volume 2 - Robert Bedrosian's Armenian History Workshop

Egyptian Souls and Their Mummies. 391
that they might wear them as amulets. In such requests
he saw a survival of the ancient Egyptian belief in the
magical qualities which the little finger was supposed
to possess, and reminded me of the mention of the little
finger of King Pepi which occurs in the Pyramid Texts.
It may be noted in passing that many distinguished
psychical men have visited the mummies in the British
Museum for other than archaeological purposes, and
among these may be mentioned Mr. Douglas Murray
and Mr. Stead. These gentlemen used to say that they
could distinguish between the different " spirit personalities
" which they alleged were present in the First
Egyptian Room, and declared that they were able to
hold intercourse with them, and that they obtained
from them information concerning the state and manner
of existence of the Egyptian souls who had passed over
to the " Other Side." They were convinced that the
mummies in that room were visited nightly by the souls
who had lived in them on earth, and they were anxious
to obtain permission to make arrangements to pass a
night in the mummy rooms, so that they might converse
with the souls. They proposed to invite several " firstclass
mediumistic persons," both ladies and gentlemen, to
be present, and were certain that if they were allowed
to pass a night with the mummies they would be able
to clear up all the Egyptologist's difficulties about the
functions and relationships of the spirit-soul, heartsoul,
double, shadow, etc., and obtain from them important
information concerning the spirit-world. They
regarded the mummy rooms in the British Museum as
ideal places for such a seance, because, as they said, the
conditions under which the mummies in them existed
were such as to promote " free intercourse between
their bodies and their spirit-souls and heart-souls, and
all the other parts of their material and spiritual entities."
They wished also to communicate with the souls of
the royal mummies at Cairo, but thought that the
injuries which they had received through the carelessness
which the Service of Antiquities had displayed in respect
of the preservation of them had made it impossible.