This lesson begins by asking students to develop a list of characteristics for effective leaders. Students then consider if leaders are leaders because of what they do or because of who they are. Historically, people often had leadership positions because of the families that they were born into and not because of their own skills. Students then consider the appropriateness of limiting historical analysis to the leaders of a civilization, instead of to commoners as well. Given the limitations of resources available to historians, students then consider the role that leaders fill as representatives of their civilization. Next, students consider pharaohs and Hammurabi as specific representatives of their civilizations and the emphasis that Hammurabi placed on moral behavior, as demonstrated through his code. Finally, since historians have analyzed the pyramids of ancient pharaohs to learn about ancient Egypt students are asked to identify five objects that they would place in a pyramid built today to reveal information about our society to people in the year 3000.