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Primary sourceArtifactc. 1273 BCE

Abu Simbel

Ramesses II · c. 1273 BCE

Rock-cut temples built by Ramesses II in Nubia, with colossal statues of the king and scenes of his reign.

Ramesses II commissioned these temples to glorify himself as pharaoh and god in Nubia.

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Facade of the Great Temple at Abu Simbel carved into a sandstone cliff under a clear blue sky. Four seated colossal statues of a pharaoh flank the central doorway, with a sand-covered walkway leading up to the entrance.
Great Temple at Abu Simbel, built under Ramesses II, c. 1273 BCE. Abu Simbel, Egypt.

About this source

What it is

Abu Simbel is a complex of two temples carved into a mountainside in Nubia during the reign of Ramesses II in the 13th century BC. The Great Temple honors Ramesses himself, with four huge seated statues of him at the entrance, while the Small Temple honors his wife Nefertari. In the 1960s the whole site was moved to higher ground to save it from being flooded by Lake Nasser.

Why it matters

The temples were meant to show Egypt's power to the Nubian people and to glorify Ramesses as a god-like king. Inside, reliefs commemorate his role at the Battle of Kadesh. The site shows both the scale of ancient Egyptian building and the modern international effort needed to preserve it.

Look closer

  • Why would Ramesses want huge statues of himself in a distant frontier region?
  • What does including Nefertari and his children suggest about the image he wanted to project?
  • How might the temple's purpose change our understanding of 'art' versus 'propaganda'?

This artifact is part of the curated material that grounds the AI version of Ramses II (Ramses the Great) on Humy.ai — when students ask about related events, the AI can quote it and cite it.

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Two clay cuneiform tablets on a clear acrylic stand against a red background. The larger tablet is broken into several fragments, covered in dense wedge-shaped writing. A smaller tablet fragment sits at lower right, also inscribed.Document

Primary source

Egyptian–Hittite Peace Treaty

c. 1258 BCE

Sepia photograph of the facade of the Abu Simbel temple in Egypt, with four seated colossal statues of Ramesses II carved into the rock. A small standing man at lower left shows scale. A doorway lies between the middle statues, and hieroglyphs are carved across the upper wall.Photograph

Secondary source

Abu Simbel Temple Colossi

Pascal Sébah · 1875

Sepia photograph of the Abu Simbel temple facade in Egypt. A colossal seated stone statue of a pharaoh with a striped headdress dominates the right. Beside it stands a statue of a falcon-headed god wearing a sun disk. Relief carvings and hieroglyphs cover the wall, and a small seated man at the bottom gives scale. Caption reads Abou Simbel, Gd Temple, Le dieu Soleil Ra et Rhamses II, P. Sébah.Photograph

Secondary source

Facade Detail of Abu Simbel Showing Ramesses II and Ra

Pascal Sébah · 1875

Sepia photograph of the ruined Ramesseum temple at Luxor, Egypt. Four fallen-headed colossal seated statues stand before a sandstone gateway with carved hieroglyphs on its lintel. A broken statue lies in the foreground, and a small figure sits near the base of the statues. Desert and a column are visible on the left.Photograph

Secondary source

Ramesseum Colossi in Ruins

Pascal Sébah · c. 1875

Black-and-white drawing in profile of an elderly Egyptian man wearing a tall, patterned royal headdress with a cobra emblem and a pleated collar necklace with a scarab pendant. Signed WLM 1917 at lower right.Painting

Secondary source

Figure of Ancient Egyptian, Ramesses II

1917

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