The Egyptian Museum

The Egyptian Museum is one of the most important establishments in all of Egypt, as it contains some of the most culturally and historically significant pharaonic artifacts. With over 120,000 items in its collection, it really does bring the history of the ancient Egyptians back to life.

Located in Cairo, Tahrir Square, it was built in 1901 by the Italian company of Giuseppe Garozzo and Francesco Zaffrani but designed by the French architect Marcel Dourgnon, and it is the largest museum in all of Africa as of writing this.

Ground floor :

The museum is comprised of two main floors. The first one is the ground floor, which contains the bigger artifacts like statues made of stone, and artifacts from the New Kingdom (1069 – 1050 BC) which include :

• Statues
• Tables
• Coffins

With many rooms (42) displaying everything from boats to statues to sarcophagi, you will definitely be blown away by the amount of impressive and imposing artifacts.

First floor :

The first floor houses the smaller artifacts like authentic papyrus, coins, textiles, and a bunch of wooden sarcophagi. The papyri, while they small fragments thanks to their aging throughout the past few thousand years, they give you a glimpse into the era they originated from, where you will find many languages to be inscribed into them, such as :

• Latin
• Arabic
• Ancient Egyptian
• Greek

The coins also come from different backgrounds, with some being Islamic, Greek, and ancient Egyptian, which helped researchers and historians find out more about the trades that have happened in Egypt back then.

On the first floor there are also some artifacts belonging to the last two dynasties of ancient Egypt, such as the contents that were found inside the tombs of many pharaohs, as well as a plethora of artifacts from the Valley of Kings, namely the contents found within King Tutankhamun’s tomb.

King Tutankhamun’s mask :

The place is famous for many things but it is perhaps most well known for housing King Tutankhamun’s legendary golden funerary mask, which is widely considered to be one of the best works of art in the world for its pristine craftsmanship. After being buried for over 3 millennia, it was discovered by Howard Carter in 1925 in the Valley of Kings.

Designed to resemble the god of the after life Osiris, it is 54 centimeters, and weighs in at about 10 kilograms, made of semi precious stones, and with ancient spells from the Egyptians’ “book of the dead” inscribed on each shoulder. Such elite attention to detail has made this piece of art from ancient history to be one of Egypt’s most famous items ever.

Thanks for reading and I hope you have a wonderful time uncovering the secrets of the Ancient Pharaohs!