Original subtitles

NARRATOR: Abu Simbel,

the most breathtaking temple of Ancient Egypt.

A colossal monument,

shaped from stone to honour the man

who ordered its construction...

.. Ramses II, also known as Ramses the Great,

his image carved into the temple's entrance.

Ramses II is Ancient Egypt's most well-known pharaoh.

Even his face seems familiar,

thanks to his astonishingly well-preserved mummy.

In addition to Abu Simbel,

Egypt has Ramses to thank for dozens of temples

and hundreds of statues.

And he left his mark at Karnak

where his memorial temple was described in antiquity

as "the most majestic of all".

But it was said that according to the ancient texts,

the most magnificent achievement of this builder and pharaoh

was his capital, Pi-Ramses...

..a forgotten city whose splendour can only be imagined

through the words of ancient texts.

There stood extravagant temples and palaces,

testaments to the power of a monarch.

The walls of his monuments documented his conquests,

but his legacy is far greater.

The exact location of this city remained unknown

until the 20th century.

And today, thousands of years after its peak,

the remains of ancient Pi-Ramses

are being meticulously excavated by archaeologists

who are gradually revealing the secrets

of this legendary lost city.

Qantir is a farming village located in the Nile Delta,

about three hours' drive northeast of Cairo.

It is a long way from the more well-known archaeological sites

at Giza or the Valley of the Kings,

which are located further south.

Here, there are no ruins of temples, no monuments.

Only a mix of open fields and assorted residential areas .

And yet it is here that archaeologists are unearthing

the remains of Pi-Ramses.

German professor Henning Franzmeier

leads this international team.

Henning first visited this site in 2005

while he was still a student.

He has participated in each of the excavation campaigns since.

(assistant speaking Arabic)

- When we excavated here five years ago,

with a very small excavation on the other side of this field,

we found also sand like this,

but we did not really understand what it was.

Just by excavating now here, we really know what is it.

It's actually a wall or what is left of it, it's a foundation trench.

NARRATOR: Foundations which are anything but ordinary.

Their width and depth are surprisingly large,

suggesting the existence of a significant building.

A temple perhaps? Or even a palace.

- It's a very huge wall, it's more than two and a half meters wide

and this already shows that it's a huge building.

And it's the first such huge and monumental building

that we ever excavated here in Qantir

over the past 40 years.

NARRATOR: Since the beginning of the 1980s,

excavation campaigns have continued here, one after another.

Excavations which have revealed a multitude of objects

that all link Qantir to the pharaoh Ramses II.

Most of the artefacts are kept here,

a few kilometres from the site,

in a secure warehouse under the custody of the Egyptian police.

(both speak Arabic)

NARRATOR: Typically, no-one is allowed to enter this space,

not even archaeologists.

But Henning Franzmeier has been granted special permission

to make an inventory of some of the objects,

which will later be exhibited in the Cairo Museum.

Many of the objects were discovered before he began working on the site,

so this will be his first opportunity to see them up close.

- It's some of the best finds of the last 40 years.

This is also very special kind of sparrow arrowhead.

NARRATOR: Remarkably preserved pieces of weaponry, pottery,

as well as bas-reliefs and sculptures.

The objects unearthed at Qantir over the decades

are exceptional in their variety.

They are irreplaceable

and priceless.

This is a goddess in the shape of a snake with a human head.

And it might have been part of a little shrine

or something like that.

For me it's a bit like Christmas.

Opening presents and such wonderful objects, it's...

This is objects that I know myself often from publications.

Ramses is here on the left and that is the god Amun.

So here we have a typical stela of a king smiting an enemy.

Actually, every Egyptian king is shown like this,

holding by his hand some enemy.

So it's not depicting something that actually happened,

but something that the king has to do as part of his job.

NARRATOR: All of the objects unearthed by archaeologists in Egypt

are the property of the Egyptian State,

and they are preserved onsite.

But this was not always the case.

In the 19th century, and during the first decades of the 20th,

archaeological treasures belonged to those who discovered them.

They were then often sold to the highest bidder.

This is how the Roemer and Pelizaeus Museum

in Hildesheim, northern Germany,

was able to build up a collection of Egyptian antiquities,

many of which came from Qantir,

and almost all of which are directly related to Ramses II.

The Hildesheim Museum is now partly financing

the excavations at Pi-Ramses.

Among the most striking pieces exhibited here

is this series of steles honouring the great pharaoh.

- One thing about this stele

is that they all show Ramses II.

