The Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM) on Saturday received 356 artifacts from Tahrir’s Egyptian Museum, including 57 artifacts from the treasures of King Tutankhamun – with 11 artifacts to be displayed on the grand staircase – said the supervisor of the GEM project Atef Moftah.
The General Director of the Archaeological Affairs Area at the GEM Tayeb Abbas explained that two statues of Ptah, the god of craftsmen and architects, weighing between five and six tons, will be displayed on the grand staircase alongside royal statues such as a pink granite statue of King Ramesses III, and a black granite statue of King Thutmose III.
Around 49,779 artifacts have so far been transferred to the museum, which will be open by the end of 2020.
Egyptian archaeologists cooperated with 240 foreign archaeological missions to implement 90 percent of the museum’s excavation and restoration work.
The GEM’s construction is more than 88 percent complete, and is set to open by 2020 before the previously-announced official date in 2022.
Construction of the museum first began in 2006 but slowed down due to the outbreak of the January 25th revolution.
Groundbreaking with respect to its exhibited artifacts, the museum aims to impress with King Tutankhamun displays never shown since Tut’s tomb’s unearthing in 1922. Egypt’s former Tourism Minister Rania al-Mashat said in May that King Tut’s tomb will be displayed via hologram technology during the opening of the GEM.
Constructed on approximately 500,000 square meters, the GEM is located nearby the Giza Pyramids. The GEM is expected to be one of the largest museums in the entire world dedicated to the heritage of a single civilization.
Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm
