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Theme Pages For centuries, man has marvelled at the mystery and majesty of the ancient civilization of Egypt. Men have lost their lives attempting to uncover its lost treasures. This page is committed to capturing the spirit of that adventure and to giving tips on how to create your own treasure hunts within the theme of this spectacular culture. Click the picture to download
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Articles |
A Mummy's Tomb - Theme Your Haunted House |
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| Using Heiroglyphs in Your Treasure Hunts | ||
| The Curse of the Mummy | ||
| A Treasure of a Fundraiser - incorporating a themed treasure hunt for a fundraising event | ||
| Puzzles | Indiana Jones and the Gold Bust of Ramses II | |
| Ancient Egypt Word Search | ||
| Links | Discovering Egypt - All about Egypt, pyramids, temple reconstructions and the pharaohs. Free screen savers and hieroglyphics - you can write your name in the ancient script and the Ancient Egyptian Print Studio enables you to create your own Egyptian themed cards, calendars, notepapers, hieroglyphic cards, etc. | |
| Bostany.com - Flowers and Gifts to Egypt - Quality flowers and gifts delivered next-day to any Egyptian City. | ||
| Nilemaid Egyptian Gift Shop | ||
| Beloved Egypt. Photos of Egypt, Spiritual Egypt Tours, FREE Hieroglyphic Shirt Contest and writings about Egypt. | ||
| www.e-tutankhamun.com - An incredible resource for those looking for authentic Egyptian objects! | ||
| Local Links from Egypt | ||
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| The
Mummy's Tomb
(An exerpt from The Mummy section of The Halloween Vault) Over the years, Halloween has created in itself a vast library of images and frights that have for the most part, turned into near cliches. Of course, these cliches are still a lot of fun. After all, what would Halloween be without spider webs, haunted graveyards and an occasional headless man? However, for those that pursue new creative avenues during this holiday season, it can be very difficult to do 'what no one's seen before.' As a new twist this Halloween, I suggest that you specialize. Pick a single theme and explore it to its full potential. The following portion of ideas detail some examples of how to focus your Halloween frights (whether in a Haunted House or for a Halloween Party) on the theme of The Mummy. · Create the entrance to a large Egyptian tomb for your guests to enter through (either the entire experience is within the tomb, or the tomb only being a smaller part of a larger Haunted House). · Temple walls can be constructed from cardboard boxes, stacked like large bricks. Spray a strong fixative on the boxes and sprinkle sand onto the surfaces, creating a rough, sandstone-like texture. For painting, find two distinct shades of tan spray paint and one dark brown. Cover the walls with the slightly darker shade of tan first. With a razor blade, SLIGHTLY score the spray can opening - enlarging it. This will create a slight sputter or spitting of paint as it is applied. Do not cover the walls completely with the sputtering, use it only to add depth. Finally, with the dark brown can, score a little more heavily the opening as you did with the lighter tan. VERY sparingly, allow a couple sputters to hit the wall. The finished effect looks great. Fast, cheap and looks great (the three best qualities for haunted house designers). · Spider webbing can be generously strewn throughout the tomb. A tip on the application, though. First off, know where ahead of time you'd like to put your spider webbing. In order to achieve that thin, splayed webbing affect (where it is not all scrunched up in clumps as it so likes to do) you'll need to hammer very small nails (where possible) strategically throughout the desired area, allowing for places to 'snag' the webbing. · Gold coffin (or gold walls, if needed). Spray paint the box structure (or wooden or whatever material you've chosen to make it) with a standard HIGH GLOSS finish gold spray paint (not matte finish). Using some art history books as guides, draw cartouche images on the sides using a fine tipped, black permanent marker. Now, the marker will not be dark enough atop the gold spray paint &you'll need to go back over it with some black acrylic paint. Some color was used by the Egyptians, notably white, turquoise and an earthy brick red. Reflect these colors in touch up details on the sides of the coffins. · Curtailing the above, inscriptions on walls can be done in a similar fashion. For the sake of time and appearance, try to get your hands on an overhead projector (ask your local school teacher, they can often get access to these freely - or those who often make presentations at their work). Make a transparency of the image you wish to display on the wall (or a book if you can find an Opay (spelling?) projector.