And indeed on this stele, we found often persons

with this particular kind of skirt,

very much related to military persons.

And the king himself in these statues

is somehow referring to a warrior aspect somehow

because he was named Montu-Ta-Uhi.

So what is meant here is a god Mont,

he is a warrior god.

So therefore the statues he made of himself

connected to this warrior god,

to a mighty god who is protecting Egypt.

But also is an aggressive god who frightens the enemies.

NARRATOR: A great warlord crushing his enemies

and terrorising his rivals.

This is how Ramses II is most often represented.

The walls of the temples built during his reign

are adorned with accounts of his military exploits.

But this is a misleading portrayal.

Ramses was much more than the battle-hardened king

that his legend describes.

He was an accomplished monarch, as benevolent in peace

as he was formidable in battle.

FRANZMEIER: I think Ramses was a very pragmatic type.

He was definitely very smart in acting.

He stayed king for 67 years.

And he must have been a good politician in a certain kind of way.

NARRATOR: Ramses II died at the age of 92,

probably in 1213 BCE.

It was the longest reign in Egyptian history.

The longest, and in the minds of the Ancient Egyptians,

the most prosperous.

During his 67-year reign,

Egypt enjoyed 46 years of peace.

Under Ramses II, there was no debating Egypt's power.

And the most obvious manifestation of this power was its capital,

Pi-Ramses.

When arriving in Egypt from the east or the north,

Pi-Ramses was the first big city one would encounter.

There were tracts of housing,

surrounding numerous temples dedicated to the gods,

and colossal statues of the pharaoh.

FRANZMEIER: After just one day of going into the river,

you already arrive at what you would have thought is Egypt.

Big monumental buildings.

You would immediately arrive in the centre of power.

The first thing that a foreigner sees

when coming into Egypt from the north

is the new capital.

NARRATOR: The city was built between two branches of the Nile,

intersected by canals that irrigated its many terraced gardens.

And in the middle, the palace of Ramses II.

And yet this spectacular city, built in just 15 years,

was occupied for less than two centuries,

and no traces of its former grandeur can be found on Earth today.

Every year, Henning Franzmeier and his team return to Qantir

and, plot by plot, try to uncover the remains of this lost city.

This year, it was this section of land that they chose to excavate,

a few hundred square metres, covering the foundations

of a building that must have been particularly impressive.

FRANZMEIER: What we have here, in fact, is the foundation trench

of the walls of this building.

It's about 2.5 metres wide

and between 60 and 80cm deep,

filled with kind of pure sand.

This means you have something like 80 or 90 cubic metres of sand.

They just put in the foundation trenches of the wall here.

So in total they had like six or eight modern trucks of sand,

which, even though it doesn't look that impressive anymore now,

you will be able to understand what kind of effort it took.

And they must have transported it from at least a bit of distance

because directly here we don't have sand.

NARRATOR: At first sight, it's hard to imagine

what kind of building could have required such a quantity of sand

and such large foundations.

But in the keen eyes of the archaeologists,

these trenches already provide some clues.

(camera shutter)

NARRATOR: Seen from above,

the sand-filled trenches seem to trace the outline of a room,

in which the foundations of six enormous columns can be seen.

On one side of the room, a smaller room

with only four columns can be seen.

At the end of the first room, other columns seem to form two rows

which extend beyond the excavation site.

(camera shutter)

NARRATOR: Matthieu Goetz is the team's architect.

For him, these are the remains of a pharaoh's palace.

- (speaks French)

NARRATOR: What Matthew is hoping to find in the palace foundations

is something like this - a brick,

bearing the signature and royal titles of Ramses II,

like this one, discovered at Qantir

and preserved in the Hildesheim Museum.

- It's made from faience.

So that means this was never used as a real brick in a wall.

The purpose of this model brick

potentially was, it was used in the foundation ritual

where the king was somehow performing himself as a builder,

and we have scenes where the king depicted himself

performing foundation rituals,

and we assume other kings did so as well.

(lively chatter)

NARRATOR: Conducting excavations in the Nile Delta

is always very challenging.

More than half of the population of Egypt lives in this region,

in an area that represents barely 3% of the country's territory.

Urban development is rampant

and often conceals ancient remains hidden in the earth.

(general chatter)

NARRATOR: Surrounding the settlements,

farmers grow wheat or rice according to the season.

This agricultural production is vital for a country

that is 96% desert and needs to feed 100 million inhabitants.

Each year, the archaeologists have to negotiate with the farmers

and rent the plots they intend to excavate.

