Latest / Ramses the Great: Egypt's Most Powerful Pharaoh — Fexingo History / Ramses the Great's Mummy: The Incredible Journey of a Pharaoh's Body
Transcript
- Lucas: You know, we've talked a lot about Ramses's monuments, his family, his wars — but we've barely touched on his actual body. What happened to Ramses the Great after he died? Luna: I guess I assumed he was still in his tomb somewhere. Lucas: That's the thing — he was, but not for long. Ramses was buried in a massive tomb in the Valley of the Kings, KV7, but within a couple of centuries, tomb robbing had become a huge problem. By the 21st Dynasty, around 1000 BCE, the priests of Amun got worried. They started moving royal mummies around, hiding them in secret caches. Luna: They moved Ramses? Lucas: Yes, and not just once. His mummy was moved at least three times. First from KV7 to his father Seti I's tomb — can you imagine the logistics? Then to a tomb of a queen called Inhapy. Finally, around 950 BCE, he ended up in a hidden chamber at Deir el-Bahari, right next to Hatshepsut's temple. That cache held more than 40 royal mummies, including Ramses's father Seti I and maybe even his son Merneptah. Luna: And they stayed there for almost 3,000 years. Lucas: Exactly. The cache was completely forgotten. Until 1881, when a local family from Qurna, the Abd el-Rassuls, stumbled on it while digging for antiquities. They didn't tell anyone — they started selling objects on the black market. A few years later, the Egyptian Antiquities Service got wind of it and traced the loot back to them. Luna: How did they finally get them to reveal the location? Lucas: The eldest brother, Ahmed Abd el-Rassul, was arrested and tortured, but he wouldn't talk. Eventually, after months of pressure, another brother led the authorities to the cache. In July 1881, the French Egyptologist Gaston Maspero — who was head of the Antiquities Service — sent his assistant Émile Brugsch to investigate. Brugsch lowered himself on a rope into a dark shaft and found himself in a narrow chamber packed with coffins and mummies. He apparently said it looked like a 'royal dormitory'. Luna: So Ramses was in there. Lucas: He was. They identified his coffin by inscriptions. When they brought the mummies out, they loaded them onto a barge on the Nile. Local villagers along the riverbank reportedly fired guns in the air — a traditional sign of mourning. For them, these were not just antiquities; they were their ancient kings. Luna: Did they unwrap him right away? Lucas: Not immediately. The mummies were taken to the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. In 1886, Maspero himself unwrapped Ramses's mummy in front of an audience. He described the pharaoh as having a 'hooked nose, high cheekbones, and a strong jaw.' The body was remarkably well preserved — they could even see the red hair. Ramses had naturally red hair, which is quite rare among ancient Egyptians. Luna: Red hair? That's not something you hear about pharaohs. Lucas: It's one of those fascinating details. Some scholars think it might indicate that he dyed it with henna, or that he had some northern ancestry. But his skull was also shaved — he was bald in old age. They found that he had severe arthritis in his hip, a jaw abscess, and calcified arteries. He was about 90 when he died, which was incredibly old for the time. Luna: So we have his actual medical history from his mummy. Lucas: Exactly. And it gets even more modern. In 1974, conservators noticed that the mummy was deteriorating — fungal growths were damaging the linen. So they decided to send him to Paris for emergency treatment. And this is where it gets surreal: Ramses was given a valid Egyptian passport for the trip. Under 'occupation,' it said 'King.' He was met at the airport with full military honors. Luna: Wait — a passport for a mummy? Lucas: Yes, a passport. It was necessary for international transport. In Paris, scientists at the Musée de l'Homme subjected him to a CT scan. That gave them all the details I mentioned — the arthritis, the abscess, the arteries. They also found traces of pollen in his nostrils, which might have been from flowers placed in his coffin. After treatment, he was flown back to Cairo. Luna: So the mummy is still in Cairo? Lucas: It is. He's in the National Museum of Egyptian Civilization, in a special climate-controlled room with other royal mummies. Visitors can see him. And that raises a pretty big ethical question — should we be displaying the bodies of ancient kings? Some argue it's disrespectful, that they were buried with rituals meant to ensure their afterlife. Others say it's educational and that the mummies are already damaged by unwrapping in the 19th century. Luna: It's a tough one. But without the unwrappings and scans, we wouldn't know so much about his life and death. Lucas: That's the tension. Modern technology like CT scanning is non-invasive — we can learn everything without even touching the body. But the early unwrappings were destructive. There's even a story that Maspero's assistant broke Ramses's leg while trying to remove the wrappings. So the history of mummy studies is also a history of well-meaning but damaging practices. Luna: What's the latest research on Ramses's mummy? Lucas: In 2022, a team did a new CT scan and created a 3D reconstruction of his face. It shows him as an elderly man with a gaunt face and a prominent nose. They also confirmed that he had a serious dental abscess that must have been incredibly painful — it could have contributed to his death from blood poisoning. So even the greatest pharaoh suffered from toothaches. Luna: That makes him human, doesn't it. Lucas: It does. His mummy is a direct link to the man himself. For all his colossal statues and huge temples, it's his actual body that brings us closest to him. And the story of how his remains were preserved, hidden, found, and studied is almost as epic as his own campaigns. Luna: I'll never look at a mummy in a museum the same way again. Lucas: And that's the point — they're not just artifacts. They're people with stories that continue long after their deaths. Ramses's journey from KV7 to a hidden cache to a Paris lab is a tale of tomb robbers, priests, archaeologists, and scientists. It's the archaeology of the afterlife.