Famous treasures of tutankhamun. Five unique exhibits of the "Gold of the Pharaohs" exhibition, for which it is worth going to Monaco Crown of the Egyptian princess Sat-Hathor-Yunet

The tomb of Tutankhomon, after more than three thousand years has come down to us almost in its original form, is considered one of the most important finds in archeology. Since 1922, when Howard Carter discovered the tomb in the Valley of the Kings near Thebes, the little-known Tutankhamun has become perhaps the most famous pharaoh in history. Inside the tomb, the British Carter and Lord Carnarvon discovered numerous jewelry, household items, furniture, works of art of that era, as well as a gold sarcophagus weighing more than 110 kilograms with the mummified body of the young king of Ancient Egypt.

The sarcophagus of Tutankhomon and the treasures from the tomb could be seen at a unique exhibition in Berlin. Interesting? Let's go inside then.

At the exhibition there was an opportunity to choose an audio guide in the native language

Without even going inside the main exhibition area, we plunged into the atmosphere of Ancient Egypt.

The Rosetta Stone is a slab found at the end of the 18th century in Egypt near the city of Rosetta. On it is engraved text identical in meaning in three languages: two ancient Egyptian and Greek. It was he who served as the starting point for deciphering the Egyptian hieroglyphs.

At the entrance, guests are greeted by a statue of the young Tutankhamun.

Pharaoh from the XVIII dynasty of the New Kingdom ruled for about 9 years, from about 1332 to 1323 BC (died at the age of 19).

Before reaching his 20 years of age, Tutankhamun died (and perhaps was killed) and was buried in a tomb in the Valley of the Kings near Thebes.

On November 26, 1922, English Egyptologist Howard Carter and archaeologist Lord Carnarvon became the first to descend into the tomb in more than three thousand years. All artifacts were photographed, numbered and described. The exhibition shows two interesting films about that time.

After that, the visitor is given the opportunity to contemplate the treasures of the tomb with his own eyes.

Naturally, most of the exposition is devoted to the description of the tomb of the pharaoh. His mummy was housed in three nested sarcophagi. Two of them were of gilded wood, and the third was of pure gold. The sarcophagi themselves were closed in four gilded "cabinets", also located in each other.

Also in the tomb there were many wall paintings that told specialists about the times of the reign of the pharaoh.

The sarcophagi in which the mummy of Tutankhamun was kept are presented separately.

Pharaoh sat in the throne room, and the ruler's throne itself was made of pure gold. Even today, the find strikes the imagination with its quality of workmanship and rich decoration.

Despite the fact that only recreated copies are presented at the exhibition and there is not a single original, it is breathtaking and it seems that you are really in that time and have access to the most intimate and inaccessible. Awesome exhibition, great project.

Exhibition! Just think, there are whole fake exhibitions.

It all started in sunny Chile, where they decided to make small deals for lovers of beauty. And the cold snows have already sunk over there, to Russia.

So, one fine day, Minskers saw on the posters in their city a photograph of the very Mask of Tutankhamun. Wow, they thought, is it possible that this great exhibit, as well as other treasures of Egypt, have been brought to us?

After all, the exhibition is not just anywhere - but in the National Art Museum of the Republic of Belarus, a very decent place.

Schaz.
For only 9 euros in Belarusian money, lovers of beauty are offered to enjoy a surrogate. And this despite the fact that in the announcements and posters there is not a single mention of the fact that these are copies, not originals.

The history of the traveling exhibition "Treasures of Ancient Egypt" began in 2011, when a cunning Chilean businessman invited designers and artisans, instructing them to make copies of famous monuments of ancient Egyptian art. No copies came out. Frightening, monstrous imitations of Egyptian masterpieces, often having nothing to do with the originals stored in many museums around the world, were made from plastic and other materials at hand.

The resulting mass of products, which can hardly be called even souvenir, were repeatedly exhibited by the businessmen. v shopping centers of various cities in South America, attracting ordinary people who have never seen the originals in Cairo or Berlin, to leave their hard-earned funds in exchange for the dubious pleasure of painted gold paint plastic.

