CAIRO – Egyptian archaeologists unearthed part a 3,000-year-old statue of the pharaoh Amenhotep III, believed to be the grandfather of the young King Tutankhamun, antiquities chief Zahi Hawass said on Saturday.
"The statue was found near the northern entrance of Amenhotep III's temple and depicts the king sitting down on a throne with Amun, the chief deity," Hawass said.
"The red-granite top half of the statue was discovered at the site of the Amenhotep III's funerary temple in the southern city of Luxor," Hawass said.
The newly-discovered artifact which measures 130 centimeters (51 inches) in height and 95 cm (37 inches) in width is "fantastic... because of the details of the facial features," Hawass said.
Archaeologists believe the full statue is around three meters (nearly 10 feet) tall.
In recent years, a large quantity of red-granite statue pieces have been uncovered at Amenhotep III's funerary temple at Kom al-Hitan on Luxor's west bank.
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| Zahi Hawass, head of the Egyptian Supreme Council for Antiquities, center, checks Tutankhamun's mummy at his tomb in Luxor, before exposing it to X-ray to assess the need for restoration. Wednesday's research also was an attempt to discover the cause of death for Tutankhamun, who ruled for nine years before dying at age 17 |
Amenhotep III ruled Egypt between 1390 and 1352 BC.
He was almost certainly the grandfather of Tutankhamun, according to the results of DNA tests and computerized tomography (CT) scans on the famed boy king's mummy announced by scientists on February 17.
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| A 3,000-year-old statue of the pharaoh Amenhotep III, believed to be the grandfather of the young King Tutankhamu, unearthed by archaeologists (source: Egyptian Supreme Council of Antiquities (ESCA)) |
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