This painting is based on the life-sized Anubis statue from the Tomb of Tutankhamun, currently housed in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. This painting shows a statue of a jackal, sacred to Anubis, sitting atop a gilded coffin, protecting it, resting on a sedan chair. Anubis is the jackal-headed god associated with mummification and the afterlife. He was usually portrayed as half human, half jackal, or in full jackal form wearing a ribbon. After a funeral, Anubis would take the deceased by the hand and introduce him into the presence of the sovereign judges where the soul of the deceased would be weighed. Anubis was the Guardian of Offerings brought to the ceremony by heirs of the deceased and he also guarded the mummy from evil forces in the night. When the body was embalmed, a priest wearing a jackal mask acted as Anubis's representative. He also was the guardian of the Sacred Esoteric Mysteries. The origin of this God lay in the fact that jackals could be heard howling in the desert to the west of the Nile at sunset-at the time when burials took place.
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