Aug 6, 2006, 16:22 GMT
Cairo - The Egyptian Museum opened a second mummy chamber Sunday where the mummies of 11 royal figures from the 20th dynasty of the New Kingdom were put on display.
A large crowd of tourists and journalists swarmed the chamber as Supreme Antiquities Council Secretary General Zahi Hawass gave information on the history of the discoveries and the mummified royal figures.
The room is designed like a royal tomb with vaulted ceiling and indirect low lighting to exhibit the mummies.
The exhibition includes the mummies of Ramses III and priests of Amun who succeeded in ruling the southern half of Egypt as priest kings and proclaiming Thebes as Egypt's religious capital.
Each mummy is showcased in a rectangular glass container that is supplied with a small electronic device to observe and control the humidity level around the mummy minute by minute.
The inauguration of the chamber brings to two the number of mummy chambers at the Egyptian Museum, which is a tourist attraction for those interested in ancient Egyptian relics.
Hawass said in a press release that the mummies exhibited in both rooms were first discovered in 1881 in a cache in Deir al-Bahari on Luxor's west bank and in 1898 in the second cache of King Amenhotep II's tomb in the Valley of the Kings.
The mummy of the famous Ramses III, who died at the age of 60 probably from poisoning and was immortalized for having prevented the invasion of Egypt, lay on its back wrapped in linen in a glass encasement.
The mummy of the high priest of Amum Pinumdjem II, whose power in the south rivalled the king's power in the north, was also on display in the chamber.
According to information on the display box of Ramses IV's mummy, the eyes of the king, who died aged 50 after reigning for only six years, were replaced with onions, his skull filled with resin and his abdomen with lichen.
But the mummies that are currently on display at the Egyptian Museum in downtown Cairo are soon to be moved to another hall planned at the National Museum of Egyptian Civilization in the Old Cairo district of Fustat, Hawass said in the release.
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