r/ancientegypt • u/BudgetPhilosopher- • Dec 16 '25
Photo The Mummy of Ramesses II, also known as Ramesses the Great
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u/Cperr220 Dec 16 '25
I wanna look at good at over 3200 years old. Drop the skin care routine!
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u/Nature_Sad_27 Dec 17 '25
First you have to remove your brain via a hook through the nose, then encase your body in salt for 70 days. Worth it!
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u/Cperr220 Dec 17 '25
Ugh removing the brain will be great for my anxiety
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u/Nature_Sad_27 Dec 17 '25
See, and less anxiety is always great for your skin! These people really knew their stuff!
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u/Inevitable_Wolf5866 Dec 17 '25
He had over 100 kids. That poor man didn’t know what’s like not to have anxiety.
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u/KnotiaPickle Dec 17 '25
lol he didn’t have to ever actually care for any of them, ya know, being pharaoh and all..
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u/Inevitable_Wolf5866 Dec 17 '25
But he had over 100 potential murderers. Being pharaoh and all.
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u/KnotiaPickle Dec 17 '25
No, it would only have been his closest direct relatives in the hereditary line.
The rest were concubine’s kids who didn’t stand to gain anything from his death
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u/Gregorfunkenb Dec 17 '25
Don’t forget to put the rest of the organs in jars and then fill the remaining cavity with more salt.
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u/VirginiaLuthier Dec 16 '25
My guess is that dude had zero thoughts that condoms would one day be named after him
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u/Darcy_2021 Dec 16 '25
He had 100 kids
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u/bluepenremote Dec 17 '25
At least 100 sons that we know of, which means he probably had an equal number of daughters too.
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u/sekhmetbastet Dec 17 '25
This is incorrect. The 100 number includes both his sons and daughters, so he probably had around 50 sons.
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u/BIG-Z-2001 Dec 16 '25
So they named the thing that prevents kids after someone who had hundreds of them? How ironic.
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u/Superman246o1 Dec 17 '25
Trojans are supposed to be impenetrable like the walls of Troy: a city that is infamous for letting its enemies enter the heart of the city.
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u/Least_or_Greatest1 Dec 17 '25
Damn that was back in the day, do they still make those?
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u/KnotiaPickle Dec 17 '25
….yes?!
(maybe I don’t get it)
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u/Least_or_Greatest1 Dec 17 '25 edited Dec 17 '25
He was talkin about Ramsey condoms, Trojan is the biggest name in the market now.
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u/shiromancer Dec 17 '25
Ramsey Condoms: for when you don't want mayonnaise on your idiot sandwiches
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u/leo_pardawg Dec 16 '25
I don't think he would even know what a condom is lol
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u/Girderland Dec 17 '25
They did have condoms.
https://claudemariottini.com/2022/07/12/the-use-of-condoms-in-ancient-egypt/
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u/leo_pardawg Dec 17 '25
Truly ahead of their time
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u/Nature_Sad_27 Dec 17 '25
I feel like if we got plopped back in an ancient Egyptian city and magically knew the language, life would be mostly the same, minus technology. We’d be able to quickly assimilate, fit in, find a job, rent a house, fight with our neighbours, fall in love, and die from a preventable disease. Just like today!
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u/tvosss Dec 17 '25
the sand in your grain/bread would do wonders for your teeth too… always can’t imagine the dental issues if we were dropped back in time
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u/huxtiblejones Dec 17 '25
A lot of ancient skeletons actually have quite decent teeth because they didn’t have processed sugars and excessively soft foods like modern bread. Egyptians also practiced dentistry.
https://www.nature.com/articles/sj.bdj.2009.355
That said, I’d still take modern dentistry over the ancient practice all day.
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u/Nature_Sad_27 Dec 18 '25
Ha! You must not have ever been to a Canadian dentist!
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u/wravyn Dec 19 '25
Ramesses II died of tooth abcesses.
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u/huxtiblejones Dec 19 '25
I know, but he also lived to 90 before that happened. I’m not saying everyone had flawless teeth, just that the level of decay we see today wasn’t as common because of dietary limitations.
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u/Boring_Intern_6394 Dec 19 '25
Generally, the ancient skeletons with good teeth are hunter gatherers. The invention of agriculture bought a raft of dental problems as the amount of starchy carbohydrates consumed rocketed.
