Mummification

• Museum "Rooms" - Every student in the group must create a Museum Room which should feature a specific invention or innovation for the team's civilization.  Rooms  should contain between 300 and 400 words of text, use in text citations or reference phrases as needed. (According to..., As found in...) and should present ALL of the following information:

  • • Background information on why this invention or innovation was needed by this civilization

    • How was the invention made?

    • What impact did the invention have on this civilization?

    • What (if any) impact did the invention have on later civilizations?

    • What else made this invention so historically important?

    • At least two images relating to the invention and/or information on the page with identification numbers and captions explaining the images.  

    • 3 to 5 links to other websites with related information and why a visitor might find them interesting

Ancient Egypt has been around since 3100 B.C.E. The Egyptians have invented many things such as the calendar, pyramids, and papyrus paper. One of the most important inventions by the Ancient Egyptians was Mummification. Mummification was a form of ritual done to a body after death. This was invented in 2700 B.C.E. and continued to be a trending thing amongst the wealthy until the 4th or 7th century AD.

Mummification was a multi-step process, with its origins being created when the body had gone through natural dehydration in the desert sand.

With the more modern version of mummification, though, it is a multi-step process. The process went as follows;

First, the body was ritually cleaned and certain organs were removed, with the brain pulled out through the nose and the internal organs (except the heart) taken out through an incision. Second, the body was dried by covering it in a salt called natron for about 40 to 70 days. Third, the body was cleaned again, stuffed with materials to give it shape, treated with oils and resins, and then wrapped in layers of linen bandages, often with amulets placed in the wrappings. Finally, the completed mummy was placed in coffins and often a stone sarcophagus.

Major impacts mummification had on Ancient Egypt were most very religious, with mummification as a whole was used to better understand the consensus of the body and soul after death. Another major impact mummification had on Ancient Egypt was the basic idea of medical practice. Most advancements Ancient Egyptians (specifically embalmers) had in the medical field was the basic idea of having clean tools and workspace, and being atleast some-what properly covered to not catch any types of illness.

Mummification as a whole had impacted two major civilizations, Both civilizations being the Aztec empire, and the Inca empire.

Mummification was very centralized to the Inca, as mummification was used to preserve the bodies of deceased emperors. As for the Aztecs, though mummification wasn’t as common or practiced, they used the cremated remains or sacred objects in rituals.

What had made mummification so historically important was its central beliefs of the afterlife. As they thought the deceased souls could recognize their body and use it as a vessel into the afterlife.