Latest / Ramses the Great: Egypt's Most Powerful Pharaoh — Fexingo History / Ramses the Great's Final Years: Twilight of a Supernova
Transcript
- Lucas: So we've spent a lot of time on Ramses at the height of his power — the chariots at Kadesh, the temples, the enormous family. But there’s a side to his story we haven’t touched: the long, slow twilight of his reign. He ruled for sixty-six years, which is almost incomprehensible when you think about it. Luna: That's more than twice as long as most pharaohs, isn't it? Lucas: Easily. He came to the throne in his early twenties and died somewhere around his ninetieth birthday. But those final decades — let's say the last twenty years — they're a mixed bag. On one hand, he was still building, still commissioning monuments. On the other, his body was falling apart and the succession crisis was brewing under the surface. Lucas: We have extraordinary data from his mummy — it was one of the first to be thoroughly examined in the modern era. The French anatomist Grafton Elliot Smith, then later X-rays and CT scans, revealed that Ramses suffered from severe arthritis in his hips and knees, a calcified aorta — hardening of the arteries — and terrible dental abscesses. One tooth was so infected it had created a fistula into his jaw. Luna: So the great pharaoh was in constant pain? That must have affected how he ruled. Lucas: Absolutely. And it’s not just the pain — it’s what it implies about his mobility. He would have needed help walking, maybe even been carried in a litter. Yet the propaganda still shows him as a virile warrior. That gap between image and reality is fascinating. And it raises questions: who was really managing the empire when he could barely get out of bed? Luna: Was it his eldest son? Or one of the viziers? Lucas: Well, that’s the crux. Ramses outlived at least twelve of his sons. His firstborn, Amunherkhepeshef, died somewhere around year twenty-five. Then the next in line, Pareherwenemef, also predeceased him. One by one, the crown princes fell — including the famous scholar Khaemwaset, who we talked about in episode 173, probably around year fifty-five. So by the time Ramses was in his eighties, the only surviving son of his chief wives was Merenptah, the thirteenth son. Luna: Thirteenth? That must have felt like a huge gap in experience and expectation. Lucas: Quick honest thing — we get to explore these deep historical questions because a handful of listeners chip in monthly through buy me a coffee dot com slash fexingo. That support literally funds the research and production of episodes like this one. If you’ve been walking through history with us, it’s that small community that keeps it ad-free and going. So thank you if you’re part of it. Luna: Yeah, it really does make a difference. And it lets us dig into corners like Ramses' dentures or, you know, his arthritic hips. Lucas: Right. So Merenptah was probably in his fifties himself when he finally took the throne. And he had a very different temperament — more cautious, less inclined to self-glorification. Some scholars argue that the last ten years of Ramses' reign saw a slow decay in central authority. Grain prices in Deir el-Medina rose, there were labor strikes during Merenptah's own reign — things were changing. Luna: Did Ramses even acknowledge his own mortality? Or did he just keep building like he was going to live forever? Lucas: He kept building. In fact, one of his last major projects was a massive temple at Derr in Nubia, and he also added to the Hypostyle Hall at Karnak. But there's a poignant detail: in his mortuary temple, the Ramesseum, the hieroglyphs start to get sloppy. The quality of the reliefs declines. That suggests the old master craftsmen were dying off and the new generation didn't have the same skill — or maybe the budget was being stretched. Lucas: And then there's the question of his death. We know the approximate date — around 1213 BCE, in his sixty-sixth year. The cause is unknown, but given his health problems, it could have been heart failure or infection from his teeth. He was embalmed, and his tomb in the Valley of the Kings — KV7 — was prepared. But it was robbed in antiquity. The priests moved his mummy to a cache in Deir el-Bahri to protect it. Luna: So the same mummy we can see today in Cairo was hidden away for thousands of years? That's almost poetic. Lucas: It is. And when you look at his face in the museum, you see a thin, wizened old man with a hooked nose and a prominent chin. The CT scans even show that they packed his nostrils with resin and cotton to maintain the shape of his nose. Every detail speaks of a life lived hard and long. Lucas: But perhaps the most telling legacy is how quickly the empire unraveled after he was gone. Merenptah had to fight off invasions of Libyans and Sea Peoples within his first decade. The cracks that had formed under Ramses' long shadow became fissures. It makes you wonder: did Ramses hold it all together by sheer force of personality, or did his endless reign actually accelerate the decline? Luna: That's a heavy question. And maybe one for another episode. Lucas: Absolutely. But for now, we can appreciate that even the most powerful pharaohs are human — and that their final years often tell a very different story from the official inscriptions.