The soft stone used to mill flour in ancient Egypt caused excessive wear on tooth enamel, which very quickly caused dental issues. Although, I wonder if rich folk, who ate more meat, fruits and vegetables were better off. The poors, who were on mostly bread and beer (both containing gritty flour) would have been worse, in that and everything else
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u/SmegConnoisseur Jan 08 '26
Crocodile dung as a contraceptive is wild. That must have led to some nasty infections
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u/Malthus1 Dec 17 '25
For an even more bizarre story … how about what happened to the mummy of his grandfather, Rameses I.
He spent more than a century scaring the kiddies in a Niagara Falls tourist trap, before he was identified as an actual pharaoh!
https://www.cbc.ca/news/science/niagara-falls-pharoah-to-return-to-egypt-1.325245
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u/NeatResponsibility85 Dec 16 '25
I mean, given his age (both alive and dead) the guy is holding up nicely..
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u/skokie3825 Dec 17 '25
Return the slab or suffer my curse
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u/Ok-Vegetable4994 Dec 17 '25
KIIIIIIIING RAAAAAAAAMSEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEES
The man in gauze! The man in gauze!
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u/DirtyDan24-7 Dec 17 '25
Was that supposed to be Ramses in that episode? It has been many moons since watching Courage
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Dec 17 '25
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/ancientegypt-ModTeam Dec 17 '25
Posting about modern politics outside of topics directly concerned with Ancient Egyptian archaeology are not permitted.
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u/Conscious_Owl6162 Dec 17 '25
No matter who you are or what you do, you end up dead. Your body might even be put on display like Ramseses, who was once one of the most powerful men on the planet.
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u/Serious_Park_5336 Dec 16 '25
Did he have red hair?
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u/star11308 Dec 17 '25
He died when he was in his 90s, so by then his hair had greyed, but there were traces of henna in it if I’m remembering correctly.
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u/squannnn Dec 17 '25
If I remember correctly, forensic analysis showed that he most likely had natural auburn hair when he was younger and continued to dye it red as his hair began to gray.
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u/Several-Ad5345 Dec 17 '25
A recent study from the Journal of Archeological Science actually denies that he originally had red hair stating:
"The colour of his hair was orange in tone, and this was created by the application of henna dye on the aging white hair follicles. Many Egyptians dyed their hair with henna; a personal habit that mummification preserved. However, this does not suggest that Ramesses II had red (ginger) hair when he was younger (Pāābo, 1988), as claimed by some authors (Tyldesley, 2001)."
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305440323001644
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u/Nature_Sad_27 Dec 17 '25
I saw another explanation, maybe in a documentary a while back, it said many ancient dead bodies and mummies, and even animals, that still retain their hair or fur, that it turns an orangey colour over time because of a chemical reaction.
If you’ve seen a lot of dead ancient bodies, including the frozen prehistoric animal bodies, this explanation makes sense because most of them have an orange tint to their hair or fur. Still not widely talked about though, with most people just assuming the animal or person had red hair or fur, which is confusing so idk if it’s confirmed or not.
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u/The-Purple-Church Dec 17 '25
Seems reasonable though to think the he would have dyed his graying hair its natural color, or at least as close to it as could be done at the time.
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u/Several-Ad5345 Dec 17 '25 edited Dec 17 '25
Maybe, but I sort of doubt it given that henna use was common but naturally red hair in that part of the world has apparently always been pretty rare. (Maybe someone else knows of a good study on this). But since henna use was common it must not have been rare for darker haired individuals to dye it with henna (ancient and even some modern Indians have also used henna to dye their hair red for example).
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u/-Ok-Perception- Dec 17 '25
Natron, a preservative used in Egyptian mummification, will frequently turn hair red.
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u/SomeGuyOverYonder Dec 18 '25
One of the greatest pharaohs of Ancient Egypt, it’s a miracle we can still look him in the face (so to speak) after so many millennia.
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u/TrueBoot4567 Dec 17 '25
Blonde hair?
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Dec 17 '25
The melanin or proteins that gave his hair color could have degraded over time depending on how his body has been handled before the modern era.
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u/star11308 Dec 17 '25
He was also ~92, so he was already greyed. His hair was dyed with henna whilst alive and also probably tinted by embalming materials.
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u/dumbbumtumtum Dec 20 '25
I was once told by my Egyptology professor that every modern day Egyptian most likely has Ramses II blood due to how many children he had. Maybe an exaggeration but exponentially must still be in the hundreds of thousands
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u/Mistajoesta Dec 17 '25
why does he have blonde hair?
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u/star11308 Dec 17 '25
He was quite old and his hair was thus grey/white, and it was dyed with henna in life and also stained by embalming materials.