And, each year, they have to change plots.

One might think that this expansion of agricultural land

throughout the 20th century is the reason

why no visible traces of Pi-Ramses' splendour remain.

Yet this is not the case.

It was the Ancient Egyptians themselves who,

less than two centuries after the end of the reign of Ramses II,

destroyed the city.

To understand this, we must travel to San el-Hagar,

20 kilometres north of Qantir, to Tanis,

one of the Nile Delta's most beautiful archaeological sites.

Tanis was the capital of the pharaohs

of the 21st and 22nd dynasties,

approximately two centuries after the death of Ramses II.

However, for decades,

Egyptologists thought that Tanis was Pi-Ramses.

This archaeological misunderstanding lasted

until the middle of the 20th century.

Today, a French team, led by Francois Leclere,

is excavating the remains of Tanis.

- (speaks French)

NARRATOR: His cartouche is engraved in stone.

His silhouette adorns several bas-reliefs.

And many monumental statues dedicated to him...

have been discovered here.

More than enough to mislead the first Egyptologists

who came to work here..

- (speaks French)

NARRATOR: The Bible mentions the name Pi-Ramses several times,

notably in Exodus .

But it never specifies its location.

The region of Tanis is also mentioned in the Bible

and associated with the Exodus.

For a long time, this ambiguity contributed to the confusion

between the two ancient cities.

Then, when several inscriptions mentioning Ramses II were discovered

in Tanis in the 19th century,

the question seemed to be settled:

Tanis and Pi-Ramses were one and the same.

- (speaks French)

NARRATOR: From a 21st-century perspective,

the idea of dismantling ancient monuments to build new ones

may seem sacrilegious.

But in ancient times, it was a common practice.

- (speaks French)

NARRATOR: One of the most striking examples, at Tanis, is found here,

on the remains of a temple gate, erected by Pharaoh Sheshonk III,

four centuries after the death of Ramses II.

This granite block bears the mark of Pharaoh Cheops,

who reigned in the 26th century, 1400 years before Ramses.

This quartzite block is signed by Teti,

who reigned 1,000 years before Ramses II.

These three granite blocks are marked

with the cartouche of Rameses II.

As for this limestone block,

it is signed Sheshonk I,

who reigned three centuries after Rameses II.

Most of these blocks were removed from Pi-Ramses.

- (speaks French)

NARRATOR: In the middle of the 20th century,

archaeologists realised that Ramses' successors

had built the city of Tanis

by dismantling his capital stone by stone.

This reopened the mystery.

Where was the original site of Pi-Ramses?

- And there..

NARRATOR: Regine Schulz is director of the Hildesheim Museum.

She is also an Egyptologist

and is responsible for monitoring the excavations at Pi-Ramses.

REGINE: We had no idea where this place originally would be.

There was no clear understanding where originally this city was,

which was mentioned in several texts.

We have a very clear understanding that it must have been a big area

where this city was located.

NARRATOR: As early as the 1930s,

Egyptian archaeologists were suggesting

that Qantir was the most likely location of Ramses' capital.

But it was not until the 1970s,

with the systematic excavations

carried out by the German archaeologist Edgar Pusch,

that the site of Qantir was definitively identified

as Pi-Ramses.

REGINE: The idea was to find out how big this area might be.

And he talked to Helmut Becker,

who was a specialist for magnetic analysis.

And he was the first one who really worked in Egypt

with this methodology.

Areas they looked at was very big,

altogether two square kilometres.

NARRATOR: These magnetometric analyses,

derived from the then-most advanced medical imaging technologies,

first appeared on excavation sites in the 1990s.

They allow archaeologists to map the subsoil of the areas

they wish to excavate.

To do this, the device measures minute variations

in the magnetic field at ground level.

These variations are caused by the presence of materials

buried within the natural soil...

..the remains of walls, for example, or sand-filled foundation trenches.

REGINE: Looking at the results of the geometric analysis,

they tried to think a bit about how big the city could have been,

and most probably ten to 12 square kilometres.

it's an unbelievable huge ancient city,

the biggest one which we know so far from this time period,

not only in Egypt, in the Mediterranean.

NARRATOR: The dimensions of the structures revealed by magnetometry

left no room for debate.

This colossal city had to be Pi-Ramses.

Three decades later, Henning Franzmeier and his team

are still working from this original map.

It helped them locate what they believe

to be Ramses II's palace,

where they are currently carrying out their excavation campaign.

