Egypt recovers ancient statue of King Ramses II stolen 3,400 years ago

CAIRO—Egypt celebrated the return of a 3,400-year-old statue portraying the head of King Ramses II after it was stolen and smuggled out of the country over thirty years ago, as announced by the country’s antiquities ministry on Sunday.

The statue is currently housed in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, though it is not currently on public display. The ministry plans to restore the artifact, according to a statement released.

The statue was taken from the Ramses II temple in the ancient city of Abydos in Southern Egypt more than three decades ago. While the exact date of the theft is unknown, Shaaban Abdel Gawad, the head of Egypt’s antiquities repatriation department, estimated that the piece was stolen in the late 1980s or early 1990s.

Egyptian authorities identified the artifact when it was put up for sale at an exhibition in London in 2013. Subsequently, it traveled through several other countries before finally making its way to Switzerland, as reported by the antiquities ministry.

“This head belongs to a set of statues depicting King Ramses II sitting among various Egyptian deities,” explained Mr. Abdel Gawad.

Ramses II, also referred to as Ramses the Great, was a prominent pharaoh in ancient Egypt. He was the third ruler of the Nineteenth Dynasty of Egypt, reigning from 1279–1213 B.C.

Related Stories

Egypt worked in conjunction with Swiss authorities to confirm its rightful ownership. Last year, Switzerland returned the statue to the Egyptian embassy in Bern, with Egypt only recently bringing the artifact back home.