Death. This chilling, enthralling, and inevitable process happens and has happened to every single human being on Earth. Despite our diverse customs, languages, history, food, and values, we are all linked together by the sudden ending of life. Many cultures, from the Egyptians to the Etruscans to Warhol’s pop culture 1960s, are fascinated with the spectacle of death and the grandeur of it all. In this article, we will explore what death meant to people across different time and space.

       The Ancient Egyptians are most notorious for their emphasis on the afterlife and death. From Khufu in the 4000s BCE to Cleopatra in the 1st century BCE, Egypt was oriented around the brevity of life on Earth and the immortality of life in the Ka statue. The Ka was the life force of a person, the spirit that would inhabit the mortuary statue after death. Most statues were constructed for the Pharaoh or the elite; regular Egyptians could not afford the elaborate burial rituals. Another detail that hints at the importance of death was the materials that the Egyptians constructed their buildings out of. Regular structures such as houses and shops were usually made of mud brick or other cheap materials. By contrast, the important burial objects were made of limestone or expensive materials such as faience and diorite (northosite gneiss). A famous example of diorite is the Ka statue of Khafre, the builder of the second Pyramid at Giza. Diorite, an expensive medium that was incredibly difficult to carve, glowed a brilliant blue in the light, linking the Pharaoh (who was at the top of the social hierarchy) to Horus, the god of protection and the sky.

Khafre Enthroned http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Khafre_statue.jpg

        Finally, the Egyptians had elaborate burial processes for embalming the dead. Mummies were made by drying out the body, wrapping it in linen, and taking out the internal organs so they could be placed in canopic jars. It is said that the brain was pulled out of the body through the nose because it was considered unimportant (the heart was the most vital). The Egyptians truly believed the afterlife was of the utmost concern; this was also illustrated in the intricate Books of the Dead found in mortuary temples, mastabas, and underground burial shafts.
       Next, the Etruscan civilization of Ancient Italy also valued the afterlife above earthly matters. Eretria was a wealthy region in central Italy, and it prospered from the 11th to the 1st century BCE because of the valuable metals mined there (i.e. copper, iron, and tin). Although no Etruscan temple survives completely intact, models show that the temples were similar to the Greek temples before them. The Etruscan temples had red columns (from Minoan civilization?), a pediment without sculptures in it, non-fluted doric columns that tapered at the end, a prominent portico (porch), and three cellas. The medium was stone, which contrasted to the ordinary building materials of wood, mud, and brick.
       Most tombs were cut into rocks or underground mounds where they have remained undiscovered until recently. One such tomb dating from the 7th-2nd century BCE has faded wall paintings of a three-headed dog (possible Cerberus from Greek mythology) and white women and red men (an artistic convention) dancing energetically. Carved into the walls of the tomb were everyday objects such as pots, pans, and other domestic commodities. This hints that Etruscans viewed the afterlife not as something to be feared as the Egyptians slightly did, but rather as a genial party. Scenes of dancing, hunting, and merriment, and even a relaxed terracotta sarcophagus of a couple reclining adorn the burial structures, indicating that the Etruscans saw death as a more satisfactory continuation of life on Earth. These kinds of lively scenes would never occur in the strict, geometric, and unchanging depictions of the Egyptians (i.e. weighing hearts before Thoth and defeating Seth). 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/goincase/8369055044/ Jackie Kennedy after the death of her husband http://www.flickr.com/photos/98701585@N02/9415965524/