In the photo: a genuine monument + a Latin American copy.

The problem of the exhibition was not only the extremely low level of the items presented. It is also impossible to call the project an educational project: labels and explications are replete with terrible factual errors, many things are incorrectly attributed, drawings on the walls and on papyri made from banana peel only vaguely remind that the heritage is shown so crookedly and shamefully, in fact, by one from the brightest, most refined and refined civilizations of the Ancient World. It is unlikely that the swollen face, which the organizers present as the "mask of Tutankhamun", or the ugly, crooked face that the label calls "Nefertiti", is able to tell something real and important about the Egypt of the pharaohs to those who inadvertently bought a ticket.

That is, these are not even authentic casts, but such fantasies, a bright attraction, which, at best, has a place at VDNKh.

This story would have remained on the conscience of the Chileans and their neighbors if an absolutely incredible precedent had not happened: this whole plastic dump, diluted for decency with several authentic, but mediocre Egyptian things from a small American private collection, was shown with incredible fanfare by a leading art museum Belarus.

Alas, there are no Egyptologists there, just as there are no Egyptian originals - several significant monuments disappeared from the collection of the Minsk Museum during the Great Patriotic War... As a result, the material expert judgment to whom there was simply no one to give, appeared in the halls of the national museum, and the shameful project had a "museum precedent", however, which caused a colossal wave of indignation in social networks- people who came to the exhibition and paid a lot of money for a ticket, in fact, were deceived.

And Cho, the gold glitters, shitty


Fake banana papyrus (or not papyrus, but relief?

“Facing a wave of indignation,” the well-known Russian Egyptologist Viktor Solkin told IA REGNUM, “the Minsk Museum published an open letter in which he blamed the press for all the troubles and, trying to justify himself, declared the project“ educational ”, announcing that most of - copies. But what educational value can we talk about if the exhibited monuments form a completely distorted idea of ​​ancient Egyptian art, and actual errors in labels are in the hundreds - Minsk fans of the East have already posted photos with this shame on the Internet for active discussion.

The museum is wrong: the exhibits are not copies, but handicraft imitations of monuments, humiliating for the masterpieces of Egyptian art. This precedent is extremely sad and dangerous. This is an absolute shame for the museum community in Minsk. Not every visitor to the museum, having got to the exhibition, advertised with the help of beautiful photographs of the outstanding photographer Sandro Vannini, who at one time was specially invited to Cairo to photograph the genuine treasures from the tomb of Tutankhamun, will understand that in fact he was offered a product that was not even of the second freshness and that he is simply deceived, extracting good profit from his ignorance. "

They don't even copy. They improvise by cutting and trimming.

Apparently, the Chilean organizers saw the precedent in Minsk as a successful way of enrichment, and therefore preliminary posters of this "exhibition", which should open on December 24, 2017 at the Museum of Moscow, appeared on the network.

So if any of the Muscovites wants to join in December and pay about 620 rubles for "Treasures of Ancient Egypt", keep in mind that you will be shown gilded plastic.

In general, we have the opportunity to watch the legalization of the project live: from trade entertainment centers(where he belongs) -> to the museums of world capitals! I emphasize - state museums, which are obliged not only to entertain, but also to bear the educational load, and be responsible for the reliability of the head.

Interestingly, the Museum of Moscow was generally aware of what it was signing up for? Decent people work there. Or took, without looking, a pig in a poke?
***

As a show, all this beauty is disgraced, however, it's still nothing to bring the kids together. Younger school age.

