Common Core Literacy Module
Title: The Pharaoh’s Life Preparing for the Afterlife
Author: Lissa Saunders
Grade Level: 6th grade
Teaching Task:
What did Pharaohs do during their reign to prepare for their afterlife as a god? After reading
selected readings, website activities, & internet interactive; students will write a List Poem that
describes items placed within the pyramids & addresses the question. Support your discussion with
evidence from the readings, game, & research. (Informational or Explanatory/ Description.
Essential Question:
How did the Pharaoh’s beliefs in their afterlife affect their lives, their reign, as well as their
burials?
Vocabulary Task:
Mix, match, freeze- with vocab cards created by students from the website readings on
mummification & pyramids.
Mini-Task:
1-2-3- Special- using readings to gather information.
Mini-Task:
Blow off the Roof- using information gathered from the knowledge gained during students’
research.
Mini-Task:
Photo Analysis- using a replication of Egyptian paintings have students investigate photo for
further info.
Mini-Task:
Summarization Pyramid- activity intended to get students thinking about all they have learned in
this unit.
Materials Needed:
King Tut notes (http://www.ancientegyptonline.co.uk/tutankhamun-tomb.html) scroll down to
decoration. Copy at end of document.
Burial/ Book of the Dead notes (http://www.crystalinks.com/bookofthedead.html) Copy at end of
document.
Mummification website (http://www.ancientegypt.co.uk/mummies/home.html)
Pyramid website
(http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/egyptians/launch_gms_pyramid_builder.shtml)
Day 1http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H7ukJSMlazc- Horrible Histories The Pharaoh Report.

King Tut notes: pass out notes on King Tututkumun’s discovered tomb. While students are
reading have students copy highlighted/ bolded words from reading on 3 x 5 cards. (words on ½
card & definition on other.)
Note: if students get reading from the computer they are able to click on vocab words &
definitions will pop-up. Or check for comprehension, by having students check website definition with
their own definitions for accuracy.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/egyptians/launch_gms_pyramid_builder.shtmlPyramid
website: after students complete reading/ writing activity have students complete this activity
to use the knowledge they have recently gained in order to play interactive game building a
pyramid for the Pharaoh.
Note: if student doesn’t complete game have them work at home to successfully build their
pyramid.

Possible homework activity: After student completes the interactive game have them write a
summary explaining what was necessary to build & complete the pyramid for their Pharaoh.
Day 2http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=cOKI_uh6AKw Horrible Histories Walk
Like an Eygtian.


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Mix- match- freeze with vocab from Tut’s burial notes.
Burial notes: pass out notes on The Funeral Scene & the Book of the Dead . While students are
reading have students use the 1-2-3-Special graphic organizer to gather important info.
http://www.ancientegypt.co.uk/mummies/home.html Mummification website: While students
are reading have students copy highlighted/ bolded words from reading on 3 x 5 cards. (words
on ½ card & definition on other.)
Note: if students get reading from the computer they are able to click on vocab words &
definitions will pop-up. Or check for comprehension, by having students check website definition with
their own definitions for accuracy.

Writing: Have students outline info gathered from reading from today & yesterday. If class has
previous knowledge have them work independently, but if not complete outline as class.
Day 3http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OipmPbe1ezs&feature=related Horrible Histories Egyptian Gods &
the Devourer.




