of context. Traditional forms of cent catalogue. Moreover, sensitivity of are emphasised on displays and video academic publication are still favoured, the paints to vibration means that the panels, through interviews with devel- although other open-access models are museum will have to modify its original opers, academics being explored by publishers. plan of taking the exhibition on tour. “Many scientists and information The exhibition also probes advances in The best-known vignette in the Book are concerned scientists. searching for information. Future read- of the Dead, rightly given pride of place that publicly The exhibition ers might require ‘intelligent’ personalized near the end of the exhibition, is the also highlights searches that deliver quality content based judgement of the deceased before he or posted content the recent shift on previous patterns of search activity. she is permitted to enter the afterlife. In that has not been towards open data Library users are also likely to participate the papyrus of Ani (pictured), a scribe peer reviewed sets. Databases in knowledge generation through shared who probably died around 1275 bc dur- could be used out are increasingly resources such as Wikipedia or crowd- ing the reign of Ramesses II, Ani and of context.” being made freely sourced research projects such as Galaxy his wife bow respectfully towards the available to the Zoo, which asks the public to help classify gods, as Ani’s heart (regarded as the seat research community as a means of maxi- millions of galaxies. The challenge for librar- of intelligence) is weighed in the bal- mizing efforts and inspiring more creative ies is to handle the data deluge — which is ance scales by the jackal-headed Anubis analyses. Public release of scientific data is expected to increase exponentially — by against the feather of Maat (truth). The often demanded by research-funding bod- exploiting remote, Internet-based ‘cloud procedure is watched greedily by Ammit ies, but concerns remain about data own- computing’ storage. the Devourer, a monstrous combination ership and misrepresentation. To alleviate Although solutions to managing infor- of crocodile, lion and hippopotamus. such fears, the curators display a range of mation in the Internet era are still evolving, Ani speaks to his heart, telling it not to examples of such data sets, including the one thing is certain: library visitors of the testify against him like a bad conscience. website that collects public information future will be demanding. They will expect “The Egyptians devised ways to escape from the UK government (http://data. interactive catalogues to contain every punishment by the gods, but the fact gov.uk), orchestrated by Tim Berners-Lee, permutation of possible data, and for it to be that they felt a need to do so is reveal- inventor of the World Wide Web, and com- accessible on multiple devices at any time. ing of a new stage in human psychology, puter scientist Nigel Shadbolt of the Uni- Research libraries will define and maintain a new notion of just behaviour,” notes versity of Southampton, UK. standards, host and disseminate archives Neil MacGregor, director of the British Issues around data sharing are explored and provide flexible user support. Library Museum. On studying this compelling in related workshops. Questions to be buildings will encourage collaboration and vignette, even visitors as dismissive of investigated include how the academic discussion as well as quiet study. Growing Egyptian mysticism as Young would have community ensures that author contribu- Knowledge exposes these changes at the core to agree. ■ tions are acknowledged; how shared data of research practice.