What are the beliefs of ghosts in different cultures

This question will investigate the traditional belief of what a ghost is and the history of ghosts through the ages.
The traditional belief of what a ghost is is that it is a spirit or a soul of a person/animal that is deceased. They can appear in many different ways such as being invisible, wispy like shapes, translucent to being realistic. Some people purposely try to call the spirit of a dead person which, is known to be necromancy. Lots of people believe in this stuff which goes back over to Ancient Egypt times. Ghosts pretty much haunt a specific place or thing. There also are stories of ghosts trains, ships, animals and armies of ghosts.


Ghost stories date back over to Ancient Egypt times to now. Ancient Egyptians believed in ghosts and often recorded their beliefs on tomb paintings and scrolls.


There are biblical references to ghosts referring them to forbidden cult stuff. One example of this is that in the Book of Samael some guy disguised as King Saul makes some person called Witch of Endor summon, ghost/spirit of Samuel. Another example is Jesus has to persuade the Disciples that he is not some ghost person who, has been reserected from the dead. Certain versions of the bible used the word ghost, when Jesus' followers thought he was a ghost when he walked on water.

In Greece ghosts appeared in Homers poems Odyssey and the Iliad. In it they vanished like vapour. The ghosts didn't have much interaction with people. From time to time people called them to give prophecy or advice, people were not to scared of them. They appeared to be walking around with the injuries that killed them.


The Ancient Romans thought that they could use a ghost to take revenge of someone, by scratching pottery or lead and putting it into a grave. A account of a ghost then is a ghost that was Chained up. Once  the skeleton was given a proper burial the haunting s stopped.