· Build a table from stacked boxes. Cut a hole in the top of the table the size for a grown person's torso. Place a sandy, linen cloth over the table (with a hole of the same size and position as the table). The live actor will sit in the table with their chest, head and arms poking out of the top hole you cut. He/she is to be dressed as the top half of the mummy, lying motionless on the table. Make a fake 'bottom half' of the mummy, placed disjointed to the torso. The effect the guest will experience will be seeing a mummy broken in two at the waist, lying on a stone table/altar (see below for ideas on creating stone surfaces on cardboard boxes). They will be quite shocked when the mummy reaches out for them! · Mummies look great coming out of walls - especially in very narrow passageways. · Allow a live-action mummy to not move until after the guest(s) have already passed. The mummy would follow them from behind, ready to make an easy scare. Done once in the beginning, the guests will constantly be looking over their shoulders for future surprises. · A great way to make mummy wrapping is to use tea stained cheese cloth (what cooks use - especially on turkeys and large foul). Have fun playing with it &it won't take you long how to figure out how to wrap it. (A note about wrapping, make sure that the strips are NOT all in uniform length or width &remember, these mummies have been around for centuries and the wrappings have all be disintegrated!) · Locate your local carnival supply company (the Oriental Trading Co. is who I've always used. Check out their website for ordering online) for purchasing small plastic spiders and snakes. These look great coming out of the mummies. Preferably, have the exiting one of the nine holes of the body (I'll let you do the counting &) The eyes and mouth are perhaps the most popular. The reason why I mention companies such as Oriental Trading is the fact that they have great rates for larger quantity purchases. For instance, you could buy a bag of 100 spiders for what you might spend on 20 at a retail toy store. Plus, you'll find the selection noteworthy.
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| Using
Hieroglyphs in Your Treasure Hunts
What adventure has been romanticized more than the mysterious unveiling of an undisturbed, Egyptian tomb? These kinds of hunts are an absolute blast to plan - a chance to let your creative spirit run a muck! Wouldn't it be great if we were all fluent in the ancient glyphs (writing) of Egypt? I dare say that probably none of us are Egyptologists - but that doesn't mean that you can't include that beautiful writing in your treasure hunts. The first point I'd like to make is a very positive one... that is that probably none of your participants will be able to read a lick of the writing either...which also means that they would never know if you faked the whole thing. Now don't get me wrong, having a degree in Art History, the purist in me would like to imagine spending countless hours designing historically accurate documents for my participants to translate...however, reality sets in and I am forced to return to 'faking it' mode... The following are some ideas to incorporate Egyptian Hierogliphic writing into your hunts: * First off, there ARE some Egyptian Translator links on the internet. However, I've only found two (so far) that are still active links. http://www.egyptvoyager.com/hieroglyph_translator.htm - This translator will take any 10 letter English word and translate it phonetically letter for letter (as well as it can be translated) into Egyptian hieroglyphic writing. Although the phonetic representation is there, it doesn't coordinate the slightest in meaning. http://www.virtual-egypt.com/newhtml/glyph/glyph.html - This translator will take any name and translate it according to the principles above. The only difference is that it can take more than 10 characters. This one also prints it vertically in a cartouche. * Since probably you aren't going to be going
for the 'historically accurate' route anyway...I would suggest
downloading some Egyptian fonts for Windows. This way you can
play around with what characters look the best. http://personalwebs.myriad.net/steveb/egypt.html * Something to remember is that the Egyptian scribes wrote BOTH from left to right and from right to left. Additionally, they often wrote from top to bottom. * If you really want to make something look great... and is cheap - try this: Once I made a large Egyptian coffin. I took a large, long moving box and spray painted it gold. With a pencil I drew different glyphs and figures and then, with black acrylic paint (poster paint would probably work just fine as well...I just had the acrylic paint handy...) paint on the pencil lines with a thin paint brush. Don't try using a black permanent marker...tried that and it didn't work. Then, with other colored paints (ocre, mud red, turquoise and white) paint different aspects of any figures or images you drew. It took some time...but it looked very impressive! * If you need to do a lot, check out a rubber stamp store. I bought a 5x5 inch square rubber stamp of Egyptian hieroglyphic writing. It works with any standard ink pad and works pretty well (as long as you press evenly.... sometimes easier said than done.) These stamps also work great in clay. Bake the clay once it's stamped to make it hard and you could have a great looking Egyptian stele. If you are lucky, find someone who does ceramics...they could fire the ceramic clay in the kiln. That produces fantastic results! |
| The
Curse of the Mummy
"The most dire punishment follows any rash intruder into a sealed tomb." Marie Corelli, novelist A remark made just two weeks before the death of Lord Carnarvon, the excavation coordinator to the Tutankhamun site "...all sane people should dismiss such inventions
with contempt." In 1323 BC, the enigmatic life of Tutankhamun,
the young Egyptian ruler, came to an early end. Although much evidence
leads us to believe he was murdered, the actual cause of his death