Mix- match- freeze with vocab from yesterday.
Using photo from the Book of the Dead reading split photo up into sections & have students
complete a photo analysis looking for special items, spells, gods, etc. that are shown in the tomb
with the pharaoh.
Explain to students that they will be writing a list poem of things students would find in a
pharaoh’s tomb. Student’s poems can have as many items in their list as they would like. It
would be good for you to have a minimum number to items. Create a short class poem using
other knowledge they have learned from Eygpt; giving them knowledge about creating their
own poem tomorrow.
http://ettcweb.lr.k12.nj.us/forms/listpoem.htm (info about what a list poem is.)
Day 4
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Using the summarization pyramid have students begin to gather ideas for their own poems.
Give students time to rough their poems, edit for conventions, voice, & content.
Publish poems on computer, if time, have students illustrate paper with hieroglyphics of their
own.
Day 1
Decoration
Only the burial chamber in the tomb of Tutankhamen was decorated which is unusual because in
royal tombs almost all of the walls were generally painted with scenes from the Amduat (the
Book of the Dead). In this case, the burial chamber had a golden background and was decorated
with scenes from the Opening of the Mouth ritual and the Amduat (Book of the Dead), and with
depictions of Tutankhamun with various gods. There is, unsurprisingly, no reference to the Aten.
The apes of the first hour of the Amduat are depicted on the west wall. On the North wall
Tutankhamun appears before the goddess Nut and the royal ka embraces Osiris.
Further along the wall there is a depiction of Ay wearing the blue war crown of a pharaoh
(indicating that he became pharaoh shortly after the death of the young king) performing the
Opening of the Mouth ritual before the mummy of Tutankhamun.
On the east wall a spell from the Amduat (Book of the Dead) appears, along with a depiction of
the funeral procession of Tutankhamun. His mummy is drawn along on a sledge during the
funeral procession and he is followed by two of his viziers to the king and a third individual
thought by many to be Horemheb.
The decoration on the south wall depicts Tutankhamun with Anubis and Hathor and a further
scene depicting Tutankhamun being welcomed into the underworld by Hathor, Anubis and Isis.
The ceiling was decorated with a depiction of Nut with her wings spread to embrace the resting
place of the pharaoh.
Tomb Contents
The antechamber chamber of the tomb of Tutankhamun was described by Carter as being in a
state of "organized chaos", containing around seven hundred items including the components of
four chariots, a collapsible sunshade, a number of senet boards, four ritual couches, a gilded
wooden half-length bust of Tutankhamun wearing a flat crown and two near life-size wooden
figures that flanked the north wall in which the concealed entrance to the burial chamber was
located. One statue depicted Tutankhamun wearing the Nemes head cloth. The other represented
his ka wearing an Afnet headdress. Both have skin is coloured with black resin (symbolizing
regeneration) and hold a staff and mace. Their clothing and jewellery are gilded with gold and
their sandals and uraei are made of gilded bronze. It is thought that after the first tomb robberies
some of the goods originally stored here were moved to KV 54.
The burial chamber contained a series of gilded wooden shrines which almost entirely filled the
room. Squeezed in beside the shrines Carter found eleven paddles for a solar boat, containers for
perfumed oils and lamps decorated images of the God Hapi. The annex leading from the burial
chamber was used to store perfumed oils and ointments along with food and wine.
The outer sarcophagus was made from two slightly different colored blocks of granite. It seems
that the lid did not originally match the body of the sarcophagus, perhaps being intended for the
burial of a different pharaoh. At each corner one of Isis, Nephthys, Serqet (Serket) and Neith
protect the body of the king. Inside the sarcophagus a further three mummiform sarcophagi
enclose the body of Tutankhamun, the innermost is composed of 110.4 kg of pure gold. Inside
the last sarcophagus the mummy lay, wearing the funeral mask made of gold lapis lazuli,
carnelian, quartz, obsidian, turquoise and glass which is arguably one of the most famous pieces
of Egyptian art.
Inscriptions on a few of the treasures discovered in the tomb of Tutankhamun had clearly been
altered for the burial. It is unclear in some cases whether the inscriptions were altered to reflect
the change in his name from Tutankhaten to Tutankhamun, or whether they were in fact recycled
form the burials of earlier pharaohs (a practice which was no uncommon). However, in some
cases (such as that of the middle coffin and the canopic cofinettes) the facial features differ
noticeable from other images of Tutankhamun and clearly depict an older man with more angular
