Ancient Egyptians believed that in order to become immortal after death, a spirit must first pass through the underworld — a realm of vast caverns, lakes of fire, and magical gates. Needless to say, one needed to come prepared. But how? Tejal Gala describes an Egyptian "Book of the Dead" -- a customized magic scroll written by the living to promote a smooth passage to the afterlife when they died.
.
Explain:
What is the Book of the Dead for?
What must the dead pass before they can reach the afterlife?
Mummification
was done to preserve the body because the soul and the ka meet and
live again. The practice started in the pre dynastic period with the
change from simple desert burials, which preserved the body
naturally, to burial in coffins. Although the coffins protected the
bodies from the attacks of animals they encouraged decomposition.
Then the Egyptians developed a technique to maintain the bodies. The
essential steps in mummification were removing the viscera,
dehydrating the body with natron, treating it with resin,
wrapping them in strips of linen, or bandages, and finally
decorating it. The ceremonial aspects were considered crucial,
and the procedure took about seventy days. Today we call this
process mummification
TASK:
• What
was the purpose of natron?
• About
how many days did the process of natron take?
• Why
do you think they preserved some organs?
• Why
was the brain discarded?
• What
did they wrap the body with?
• How
did Egyptians mourn the dead?
• What
was mummification for? Highlight the correct answer.
a)
For the after life. Egyptians believed in a second life.
b)
Because they liked it.
c)
Because they wanted to preserve the body.
• What
was natron for?
a)
For cooking. It is very useful.
b)
Mineral salts, very useful for mummification.
c)
To throw it into the water.
• What
was ka?
a)
Ka was a fly.
b)
Ka was the spiritual part of the body.
c)
Ka was the soul of the Pharaoh
• Now
describe the process of mummification. There are five main steps.
a)
First of all they removed the viscera.
b)
c)
d)
• How
long did all the process take?
• What
kind of burial do you think the farmers had?
• Link
the sentences from the column A to column B A B
1
How many days was the body covered with salt? a-The heart.
2
Which organ was not removed? b-A salt used to dry the body.
3
What bandages did the Egyptians use? c-Palm wine.
4
What is natron? d-The mummy organs’ jars.
5
What were the canopic jars? e-Linen strips.
6
What wine was used to clean the body? f-35/40 days
• Which
step to step comes in the sequence before to burial?