Did you know Egyptians were more focused on their afterlife than anything else? Egypt was located in Northern Africa on the Nile River. The Old Kingdom began at about 2700 BC, while the New Kingdom ended around 1050 BC. Egypt is a very unique, complex civilization that has lasted for thousands of years.
The Egyptians thought the afterlife was a happy place where everyone was young and healthy. They also believed the pharaoh controlled the afterlife of everyone. The ka is the body’s life force that stays with the body in the tomb. In the afterlife, the ka needs food, water, and entertainment, so relatives brought them as offerings. On contrast, the ba is the personality spirit that goes to the afterlife and roams free for many years. You could only enter the afterlife if your heart weighed less than the feather of truth.
Because the afterlife was so important to Egyptians, they decided to mummify the bodies. Mummification was done to dry the body so it wouldn’t decay. If it did decay, the ka wouldn’t recognize it and along with the ka, the ba would die. In mummification, there are four main steps. First they removed all the organs except for the heart. They thought the heart was the center of life and you couldn’t live without it. They removed the organs by cutting the body open. Egyptians removed the brains by shoving a long hook up the nose, smashing the brain, and then they would pour out the brain mush through the nose. Second, Egyptians used natron to dry out the body. The natron was packed through the whole inside of the body. Next, they wrapped the body in a linen cloth. The final step was to put the body in a coffin/sarcophagus. Mummification was expensive and only wealthy could afford it. Poor could only afford to have the body buried in the desert where because it was so dry it preserved them on it’s own. Overall, Mummification took weeks.
In Egypt, pharaohs were considered “living gods” and they believed that the gods sent them...