By Mursi Saad El-Din I was one of the millions who watched on our national television the journey of Ramses II from the square named after him to the site of the new National Museum. The multitudes of citizens, waving the Egyptian flag and greeting the statue of Ramses the Great, was quite an impressive sight. It was as if they were greeting a national leader, coming back from a military victory. The outpouring of patriotic sentiment and the nostalgia for the greatness of an ancient past were palpable. There was an atmosphere of jubilation and an assertion of Egyptian identity. At last the great Pharaoh will be standing where he belongs. I still remember how in 1955 the statue was carted from Memphis to Cairo, to be used by the Revolution as a symbol of Egyptian greatness, hailing from the distant past. Ramses replaced Mahmoud Mukhtar's "The Renaissance of Egypt", the great artist had sculpted to commemorate the 1919 revolution. One did wonder at the time, though, whether the move signified a repudiation of recent Egyptian history prior to the 1952 Revolution. On my way from Heliopolis to the Ahram Weekly last Saturday, Ramses Square looked barren and pathetic without the Great King. Gone is the time when train passengers came out of the railway station to be greeted by Ramses. I cannot forget an old man appearing on TV, almost crying, saying "I live in the vicinity of Ramses, and on my way to work every day I used to greet him. Whom shall I greet now?". While thousands thronged to watch the journey of the king, I wondered how many of them knew who he was beyond the fact that he had been an Ancient Egyptian king. The sight of the great procession made me rush to pick up my copy of the beautifully-illustrated book Ramses the Great, by TGH James, published by the American University in Cairo Press. James is the author of a dozen books on different aspects of Ancient Egypt, its monuments and arts, and, for a number of years, he was the keeper of Egyptian Antiquities at the British Museum. Ramses is known first as a great fighter, with conquests in Canaan (now Palestine) and other regions. He ascended the throne in 1279 BC and began his reign by concentrating on domestic activities and buildings. In 1272-1271 BC, however, he began a series of military campaigns which climaxed in the battle of Qadesh, against the Hittites in 1275- 1274 BC. In the history of Ancient Egypt, indeed in the history of the ancient world, no records of battles can come anywhere near the records of the battle of Qadesh. It is carved on the walls of the temples of Karnak, the Ramesseum, Abydos and, of course, Abu Simbel. The scenes depict chariots and the infantry of two armies fighting each other. But above all, Ramses is shown single-handedly killing whole regiments. The accompanying words claim that the great king, all by himself, dealt deadly blows to thousands of Hittite soldiers. In the end the two sides realised the folly of war which caused the death of thousands and signed a peace treaty which is regarded as the very first of its kind. Ramses was known to be a great builder, with many temples to his name -- as in Abydos, Karnak, Luxor, the Ramesseum and especially the great temple of Abu Simbel. Our antiquities scattered abroad serve to keep the king's name alive. There is his obelisk standing in the Place de la Concorde in Paris, which was presented by Mohamed Ali to the French nation. Millions of tourists get to see his bust in the British Museum and his artifacts at the Turin Egyptian Museum. So in the end I say to our Great King, hail and farewell!