MEETING WITH TUTANKHAMON AND ... ANNA IOSILEVICH

Of the cultural phenomena of my middle-aged years, I remember the exhibition "Treasures of the Tomb of Tutankhamun", which 45 years ago overcame the Iron Curtain and was triumphantly held in Moscow, Leningrad, Kiev. Unfortunately, little can be clarified about this event on the Internet. For example, about the actual number of visitors to the exhibition. Even the dates of their holding have not been written. Most likely, Muscovites saw the treasures at the end of 1973, and in June 1974 she had already moved to Leningrad.
I have kept a record that according to the plan (then everything in life was planned!) 1.2 million Muscovites, 800 thousand Leningraders and 400 thousand Kievites were to get acquainted with Egyptian antiquities, including, of course, visitors. I then lived and worked in my native Pskov (which is 280 km from the banks of the Neva), so I arrived there with a group of factory workers in a custom-made PAZik in August 1974.
It was believed that the queue at the Hermitage ticket office, where the Egyptian exhibits were housed, was a 4-hour wait, but for groups there was a separate ticket office with a shorter time. The entrance ticket cost 1.5 rubles, which is 5 times more expensive than the cost of visiting the Hermitage itself (30 kopecks). So it was a profitable undertaking for the state budget.
The organization was clear: groups of 1200 people were launched, like in a cinema, for an hour and a half in strictly marked sessions: ... 12:00, 14, 16, 18, 20. And after each viewing the hall was completely vacated. Excursions with stories were not practiced so as not to “interfere” with viewing the 50 items of the tomb, located in five halls. It was forbidden to take pictures.
The catalog, which I, of course, could not even hold in my hands, was published with a circulation of only 80 thousand copies. There were no commemorative badges at all. What seemed very unusual: the exhibition was guarded by up to 30 policemen, two of whom were standing with machine guns (which in those days was outlandish) at the main exhibit of the exhibition - a golden mask of a young Egyptian pharaoh. Near it, visitors slowed down, eagerly peering into the luxury and beauty of past centuries.
Of course, the mummy of the ruler of Ancient Egypt itself, as well as a sarcophagus of gold weighing more than 110 kg, was not. And I considered small jewelry without much pleasure, considering their assessment to be the lot of specialists and fine connoisseurs of jewelry.
An unexpected meeting happened when I, after gazing at the divine mask, raised my eyes and looked to the opposite side (the audience stood on both sides). My gaze settled on a very, very familiar female face. Out of surprise, I could not understand who this smiling person was, from which city and where I had seen her before (such a sudden outburst of memory is rare, but it happens to me).
And only when she called my name and surname, I remembered that it was ... Anna Naumovna Iosilevich, my classmate in physics at the Gorky University, recruited in 1954! We did not see her for exactly 15 years, since the group of our graduation did not meet (there was a lack of an organizer), but went to different cities. We only managed to utter a few hasty words with Anna, we did not think about exchanging addresses, although we were not friends or in love with her (and how I was in love with a classmate - Veronika Alekseevna Simanskaya, Marshevskaya in marriage - I still could not be able to tell) ...
And this woman (who was most likely already married and bore a different surname, and later could go to live in Israel), I have not met anywhere later. But I met Tutankhamun in the form of a mummy and his magnificent tomb again in the Cairo Museum, when my wife Dilara and I were vacationing in Sharm el-Sheikh in March 2002 ...

Now in the Principality of Monaco there is an insert "The Gold of the Pharaohs", which tens of thousands of people managed to visit in less than a month. And even if you are not a fan of museum expositions, this exhibition is a must see. “Azure Day” has already written that unique masterpieces of the Cairo Museum are presented here - more than 150 copies. But we have selected five exhibits that, in our opinion, deserve special attention.

