Archaeologists announced Sunday that they have discovered an
ancient sun temple containing large statues of the pharaoh Ramses II under an
outdoor marketplace in Cairo, Egypt.
The temple was found in a suburb of Cairo called Ain Shams. The
site was once part of the ancient city of Heliopolis, which served as the center
of sun worship in ancient Egypt. The chief sun god, Re, was the patron sun god
of Heliopolis.
Ramses II, who is believed to have ruled Egypt from around 1279 to
1213 B.C., is known for his military exploits and monumental building projects.
To celebrate his victories, he erected statues and temples to himself all over
Egypt.
"The area where we are excavating now is where Ramses II of the
19th dynasty [1320 to 1200 B.C.] built an enormous temple for Re, the largest
temple of Ramses II ever found," said Zahi Hawass, head of Egypt's Supreme
Council of Antiquities in Cairo.
Hawass is also a National Geographic Society explorer-in-residence.
An Egyptian team has been cooperating with a team from the German
Archaeological Institute on the excavations in the Ain Shams and Matariya
neighborhoods of Cairo.
Egyptologists not involved with the discovery said it confirms
suspicions that much of ancient Egypt has been buried under modern cities and
still remains to be found.
Pink Granite Statue
The temple was built of limestone, and the archaeologists have
uncovered the remains of one pillar bearing inscriptions of Ramses II.
The researchers are currently excavating the entrance area and the
west side of the temple site.
They have found chambers for the storage of wheat, a kiln for
making amulets, part of a large statue—the head of which weighs 5 tons (4.5
metric tons) and would have stood almost 20 feet (6 meters) tall—and another
head of granite, weighing 2 tons (1.8 metric tons).
"Perhaps the most exciting [find] is an unusual seated statue that
shows Ramses II in the leopard skin of a priest, showing that he built this
temple as the high priest of Re," Hawass said.
"This statue is in the style of
dynasty 12 [1991 to 1786 B.C.] and may have been usurped by Ramses II," he
added, meaning that it may have been altered to resemble Ramses II.
"This is an important discovery,
giving us information about the cult of Re."
Ramses II, who made a name for
himself by battling the Hittites and the Syrians, is traditionally believed to
have been the Pharaoh of Exodus, the biblical figure from whom Moses demanded
that his people be released.
Ramses II erected monuments to
himself up and down the Nile with records of his achievements. His most famous
temple is Abu Simbel, which was carved into a sandstone mountain on the banks of
the Nile, near what is now Egypt's southern border.
Heliopolis
Numerous temples to Egypt's many
sun gods—particularly the chief god Re—were also built in ancient Heliopolis.
"This was the center for the
worship of the sun god Re," Hawass said.
"A number of important remains
have been discovered here, and there is evidence that this cult went back at
least to the Old Kingdom [from about 2700 to 2200 B.C.] if not before and was
active to the end of Egyptian history."
The German excavations show that
lakes or swamps dominated the area in ancient times.
Most of the temples of ancient
Heliopolis were later plundered, and the area is now covered with residential
buildings.
The discovery of the sun temple
may shed light on the status of Heliopolis in ancient Egypt.
"We do not know enough about
Heliopolis, which was one of the main cities in Egypt and moreover a religious
and, let us say, intellectual center," said French archaeologist Alain Zivie,
leader of a team that has been excavating Saqqara, the cemetery of the ancient
Egyptian city of Memphis, for more than two decades.
Zivie says the discovery also
shows that much of ancient Egypt's treasures are still buried under modern
cities, particularly Cairo and its suburbs.
"Cairo is the child of three
cities: Memphis, [the Roman fortress of] Babylon of Egypt, and Heliopolis,"
Zivie said. "Expanding more and more, it swallows now its three mothers,
especially Babylon and Heliopolis. But these [ancient cities] are not completely
lost. They continue to exist in the underground Cairo."
Leo Depuydt, an Egyptologist at
Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, agrees.
"The recent find of a giant temple
built by Ramses II, ancient Egypt's greatest builder pharaoh, in Cairo again
reminds us of how archaeological discovery would increase exponentially—almost
beyond imagination—if digging under urban centers and dismantling buildings of
later date ever becomes, technically and politically, even more feasible," he
said.
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The
3,300-year-old Amarna Princess was bought by Bolton Museum nearly three
years ago for £440,000 to add to its existing Egyptology collection.
Last
week, the team discovered six similar black granite statues depicting
Sekhmet seated on a throne and holding the "key of life" in her left
hand. Two of those statues were broken, with only the lower parts found.