features. It is generally agreed that these items initially belonged to Smenkhare. It is often
proposed that Smenkhare was the brother or father of Tutankhamun, but the strange condition in
which the mummy in KV55 (who some believe to be Smenkhare) does raise the question of
when these goods were appropriated for Tutankhamun and whether the person in charge of
Tutankhamun's burial (most likely Ay) was also responsible for the damage done to the mummy
in KV 55.
Many of the objects in the treasury were originally discovered by Carter but were not opened or
removed from the tomb. In 2007 further exploration of this chamber recorded that it contained
eight baskets of fruit from the Doum Palm (also known as the gingerbread tree or thebaica). This
tree was originally native to the Nile valley and was traditionally offered at funerals.
Archaeologists also discovered fifty clay pots marked with Tutankhamun's official seal which
may have contained money for the pharaoh to use in the afterlife. These have not yet been
opened.
One of the jars recovered from his tomb still had the remnants of a
perfumed oil within it. The perfumed ointment found in the tomb
of Tutankhamun was a combination of pure coconut oil with
spikenard and frankincense.
Our sister site Kemet Design offers an authentic copy of the
Perfume Oil of Tutankhamun which is truly divine!
The mummy of Tutankhamun still rests in his tomb within a
temperature-controlled glass case. In November 2007 the face of
Tutankhamun was revealed when his mummy was removed from
its golden sarcophagus for display in a climate-controlled glass box
(to prevent decomposition as a result of the humidity and heat
generated by tourists).
Day 2
The Funerary Scene
Arriving at one's reward in afterlife was a demanding ordeal, requiring a sin-free heart and the
ability to recite the spells, passwords, and formulae of the Book of the Dead.
The tomb-owner would continue after death the occupations of this life and so everything
required was packed in the tomb along with the body. Writing materials were often supplied
along with clothing, wigs, and hairdressing supplies and assorted tools, depending on the
occupation of the deceased.
Often model tools rather than full size ones would be placed in the tomb; models were cheaper
and took up less space and in the after-life would be magically transformed into the real thing.
Things might include a headrest, glass vessels which may have contained perfume and a slate
palette for grinding make-up.
Food was provided for the deceased and should the expected regular offerings of the descendants
cease, food depicted on the walls of the tomb would be magically transformed to supply the
needs of the dead.
Images on tombs might include a triangular shaped piece of bread (part of the food offerings
from a tomb). Other images might represent food items that the tomb owner would have eaten in
his lifetime and hoped to eat in the after-life.
Life was dominated by Ma'at, or the concept of justice and order. Egyptians believed there were
different levels of goodness and evil. Egyptians believed that part of the personality, called the
Ka, remained in the tomb. Thus elaborate and complex burial practices developed.
Book of the Dead
The Book of the Dead is the modern name of an ancient Egyptian funerary text, used from the
beginning of the New Kingdom (around 1550 BC) to around 50 BC. The original Egyptian name
for the text, transliterated rw nw prt m hrw is translated as "Book of Coming Forth by Day".
Another translation would be "Book of emerging forth into the Light". The text consists of a
number of magic spells intended to assist a dead person's journey through the Duat, or
underworld, and into the afterlife. The Book of the Dead was part of a tradition of funerary texts
which includes the earlier Pyramid Texts and Coffin Texts, which were painted onto objects, not
papyrus. Some of the spells included were drawn from these older works and date to the 3rd
millennium BC.
Other spells were composed later in Egyptian history, dating to the Third Intermediate Period
(11th to 7th centuries BC). A number of the spells which made up the Book continued to be
inscribed on tomb walls and sarcophagi, as had always been the spells from which they
originated. The Book of the Dead was placed in the coffin or burial chamber of the deceased.
There was no single or canonical Book of the Dead. The surviving papyri contain a varying
selection of religious and magical texts and vary considerably in their illustration. Some people
seem to have commissioned their own copies of the Book of the Dead, perhaps choosing the
spells they thought most vital in their own progression to the afterlife. The Book of the Dead was
most commonly written in hieroglyphic or hieratic script on a papyrus scroll, and often
illustrated with vignettes depicting the deceased and their journey into the afterlife.
The spells in the Book of the Dead depict Egyptian beliefs about the nature of death and the
afterlife. The Book of the Dead is a vital source of information about Egyptian beliefs in this
area.