Made in Egypt: Mummies

Today we explored the ancient Egyptian art of mummifying. We started our study with a reading of Aliki's Mummies Made in Egypt, a thorough introduction to the process of embalming a body and the Ancient Egyptian beliefs on the afterlife, and then, we made our own mummies.

**WARNING**
The following images may be disturbing
to Disney Princess fanatics

We prepared our princesses for embalming, following the steps concisely presented in one of Ryan's favorite books, Mummies and Pyramids, a Magic Tree House Research Guide. First, all of the organs except the heart were removed from the body. (See the remaining hearts in the photo below). The Egyptians believed that the gods weighed a person's heart when he or she tried to enter the Next Life.

Our Egyptian Princesses: Tinkerbell & Belle
(purchased for $1.00 @ at a local thrift shop)

Next, we washed the bodies with wine (white wine vinegar diluted with water) and rubbed them with oils and spices (olive oil and cinnamon). Then we covered the bodies with natron (sea salt), a type of salt the Egyptian priests used to dry the bodies before wrapping them with muslin.

Washing the body with wine & Rubbing it with oil & spices.

After this, the bodies would have been left to dry for about 40 days, we waited closer to 40 minutes. While we waited, the boys created amulets to be wrapped within the mummies' linen strips to bring good luck and protection to them in the Next Life. Ryan worked diligently to copy the amulets pictured in Aliki's book and was determined to wrap every amulet he created within the folds of his mummy's muslin.

Amulets or magic charms wrapped in the linen strips.

At last it was time to begin wrapping the bodies. (We did wash our dolls before wrapping, although the Egyptians would not have). We used a yard of muslin torn into 1-inch wide strips dipped into a mixture of 1 part flour, three parts water to wrap our two mummies. The Egyptians would have coated the muslin wrappings with resin.

NOTE: I would recommend having approximately 3/4 of a yard to a yard of material per mummy; Connor's mummy could have used a bit more wrapping. As she is, she retains a bit of her voluptuous figure.

Princess Tinkerbell & Princess Belle - mummified.

The boys are quite pleased with their finished mummies - now drying on a cooling rack in the kitchen. And this evening, Connor excitedly reported to Grandma, "Gamma, we made mommies today!" to which Ryan added, "Yes, we made mommies out of Bobbies!"