Two huge pharaoh statues unveiled in Egypt

Two statues of Amenhotep III have been restored to their original spots in the ancient city of Luxor.

Amenhotep was a prominent ruler in ancient Egypt who controlled a vast empire covering the regions between modern day Iraq and Sudan. Having become the empire's ruler at the age of just 12, the celebrated pharaoh was memorialized with several impressive colossi.

Now a team of archaeologists has meticulously restored two more of the statues so that they can be put on public display. At 11m in height, one of the colossi weighs up to 250 tons but is missing a double crown piece that would have seen it weigh as much as 450 tons.

The two restored statues have now joined the two pre-existing 3,400-year-old Colossi of Memnon statues at the funerary temple of the King where they would have been originally located during ancient times.

Tourists and journalists stand next to a newly displayed statue of pharaoh Amenhotep III and his wife Tiye (Down) in Egypt's temple city of Luxor on March 23, 2014. (AFP Photo)

A picture taken on March 23, 2014 shows newly displayed statues of pharaoh Amenhotep III in Egypt's temple city of Luxor. (AFP Photo)

Egyptian archaeological workers stand next to a newly displayed alabaster head from an Amenhotep III statue in Egypt's temple city of Luxor on March 23, 2014. (AFP Photo)

Sourouzian said that her team is trying to conserve all these monuments and the temple itself, which had been left to the mercy of the elements and suffered at the hands of man.

“Every ruin, every monument has its right to be treated decently. The idea is to stop the dismantling of monuments and keep them at their sites,” she said.

She added that the work to preserve the Amenhotep temple is being funded entirely though private and international donations and that the only way to make sure they can complete their work is through steady international funding.

Luxor is a city of 500,000 on the banks of the Nile in southern Egypt, and is now an open air museum of pharaonic tombs and temples. With the exception of the colossi, very little today remains of Amenhotep’s temple because of its location on the Nile floodplain; successive floods have eaten away at the foundations.

Source: Russia Today