A Musical Book of the Dead (with Nemuer and Dr. Christian de Vartavan)

The History of Egypt Podcast

Dominic Perry

History, Society & Culture

4.8 • 2.1K Ratings

🗓️ 20 January 2024

⏱️ 63 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Remember “Going Forth by Day”? It’s back! In song form. Many creative projects have explored themes around the Egyptian underworld. But in 2023, the Czech band Nemuer has taken a novel approach. Their album, Book of Going Forth by Day is based on original funerary papyri; and for the pronunciation of the Egyptian language, they consulted with Egyptologist Dr. Christian de Vartavan. This gives us an opportunity to explore excerpts from the Book of the Dead from a new perspective and connect more deeply with the ancient language. The podcast has covered the Book of the Dead previously, but it may be time to revisit it. Would you like me to produce more episodes diving into this text? Let me know in the comments. Episode details: Nemuer, Going Forth by Day (2023). Available on Spotify and Bandcamp. Christian de Vartavan, Vocalised Dictionary of Ancient Egyptian (2022). Available in Open Access. The History of Egypt Podcast Website: www.egyptianhistorypodcast.com. Access expanded materials and support the History of Egypt Podcast at www.patreon.com/egyptpodcast. Make a one-time donation via PayPal payments. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	I'm going to be here.
0:03.0	I'm going to be here.
0:05.0	I'm going to be.
0:07.0	We're me.
0:08.0	Mee,
0:10.0	And I'm going greeting for you.
0:14.7	Ere, Neni, in Chen, I make a greeting for you.
0:22.2	Welcome back to the History of Egypt
0:24.1	podcast. This is a bonus episode in which we cover an interesting project that
0:30.0	recently came to my attention. At the end of 2023 the that recently
0:35.0	a new concept album based on the Egyptian Book of the dead
0:42.0	the book of the, or the ancient title, The Book of
0:46.0	Going Forth by Day, is probably the most famous work of funerary literature from ancient Egypt.
0:53.8	And this text, which helps guide the deceased souls through the afterlife, has been an inspiration
0:59.9	for writers and creatives in numerous media forms across many decades.
1:06.2	There are many creative projects, films, music and novels that take inspiration from ancient
1:12.1	Egyptian society, history and mythology.
1:15.0	So you may be wondering, what's so special about this one?
1:19.0	The reason this album stands out is how it approaches the ancient Egyptian language.
1:24.6	First of all, the band does not use any English lyrics within the compositions.
1:29.4	Everything is 100% ancient Egyptian, taken from the transliterations and translations of the Book of the Dead. More importantly, the band themselves partnered with an Egyptologist to create a more nuanced and in some respects accurate
1:45.6	pronunciation of the ancient language.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Dominic Perry, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Dominic Perry and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.