Medinet Habu is a major archaeological site situated at the foot of the Theban Hills across the River Nile from the modern city of Luxor (ancient Thebes). It's become synonymous with the massive Mortuary Temple of Ramesses III, although it does also feature a number of other important ruins.
The 150 metre-long Mortaury Temple of Ramesses III - which is well preserved, and surrounded by a large mudbrick enclosure - features some 7,000 square metres of decorated wall space. Best known and most important among the inscribed reliefs are those depicting the advent and defeat of the Sea Peoples during the reign of Ramesses III.
Another, much smaller, major structure at Medinet Habu is the Temple of Amun, built by the successive pharaohs Hatshepsut and Thutmose III. It's situated just to the left of the entrance of the mortuary temple, and has been modified multiple times over the centuries right up until the Greco-Roman period.
To the north of the mortuary temple are the badly-preserved remains of the Temple of Ay and Horemheb - the final two pharaohs of the 18th Dynasty. Evidence suggests that King Tut - to whom Ay served as royal vizier - began to have a mortuary temple for himself built at Medinet Habu - two large statues of the boy king have been found there.
The Luxor Museum is a small, purpose-built museum in the Egyptian city of Luxor (ancient Thebes). Inaugurated in 1975, it stands on the corniche, overlooking the west bank of the River Nile in the city centre.
After the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, the Luxor Museum holds the largest collection of items from Tutankhamun's tomb, KV62, in the world. These include his hunting chariot, and various votive weapons. Other key pieces include 26 well-preserved New Kingdom statues, found buried in a cache at Luxor Temple in 1989, the royal mummies of Ahmose I and Ramesses I, and a calcite double statue of the crocodile god Sobek and pharaoh Amenhotep III. Another major attractions is a reconstruction of one of the walls of Akhenaten's temple at Karnak.
The Luxor Museum features a far smaller collection than the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, but this is intentional - the Luxor Museum prides itself on showing a limited number of important pieces in a clear and uncluttered way, with multi-lingual labelling, that does them the best possible justice. The museum is regularly complemented by tourists as presenting a pleasant contrast to the clamour of the over-crowded Egyptian Museum.
Submitted by Sean Williams on Fri, 12/18/2009 - 16:58
"The whole discovery of Tutankhamun needed both ingredients to make it work. It wasn't all Howard Carter, certainly not only Carnarvon. But it needed the two of them." George Herbert, 8th Earl of Carnarvon, ebbs deeper into the bond which drove two of archaeology's greatest characters to the biggest discovery of all time. But how did the two men, so different in background and expertise, even forge such a strong relationship?
George Edward Stanhope Molyneux Herbert, the 5th Earl of Carnarvon, was born at Highclere Castle near Newbury, England, on the 26 June 1866. He was the heir to the lucrative Carnarvon title and fortune - yet he used it to finance a life of daredevil sport, travel and exploration, which led eventually to his discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamun alongside legendary archaeologist Howard Carter in 1922.
Educated at the prestigious Eton College and Cambridge University, Carnarvon took on his title in 1890. His ancestory, and indeed that of his great-grandson the 8th Earl of Carnarvon, can be traced back to King Edward III and Henry VIII. Yet his life of adventure had begun three years before, when in 1887 he developed a passion for sailing that took him across the Atlantic to Buenos Aires. This was no small undertaking at the time; and certainly not in the mould of the traditional British peer.
A multi-national team of Egyptian and European archaeologists excavating at the site of 
Egypt’s Minister of Culture, Farouk Hosni, and Zahi Hawass, Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA), along with the governor of Luxor, Samir Farag, will embark today on an inspection tour along the Avenue of Sphinxes that connects the 
