Egypt shifted the 4,600 years old Pharaoh’s ship to an additional museum outside Cairo to preserve and display the world’s oldest intact ship, says Maritime Executive.
Antique legacy
The government moved the King Khufu Solar Boat from the archaeological site of the Giza Pyramids to a special building in the Egyptian Grand Museum. In view of its efforts to preserve its antique legacy, a state-of-the-art venue slated to open later this year.
The Pharaoh’s ship
The Solar Boat, thought to have been built for King Khufu and buried in a hole at the foot of the Great Pyramid of Giza about 2500 BCE, was discovered in 1954 by Egyptologist Kamal el-Mallakh, the world’s oldest undamaged ship. The Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities, in partnership with a consortium of Belgium’s Besix and Egypt’s Orascom Construction, undertook the delicate operation to relocate the boat to its new home, which took six months to prepare for the 10-hour trip.
“The project to transport the first Khufu boat aims to preserve the largest, oldest and most important organic relic, made of wood, in human history, which is more than 4600 years old, and to display it in a proper manner commensurate with its importance in the Grand Egyptian Museum,” said the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities.
The 45-ton ship, which measures 143 feet in length and 19 feet in width, was transferred to its new home by a self-propelled modular transporter that arrived at a pace of one kilometer per hour. The Grand Egyptian Museum is one of the world’s most significant structures, holding the Tutankhamun treasure, exhibiting for the first time since its discovery in 1922.
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Source: Maritime Executive
