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Status: 04/04/2021 12:36 am
Great show for deceased rulers and tourism: accompanied by costumed actors, 22 mummies in Cairo have been moved to a newly built museum. Among them are the famous Pharaoh Hatshepsut and Pharaoh Ramses II.
Thousands of years after his death, the mummies of 22 queens and kings of ancient Egypt were transported through Cairo in a solemn procession. The reason for the trip on Saturday night was the relocation of the mummies from the Egyptian Museum in Tahrir Square to the newly opened Museum of Egyptian Civilization (NMEC).
Fashion show based on vintage models
Egypt transformed the relocation into a procession based on ancient models, when deceased rulers were transported to their graves with great honors. Titled “Pharaoh’s Golden Parade,” cars accompanied by a police column traversed a seven-kilometer cordoned off stretch of the Nile promenade. Dozens of costumed horsemen and actors dragged parts of the road with them. The approximately 40-minute parade was broadcast live on television.
Disguised people accompanied the mummies on their transfer to the new museum.
Image: AFP
At NMEC, President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi observed the arrival of the mummies. He wrote on Twitter: “This grandiose spectacle is further proof of the greatness … of a unique civilization that reaches to the depths of history.”
The 22 mummies had been in the Egyptian Museum in downtown Cairo for more than a century; now they are moving into their new rooms in the newly built NMEC in the south of the city. This huge modern exhibition complex has been under construction for years and is now fully open. The mummies will not be visible until April 18, because they will first come to the laboratory for restoration work.
Ramses II and Hatshepsut move
Among the mummies is that of the important pharaoh Ramses II, also called “the great” and from 1279 BC. He ruled Egypt for 66 years. He built the temples of Abu Simbel and, after several wars, led his country to prosperity in a relatively long period of peace. The mummy of the legendary pharaoh Hatshepsut (reigned 1479-1458 BC), who only replaced his underage stepson, Tuthmosis III. he ruled, but then allowed himself to be crowned queen.
The parade of the mummies marked “the end of much work to improve their preservation and presentation,” said Audrey Azoulay, director of the UN cultural organization Unesco, who traveled to Cairo for the show. Now people could “see the history of Egyptian civilization unfold before their eyes.”
With the show and light show, the otherwise crowded Tahrir Square was cordoned off and groomed for the show, Egypt probably wants to attract tourists to the country too. The economy depends on income from tourism and suffered greatly during the corona pandemic.
