Posted on 06/04/2005 9:03:10 PM PDT by TigerLikesRooster
Sat Jun 4, 4:45 PM ET
LUXOR, Egypt (AFP) - Buried for nearly 3,600 years, a rare statue of Egypt's King Neferhotep I has been brought to light in the ruins of Thebes by a team of French archaeologists.
Officials said on Saturday that the statue was unusual in that the king is depicted holding hands with a double of himself, although the second part of the carving remains under the sand and its form has been determined by the use of imaging equipment.
Archeologists unearthed the 1.8 metre (six foot) tall statue, as they were carrying out repairs around Karnak Temple in the southern city of Luxor, Egypt's antiquities chief Zahi Hawass told reporters.
Francois Larche, one of the team that found the limestone statue of the king, whose name means "beautiful and good", said it was lying about 1.6 metres below ground near an obelisk of Queen Hatshepsut, the only woman to have reigned as a pharoah in Egypt, ruling from 1504-1484 BC.
Karnak, now in the heart of Luxor, was built on the ruins of Thebes, the capital of ancient Egypt. The huge temple dedicated to the god Amon lies in the heart of a vast complex of religious buildings in the city, 700 kilometres (435 miles) south of Cairo.
The statue shows the king wearing a funeral mask and royal head cloth or nemes, said Larche.
The forehead bears an emblem of a cobra, which ancient Egyptians used as a symbol on the crown of the pharaohs. They believed that the cobra would spit fire at approaching enemies.
Larche said this was only the second time such a statue had been found in Egypt. A similar one was dug up during the excavations of the hidden treasures of Karnak from 1898 to 1904.
But it is not clear when or if the statue will be completely unearthed. It is blocked by the remnants of an ancient structure, possibly a gate.
"In order to pull it out, a structure on top of the statue has to be dismantled and then restored," said Larche, adding that permission from the Egyptian antiquities authorities was needed before the team could go ahead with plans to raise the statue.
"It's up to the Higher Council of Egyptian Antiquities to decide on the fate of the statue of Neferhotep I and whether it will be brought to light or left buried where it was found."
Neferhotep was the 22nd king of the 13th Dynasty. The son of a temple priest in Abydos, he ruled Egypt from 1696-1686 BC.
Experts believe his father's position helped him to ascend the throne, as there was no royal blood in his family.
Neferhotep was one of the few pharaohs whose name did not invoke the sun god, Re. It is written on a number of stones, including a document on his reign found in Aswan.
Ping!
Under the bed? Between the sofa cushions? It's always the last place you look.
The mainstream media will claim it was his domestic partner.
sweet : )
My #2 dog is named Ra after the sun god.
Ozymandias
I met a traveler from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read,
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed,
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look upon my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
I can't read Ozymandias anymore without thinking of the WTC on 9/11.
My #12 dog is named mohammed after the...
.
... never mind ...
Some archeologists and historians believe that he might have been the Pharoah of the Exodus.
Then he drowned.
Well, biblically (from my understanding), the sea covered the Egyptian army--the chariot ranks and cavalry but not necessarily the Pharoah. I'm not pretending to know who was Pharoah around the time of the Exodus, but reading others' guesses is fun. From those who study what little is known of ancient Egypt, there are several different opinions on when Neferhotep I lived. I haven't found names of any archeologists, yet, who compare physical finds with biblical text (only mentions of "archeologists," so far). There are some "biblical historians" named, though. It appears that most (if not all) archeologists disagree with both biblical and secular historians to a great extent on dates.
This doesn't sound right.
If the statue is lying beneath, but not part of, an existing structure any good engineer would recommend tunneling to get at it.
Agreed, nobody knows who the pharoah of the Exodus was. I, like you, have studied the subject, and the arguments over dates and dynasties is intriguing.
So is the debate over ethncity of the pharoahs, which makes looking at their statues interesting. Young Neferhotep looks very African to me, but who knows? We do know that one of the pharoahs had a Israeli ex-con as his right-hand man.
The biblical account in Exodus mentions demise of the Egyptian army, but Psalms mentions Pharoah himself perishing in the sea. Thus my comment in the earlier post. It's an obscure passage, but it's definitely there. If you'd like, I'll find and post it later.
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