1. Early Egypt and Three Kingdoms

2. Unification of Two Lands
Ancient Egypt had two parts called Upper Egypt and Lower Egypt . Upper Egypt was in the south, stretched for more than five hundred miles from the first cataract to the north to the beginning of the Nile delta. Lower Egypt, which was in the north, was the Nile delta itself. Though it was only a hundred miles long Lower Egypt is many times wider than Upper Egypt.
By about 3300 B.C., both Upper Egypt and Lower Egypt had kings. The king of Lower Egypt wore a short, boxy looking, red crown with a tall spike at the back and a curlicue at the front. The king of Upper Egypt wore something quite different: he wore a tall, white, pear shaped crown.

4. Ancient sources say Menes was the unifier of Egypt
Ancient sources say Menes was the unifier of Egypt. Menes is one of the archaic Egyptian kings bearing the name Scorpion. Some sources say he was the son of Narmer, while others say he was Narmer. There is no tangible proof either way. At around 3100 B.C., King Menes defeated the king of Lower Egypt. After this he united both lands and called himself king of both Upper Egypt and Lower Egypt.
To celebrate his victory and to show the unity of the two lands, Menes combined the two crowns into one unified crown.

6. Three Kingdoms of Egypt
Archaeologists divide ancient Egypt's history into three big blocks of time. In each block of time, all pharaohs behaved in a certain way. These blocks of time were called kingdoms. Scientists named these blocks the Old Kingdom, the Middle Kingdom, and the New Kingdom.

8. The Old Period
During the time of the Old Kingdom, pharaohs were buried in pyramids. It was time consuming to build a pyramid. It was expensive to build a pyramid. It was hard to hide a pyramid. Grave robbers would target pyramids to try and steal the pharaoh’s grave goods, or items buried with him.
Pyramids turned out to be a great deal of trouble and expense. Pyramids went out of style.

10. The Middle Period
During the time of the Middle Kingdom, pharaohs were buried in hidden tombs all over the place. The Egyptian tomb builders did a wonderful job hiding the tombs. Archaeologist know what pharaohs ruled during this time period. The ancient Egyptians believed if you didn't have your name written down somewhere, you would disappear from your afterlife. Everybody wanted to enjoy their afterlife, so Pharaohs' had their name written down and chiseled everywhere. But, archaeologists still have not found all the tombs.

12. The New Period
During the time of the New Kingdom, pharaohs were all buried in hidden tombs in the same geographical area. Archaeologists call this area the Valley of the Kings. This was a compromise for the ancient Egyptians. It was during this time period in history that Egypt became a world power in the ancient world.