Sacred animal mummy bundle containing shrews. Dimensions: L. 15.5 × W. 11.5 × H. 7 cm (6 1/8 × 4 1/2 × 2 3/4 in.). Date: ca. 400 B.C.-100 A.D..Animal cults The Egyptians considered certain individual animals to be living manifestations of a god, such as, since earliest times, the Apis bull . Those individuals were duly mummifed when they died and buried for eternal life, then replaced by another single living manifestation. During the first millennium BC, many multiples of animals associated with certain gods were specially raised in temple precincts as simultaneous avatars of that god and then mummified in large contingents and deposited in catacombs for eternal life. The ancient perception of these multiples, the evolution of the practice in this direction, and variations within the practice are not easily accessible to us. But the hundreds of thousands of often elaborately prepared animal mummies found in catacombs and other locales testify to its ancient resonance. Animal mummie