Hello all,

I would imagine that if a king had disappeared it is something that popular books on Egyptology would at least touch on, and despite my few decades of dipping in and out of such tomes I can't recall ever reading of it (but, then, I do have a notoriously poor memory ).

It had occurred to me that a dummy might have been used instead but it hadn't occurred to me that they might have made do with what bits they could recover - which would not have been a lot if our for-the-sake-of-discussion-crocodile had been lunching on it.

Now, I consider it plausible that the AEs had some kind of backup plan (such as substituting a dummy of some description) if the king's mortal remains could not be found for some reason, However, this to me implies that the king's physical remains were not actually essential to get his spirit self (I'm not at all sure about the terminology here, but I think you'll following my meaning) to the next world.
Was this so?
As far as the AEs were themselves concerned, would the substitution of a dummy have made any difference to the king's 'journey ' to the next Life?

Of course, what I am leading up to is: would Khufu's pyramid have functioned as intended even without the king's real body?

MJ