The Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM) in Cairo held its inaugural event on Saturday, drawing a huge amount of media and online attention to the beautiful new 258,000-square-foot facility with a massive drone and fireworks display.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi hailed the opening of the museum, after almost 20 years of construction, as an “exceptional event in the history of human culture and civilization.”
Sisi said the museum combined “the genius of ancient Egyptians and the creativity of modern Egyptians” in the hope of “enhancing the world culture and art with a new landmark that will attract all those who cherish civilization and knowledge.”
The first stone for the new museum was laid in 2002. Construction began in earnest in 2005, a massive undertaking that involved building roads, rail stations, and even a new airport. Historians believe the Great Pyramid took between 20 and 26 years to complete, so the GEM wound up taking roughly as long to construct.
The museum is located near the Giza Plateau, site of the Sphinx and the famous Great Pyramids, which can easily be seen from the museum grounds, and can be reached with a pedestrian and vehicle bridge.
Construction was greatly delayed by political instability, including the “Arab Spring” disruptions of 2011 and the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic of 2020. President Sisi has championed completion of the project ever since he took power in a 2013 coup, believing the billion-dollar museum would help to build Egypt’s economy, in addition to restoring national pride.
Tourism currently makes up about eight percent of Egypt’s gross domestic product and supplies a great deal of its foreign currency. The GEM is key to an ambitious agenda of nearly doubling Egyptian tourism over the next six years. The GEM itself is expected to draw some five million visitors per year.
The museum began granting limited tours to parts of the facility several years ago, but security and secrecy were increased in the run-up to the grand opening. The Sisi administration declared opening day on Saturday to be a national holiday, and issued a series of commemorative coins and postage stamps.
President Sisi hosted the grand opening event, which was attended by royalty from around the world — from Queen Rania of Jordan to Princess Akiko of Japan.
“We are writing a new chapter of the history of the present and the future in the story of this ancient nation,” Sisi said at the inaugural event.
The completed GEM houses about 100,000 artifacts ranging from small items of historical interest to the fabled treasures of Tutankhamun. The biggest items on display include a 36-foot, 183,000-pound, 3,200-year-old statue of King Rameses II, and a 20-ton, 138-foot, 4,200-year-old boat owned by the pharaoh Khufu.
The boat, whose origins and original purpose remain mysterious, was found buried next to the Great Pyramid that bears Khufu’s name in 1954. It was transported with great care across the five-mile road linking the pyramids to GEM in a ten-hour procession in 2021. Another of Khufu’s “solar boats” will be reconstructed at the museum over the next three years, in full view of museum visitors.
Another massive item on display is an 87-ton obelisk built by Rameses II that stands over 50 feet high.
The star attraction at the museum is the collected display of over 5,000 artifacts from the tomb of Tutankhamun, including the legendary golden mask of the boy king. The full contents have not been displayed together since the tomb was discovered by archaeologist Howard Carter in 1922.
“What sets this apart is not just the full collection, but how it is presented — as a narrative of the king’s life and reign, not as standalone objects, and without visual clutter,” said museum director Ahmed Ghoneim.
Tour guide Ahmed Seddik told the BBC on Saturday that he hoped the new museum would “usher in a new golden age of Egyptology and cultural tourism.”
“I’ve been organizing so many tours to the museum even though it was partially open. Now it will be at the pinnacle of its glory. When the Tutankhamun collection opens, then you can imagine the whole world will come back, because this is an iconic Pharoah, the most famous king of all antiquity,” he said.
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