The emergence of the cult of Osiris is, in most cases, dated to the end of the 5th dynasty, the period in which the name of Osiris appears in writing, and it is commonly held that before this period not a trace of the cult can be discerned. This study is intended to investigate whether this emergence was really so sudden, or if there is evidence to suggest this appearance was preceded by a period of development of the theology and mythology of the cult. One of the most important aspects of the mythology of the cult is the rebirth of Osiris. In the theology of the cult this rebirth was projected on mortal men, and led to the postulation that every human being, whether royal or non-royal, had the possibility to attain eternal life after death. What made this cult even more attractive is that this eternal life was not confined to the tomb, as it used to be for non-royalty. The study is concerned with the rebirth possibilities of non-royal persons and aims to determine the chronological development of the rebirth connotations of the various decoration themes that were used in the chapel of Old Kingdom tombs. The decoration themes that are the subject of the determinations are the group of bed-scenes consisting of the bed-making scene and the marital bed-scene, the development in form and length of the bread loaves on the offering table, the different aspects of the scenes in which the "lotus" flower is depicted, and the marsh scenes.

At the end of the 6th dynasty the 500 year old established order of the Old Kingdom fell apart, which, according to the interpretation given to various contemporary literary sources, started a period of social unrest and economic decline. The magnitude of the economic investment bestowed by the members of the higher social strata on the monuments that would be the abode for their after-life leads to the hypothesis that an economic decline could also manifest itself in the dimensions of the various architectonic elements of these monuments. The dimensions of the tombs have been chosen as the subject of this study. The preliminary part of the study is performed on the tombs in the necropolis of Giza. The results of the study are compared with the same measurements in the necropoleis of Saqqara and Abusir. The conclusion is that the economic decline started already at the early dynastic period and not as a result of the caving in of the Old Kingdom. An interesting 'side-effect' of the study is that the dimensions of the tombs can serve as a method to check a dating that has been proposed based on other aspect of the tomb.