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Name : The Younger Memnon
What it is : A rugged statue depicting the Egyptian pharaoh Ramesses II ( also spell out Ramses II )
The Younger Memnon statue of Ramesses II is on display in The British Museum in London.
Where it is from : Ancient Thebes , Egypt
When it was made : About 3,300 years ago
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What it tells us about the past : The " Younger Memnon " is an 8.8 - animal foot - tall ( 2.7 meter ) broken read/write head and torso remainder of a statue fromancient Egyptthat now stand up in the British Museum in London .
It was made in the former 13th century B.C. and depicts the pharaoh Ramesses II , also called Ramesses the Great , who ruled from 1279 until 1213 B.C. The statue has traces of red , indicating that the granite cutting may have been painted in ancient time , according toThe British Museum .
Ramesses II was one of the most powerful pharaohs of Egypt ’s New Kingdom ( circa 1550 to 1070 B.C. ) , which saw a resurgence in Egyptian traditions after a menstruum of strange supremacy .
He may have also been the manakin for the unnamed pharaoh in the Bible’sExoduswho is said to have enslave and pursue the Israelites across the Red Sea .
Part of Ramesses II ’s great plan was to ordinate the universe of temples , include the expansion ofKarnak Temple , monuments and even full cities — along with many giant statue of himself . He also head military efforts to reestablish Egyptian influence , including theBattle of Kadeshagainst the Hittites in about 1275 . The Pharaoh of Egypt became so famous that ancient Egyptians honored Ramesses II long after his demise , including with2,000 mummified random-access memory ' headsleft at a temple 1,000 years after his sovereignty .
The Younger Memnon was one of two statue outside a massive tabernacle that Rameses consecrate to himself in the ancient necropolis of Thebes , near advanced Luxor .
The name " Memnon " ensue from muddiness over Greek inscriptions on a exchangeable statue that go 19th - century Egyptologists to think it portray a mythical Greek Billie Jean King of that name , although it actually depicted the Egyptian pharaoh Amenhotep III ; and in other Egyptology , all such statues were called " Memnons . " The term " younger " was used to distinguish it from others because it was minor .
— Mask of Agamemnon : A gold death mask once thought to be grounds of the Trojan War
— Phaistos Disk : 3,000 - year - older inscriptions from Crete that have never been decode
— Nabta Playa : A mysterious stone circuit that may be the world ’s old astronomic observatory
The Younger Memnon may be most famous because it is said to have inspire the English poet Percy Bysshe Shelley towrite the verse form " Ozymandias " — the Greek name for Ramesses II . Egyptology was a burgeon academic discipline in the 19th century , and a fascination with ancient Egypt — known asEgyptomania — swept through Europe and America .
But it ’s now unclear whether Shelley ever saw the real statue , or if he ’d only heard a description . Records point the British Museum did not buy the Younger Memnon until 1821 — around three yr after 1818 , when Shelley published the verse form and the words " attend on my whole kit , ye Mighty , and despair ! "
Hatnefer ’s centre scarab : An keen ancient Egyptian gold necklace encipher with the Book of the bushed
archeologist unearth tree - line walkway that head to ancient Egyptian fortress in Sinai Desert
Famous grave said to hold Alexander the Great ’s father really contains younger valet de chambre , a woman and 6 baby , written report finds