Pharaoh Psussenes I's legacy: golden mask, sandals, fingertips and telegram

Everyone knows who Tutankhamun is and that his tomb was found intact and intact. But not everyone knows that the burial of the pharaoh is not unique of this kind. Archaeologist Pierre Monte dreamed of finding an intact tomb. Luck smiled at him, and after 10 years of excavations in 1940 in Tanis (Nile Delta), the Egyptologist discovered what he was looking for. The joy of discovery was clouded by the beginning of the Second World War... Pierre Monte was forced to go home to France to his family. Only in 1951 did the Egyptologist reach the coveted tomb. The opening of the burial was attended by the king of Egypt Farouk I. As it turned out, this tomb belonged to Pharaoh Psusennes I, who ruled about 1039-993 BC. NS. Pharaoh was buried in three sarcophagi: the outer one was made of pink granite, the middle one was made of black granite, and the last one was made of silver. The mummy of the ruler was there. The presence of a 90-kilogram sarcophagus made of the "bone of the gods" testifies to the enormous wealth of Psusennes I. Unfortunately, the mummy has not survived. Dampness and water seeping through the ceiling led to its destruction. On a pile of bones, Pierre Monte discovered a traditional death mask made of gold. There were also sandals and fingertips made of pure gold, 20 bracelets, 30 rings, a necklace made of lapis lazuli.

All this you can see today in Monaco and even a telegram that Pierre Monte sent to his wife and daughters on March 17, 1939, where he wrote: “The tomb of Psusennes has not been plundered, everything is good. Pierre "

Crown of the Egyptian princess Sat-Hathor-Yunet

This princess with a complicated name was the daughter of Pharaoh Senusret II, who ruled c. 1845/44 - 1837 BC. The pyramid and the burial of the pharaoh himself were plundered long ago, but near the pyramid there were buildings where the daughter of Senusret II Sat-Hathor-Iunet was buried. The Illahun treasure was found there: three ebony boxes containing very beautiful gold inlaid pectorals, a delightful diadem with a high thin gold feather, a headband inlaid with rosettes, a whole collection of jewelry and cosmetics.

All items were in a wall niche. During the floods of ancient times, the niche was probably filled with silt, and the robbers who entered the princess's sarcophagus did not notice this treasure. The Crown of Sat-Hathor-Yunet is visiting the Principality of Monaco today.

Sarcophagus of Yuya

Have you heard who Juya and Tuya are? Probably not, but by the way, these are the parents of one of the most powerful and famous queens of antiquity, the wife of Amenhotep III - Teie. When Joya and Tuya passed away, the queen and her husband did an unprecedented act: they were buried in the royal necropolis. This tomb was found in 1905 by an American archaeologist. Today in Monaco you can see the inner sarcophagus where the mummy of Iuya was kept. And, in addition, various pieces of furniture, figurines that were found at the burial.

Princess Satamon Chair

Who is Satamon? It is believed to be the eldest daughter of Pharaoh Amenhotep III and his "Great Wife" Teie. The evidence that she was the daughter of Amenhotep and Teie is the presence of objects found in the tomb of Yuya and Tuya, the parents of Queen Teie, especially the inscription on the armchair with her title "The Royal Daughter". Subsequently, the princess married her own father Amenhotep III in about 30 years of his reign. And she acquired the title "Great wife of the king." She was also Tutankhamun's aunt. But what about the chair. The fact is that it was the pieces of furniture that became the main evidence that such a princess existed at all. In the tomb of Yuya and Tuya, which we wrote about above, three remarkably made chairs were discovered. They were used for growth, as the owner grew older. Then they were placed in the grave of her grandparents - according to the tradition of that time, it was considered normal to bury objects that were significant for the deceased during his lifetime. In the last decade of her father's reign, Satamon was promoted to the status of "The King's Chief Wife." Her grave was never found.

Princess Khnumit and Ichi Necklaces

The double tomb of the queens Khnumit and Iti was discovered by the French archaeologist Jacques de Morgan in the Dakhshur necropolis near the pyramid of Amenemkhet II (Middle Kingdom). Now this area is covered with sand, and only in one place is the vault of the burial chamber of the unfinished or badly destroyed pyramid of Amenemkhet II. The burials of the princesses were left undisturbed and hid the amazing pieces of jewelry art of the Middle Kingdom.

Since the burial was found near the "White Pyramid" of Amenemkhet II, until recently Khnumit and Iti were considered his daughters. However, much indicates that this burial dates from the time of Amenemhat III, and the question of a more precise relationship remains open.