to this day has yet to be scientifically confirmed. * At the precise moment of Carnarvon's death, it was said the lights of Cairo went out, while at the same time in England, Carnarvon's three legged terrier, Susie, howled and dropped dead. * Carnarvon's younger brother, Aubrey Herbert, died suddenly in September of 1923 (only months later). * On February 16, 1923, the day the tomb was opened, Carter's pet canary was swallowed by a cobra. * Carter's secretary. Richard Bethell, died in unusual circumstances at the Bath Club in 1929 * Bethell's father, Lord Westbury, who had never seen the tomb but possessed a small collection of Egyptian antiquities, committed suicide a short time later. (An eight year old girl was accidentally killed by Lord Westbury's hearse.) * An X-ray specialist passed away unexpectedly while en route to Egypt to examine the King's mummy. * Georges Benedite, a French Egyptologist, died as the result of a fall after seeing the tomb. * The American Railroad Magnate, Jay Gould, died of pheumonia (the result of a cold contracted during a visit to the tomb) * Arthur Mace, Carter's right-hand man, suffered a breakdown of health and died before the tomb had been fully cleared. * Ali Kemel Bey, an Egyptian, was shot by his wife in the London Savoy some time after viewing the discovery. |
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A
Treasure of a Fundraiser Throughout the 15+ years of designing themed treasure hunts professionally, some of the most successful and exciting events planned were for fundraising efforts. With low overhead costs and the ability to generate a lot of excitement for a fresh, new type of event, themed adventures are proving to be more and more successful in raising money for private and public organizations, large and small. There are a number of different creative and exciting ways to raise money by planning a themed treasure hunt. This article will attempt to 'whet your appetite' as to the numerous ways funds can be raised and excitement generated for your next fundraising event. The hunt
itself can vary greatly in both size and budget. Some hunts I've
produced have been for crowds in the hundreds paying small entrant
fees - all attempting to be the first to complete the hunt for
a prize donated by a local merchant. Others have been considerably
more sophisticated, as in the case of a California Department
of Mental Health function held a few years ago. Bids were sold
to a more affluent crowd and a Quest for the Holy Grail adventure
was held on the grounds of a very large and wealthy estate. (For
more information on the Quest for the Holy Grail adventure, click
here) The flexibility exists to ensure that every group fundraiser
can be successful, no matter the size, age or affluence of the The following is a collection of ideas to show the various and numerous ways to raise money easily and creatively by planning a fantastic themed treasure hunt adventure & · Begin by planning on selling tickets to participate in the event. The adventure itself will be worth the price of the ticket, by following the step-by-step instructions of planning this kind of themed adventure. Ticket prices can vary depending on the demographics of your participants. For example, if your are planning an event involving high school aged students, you'd probably fair better at selling hundreds of tickets at a cheaper price. However, if you were planning an event for a more mature and sophisticated crowd, you might want sell tickets at a much higher price, making available only a set number of tickets for purchase to ensure higher odds at winning the grand prize for the participants (especially if a prize is given for the winning team.) · Great prizes can be offered. Many groups have been very successful at arranging for prizes to be donated by local merchants. Sometimes a large prize was donated, such as a television set. At other times, a small basket of several smaller gifts has been offered from donating merchants ($15 gift certificates, etc.) Prizes can also come in the form of services provided by the organization planning the adventure. For example, a prom committee raising funds for their dance could give out free Prom bids to the first five finishing teams. Another idea for a prize is to have the top placing teams being refunded their entry fee - or even getting a percentage of the total proceeds taken in by the event. ·
Here are a few tricks to get prizes donated · As a way to enhance your theme, find out if a local costume shop will donate one or some of the needed costumes · Curtailing the above, if there are any other props or set pieces that would enhance your theme, find out if there are any vendors who would donate them in exchange for a form of advertising · Capitalize on your theme. Is your theme based on Pirates of the Caribbean? Why not have a small pirate port themed area at the beginning/end of the hunt and sell spaces to vendors where themed items and food can be sold? The same would work for a mini Renaissance Faire or an Egyptian marketplace. Depending on your theme, you could really plan a spectacular bazaar that could rival the hunt itself for excitement! · Print up a mini story or background piece about the theme and storyline of your adventure treasure hunt and distribute them to the participants before they begin. It will generate a lot of enthusiasm when your participants get consumed with the story. · Once the event is proven as a success, it could easily be turned into an annual event, as it did with several of my clients. Teams from the year before often reassembled in later hunts to try once more to win the prize. A continuing plaque or trophy could be displayed with the current and all past year's winners. Perhaps the greatest part about planning a themed treasure hunt adventure for your next fundraiser, besides all the excitement it will generate, is the fact that it has a potentially very high chance of having very little overhead costs. Aside from some photocopies and footwork, few other expenses need to be expended - now that is music to a fundraiser's ears! Plan something new and exciting that everyone will remember in future years! Plan a treasure of a fundraiser!
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to Egypt Port Egypt themed party ideas. Egypt party, Egypt parties - games and treasure hunts. Tons of Egyptian themed party ideas. King Tut, Pharoahs, Pyramids, tombs, it's all here. Have fun at your next Egyptian themed party. |