Ancient Near Eastern and Mediterranean Texts (Esoteric Texts)

The Book of the Dead is the name given to an ancient Egyptian funerary text generally written on papyrus and used from the beginning of the New Kingdom (around 1550 BC) to around 50 BC.

The Sumerian King List (abbreviated SKL) or Chronicle of the One Monarchy is an ancient literary composition written in Sumerian that was likely created and redacted to legitimize the claims to power of various city-states and kingdoms in southern Mesopotamia during the late third and early second millennium BC.

The Liber Linteus Zagrabiensis (Latin for "Linen Book of Zagreb", also known rarely as Liber Agramensis, "Book of Agram") is the longest Etruscan text and the only extant linen book (libri lintei), dated to the 3rd century BC, making it arguably the oldest extant European book. (The second longest Etruscan text, Tabula Capuana, also seems to be a ritual calendar.) Much of it is untranslated because of the lack of knowledge about the Etruscan language, though the words and phrases which can be understood indicate that the text is most likely a ritual calendar.

The stories are written in Ugaritic, a Northwest Semitic language, and written in a cuneiform abjad.