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Archaeologists found an enormous 42-foot tall statue of Amenhotep III in Egypt, and the news bring about the poem Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley to my mind:
The statue consists of seven large quartzite blocks and still lacks a head and was actually first discovered in the 1928 and then rehidden, according to the press release from the country’s antiquities authority. Archaeologists expect to find its twin in the next digging season.
Excavation supervisor Abdel-Ghaffar Wagdi said two other statues were also unearthed, one of the god Thoth with a baboon’s head and a six foot (1.85 meter) tall one of the lion-headed goddess Sekhmet.
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
King Tut may have brought the image of splendor and wealth to your mind, but the reality was far grimmer for the Egyptian boy king:
The report is the first DNA study ever conducted with ancient Egyptian royal mummies. It apparently solves several mysteries surrounding King Tut, including how he died and who his parents were.
"He was not a very strong pharaoh. He was not riding the chariots," said study team member Carsten Pusch, a geneticist at Germany’s University of Tübingen. "Picture instead a frail, weak boy who had a bit of a club foot and who needed a cane to walk."
Regarding the revelation that King Tut’s mother and father were brother and sister, Pusch said, "Inbreeding is not an advantage for biological or genetic fitness. Normally the health and immune system are reduced and malformations increase," he said.
Oh, and he’s got malaria too: Link (Photo: Kenneth Garrett/National Geographic) – via Boing Boing
The giant pharaoh is currently floating down the River Thames on its way to Legoland in Windsor, England, where it will be the centerpiece of Legoland’s Kingdom of the Pharaohs, which is set to open March 21.
This is the final leg in its 1,395-mile journey by truck and boat from the Czech Republic, where it was constructed.
The pharaoh required more than 200,000 Lego bricks and weighs one ton.
(image credit: Geoff Caddick/PA Wire via AP)
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