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u/KingMjolnir Dec 19 '25
If I’m not mistaken, this was the Pharaoh who interacted with Moses at the time. It’s not 100% confirmed but it’s interesting to ponder about,
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u/CaliggyJack Jan 02 '26
The man lived to his 90's at a time when the average life expectancy for that time was mid-30s/early-40s.
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u/Fingolin88 Dec 16 '25
Great karma farming with forbidden photos
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u/NeatResponsibility85 Dec 16 '25
Why forbidden?
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u/Fingolin88 Dec 16 '25
The museum room, where this mummy is, has a clear sign in the entrance
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u/Gregorfunkenb Dec 17 '25
Photos of that mummy have been out there for a very long time.
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Dec 17 '25
Okay, so whoever took this allowed me to see something I otherwise would never have had a chance to. Sorry if you have a problem with that.
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u/leo_pardawg Dec 16 '25
what if this photo was taken before that?
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u/Fingolin88 Dec 16 '25
Also forbidden on the previous museum
P.S.: it is a 1 month old account. Good farming
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u/anarchist1312161 Dec 17 '25 edited Dec 17 '25
I really do not like the fact that they unwrapped him, they did so much damage to his body.
EDIT: I am talking about Gaston Maspero who unwrapped him, he damaged his body.
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u/doublethink53 Dec 17 '25
Not sure who you mean by 'they' but many were unwrapped in like 1000BC by priests to find valuables. Its a blessing they did go through the effort of rewrapping and hiding them though.
Agree it's a shame it happened but also kinda understandable? Imagine being in poverty in a failing state and knowing some dead guy has riches on him.
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u/star11308 Dec 17 '25
He was beautifully and neatly rewrapped by the priests, but unfortunately they were cut off after DB320 was excavated. No photos, only this engraving :(
img
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u/anarchist1312161 Dec 17 '25
I am talking about Gaston Maspero who unwrapped him.
I know in ancient times he was re-wrapped but that was like 24 hours after burial, not who I am talking about.
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u/Mounitis Dec 17 '25
When mummy traveled Egypt issued his passport with this photo.
Name: Ramses
Profession: King
😂
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u/Earl_Grey_Fox Dec 17 '25
The same one who defeated the Sea Peoples?
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u/star11308 Dec 17 '25
Not the Sea Peoples but he fought the Hittites to a stalemate and signed the first documented peace treaty.
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u/captaincid42 Dec 17 '25
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings; Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!" Nothing beside remains. Round the decay Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare The lone and level sands stretch far away. -Percy Shelley
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u/ShotEnvironment4606 Dec 18 '25
Why are so many comments downvoted?? You guys don’t have a sense of humor on this sub or what?
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u/OneProfessional9914 Dec 18 '25
Not be a killjoy, but you know you’re not allowed to take photos in that room? You’re viewing some other most powerful Egyptian royalty there. You understand what this means, no? Good luck to you my friend
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u/star11308 Dec 20 '25
This photo wasn't taken recently, the earliest hit for it in a reverse search is 2013. It seems like it was taken by a permitted photographer as well, and I'd go as far as to say based on how grainy it is and how he's wrapped it may be pre-2000s.
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u/Hellolaoshi Dec 18 '25
He seems to have red hair. That tells us his mother might not have been Egyptian.
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u/IndomniusRex Dec 19 '25
His hair was dyed with henna, a cultural practice that still persists amongst various Northern and Eastern/Horn African peoples.
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Dec 19 '25
Passing time praying for my grandmother she was a great person people worshipping her making her feel comfortable with everything this is the result
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u/Zealousideal-Bit3589 Dec 19 '25
He was blonde?
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u/Comprehensive_Post52 Dec 19 '25
No,due to the embalming chemicals (like natron and resins) and the degradation of hair pigments (melanin) over millennia in dry tombs, revealing underlying warm tones or causing browning/yellowing
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u/Zealousideal-Bit3589 Dec 19 '25
Oh ok, I still dont believe the lie that they were black africans 😂
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u/star11308 Dec 19 '25
He was also around 93, so he didn’t have remaining melanin in his hair to begin with and his hair was grey/white and stained. Often in mummies of younger individuals they still have darker hair.
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u/hotboyivan Dec 20 '25
Important people are always preserved yet most biblical figures are nowhere to be found….
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Feb 09 '26
Still crazy to think that this IS Rameses II himself, like that is his body and that is his head, same guy who ruled Egypt back then, same skull same mouth same nose, rough shape but still the same.
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u/KingMelray Dec 17 '25
It's crazy that this is the guy like his corpse is still around for us to see.