- (speaks German)

NARRATOR: According to the data from the magnetometer,

the city of Pi-Ramses was enormous for its time.

It is therefore likely that Ramses had multiple palaces there,

each serving a different purpose.

What kind of role could the palace on which Henning and his team

are currently working, have played?

REGINE: Until now it has been speculation.

It's a very very huge palace

and therefore it's a little unusual.

It is one of the biggest palaces we know from Egypt.

On the other side, if you are looking how big the city was,

there's no doubt there had been other palaces

and also there must have been some temples.

So this means what we have in the moment at different areas,

we know some things about the living areas,

we know some things about the production areas

and now the idea of is to look at a very different area.

NARRATOR: To better understand the nature of the building

they are excavating,

the archaeologists meticulously catalogue

everything they find on the site...

A tiny fragment of pottery could be a decisive clue,

depending on the context in which it was found..

Where exactly was it discovered?

At what depth?

What else is nearby?

Each section of the site is carefully photographed,

drawn and mapped as the excavations proceed.

- (speaks Italian)

NARRATOR: Each discovery is geolocated

using what's called a total station...

-196.

..a surveyor's tool, accurate to the nearest centimetre.

- 191.5.

NARRATOR: Even tiny fragments of pottery

are thoroughly described, measured and referenced.

This work must be carried out as close to the field as possible,

so that no information is lost.

HENNING: Like this, we can put this find slip in a special bag

with the pottery, with the find,

so we will also after a very long time still know where it comes from.

We don't have the need to always keep up with data.

Even if we are not here for 20 years,

we will still be able to identify what we have.

NARRATOR: But in addition to this old-fashioned work,

the archaeologists also rely on modern techniques

to create the most complete record possible.

And one technique that has emerged over the last decade

has completely revolutionised the work of archaeologists...

Photogrammetry.

(camera shutter)

- (speaks French)

NARRATOR: The principle is simple:

You take as many high-definition photos as you need

to capture the surface you want to model in 3D,

varying the angles of the shots.

An exercise that sometimes leads the archaeologist

to perform a strange kind of dance.

- You mustn't forget anything.

That's why it's good to have a certain rhythm,

a certain way to do it.

Especially around the corners, you have to go back and forward again.

NARRATOR: Frank is a digitalisation specialist on the team.

He is responsible for modelling the photogrammetric images.

(loudspeaker announcement)

NARRATOR: It's noon. The whole team is about to go to the Dig House,

a home base rented by Henning in the centre of Qantir.

This is where the archaeologists gather to work, sleep

and have their meals.

Working through his lunch break,

Frank Stremke begins to assemble the photos taken the day before.

- The most important thing is to move the camera in between shots.

You cannot just stay like this because then there is no baseline

between photographs which you need to triangulate the distance

to the object.

NARRATOR: To produce this image, for example,

448 photos were taken.

The software analyses them

and identifies all the elements that are common to several photos.

Using a trigonometric formula, it then stitches them together.

In this case, it detected ten million overlapping points.

- This one is used to calculate the camera positions.

So the blue area here, the blue patches,

is where the camera was positioned.

And in the next step it reverses the calculation

and calculates outside world points based on the camera position.

It's a circle. It's magic, but it works! (laughs)

Over the last ten years or so, it has really changed archaeology.

NARRATOR: Thanks to the photogrammetric modelling,

archaeologists can now view all the physical data from the field

on a computer screen.

They can observe a wall, an object or a trench

from angles that would be difficult to achieve in real life.

With a few clicks, they can make every possible measurement

with pinpoint accuracy...

- (speaks French)

NARRATOR: Material evidence such as the base of a column,

which could have helped the archaeologists,

is missing from the excavation site.

But based on what has been found in other palaces in Egypt,

Henning Franzmeier offers a hypothesis.

- The idea is that we have such big walls, such large walls

because the rooms inside the building might have been vaulted.

It was one the one hand a high building, a really tall building

where the room inside must have reached six, seven meters of height,

but also there might have been vaults as a ceiling.

NARRATOR: If Henning's hypothesis is correct,

the throne room of the palace must have looked like this.

Above the six sand-filled foundation holes, domed column bases,

like this.

Above them, the columns themselves, carved in stone

and topped with a rounded capital.

The whole thing was probably seven metres high.

The monumental columns may have resembled this one, found in Tanis,

one which perhaps may have come from the palace itself.

Above the columns, decorated with painted motifs,

a triple vault..

According to Henning, the massive pressure exerted by this vault

and the height of the building

justify the thickness of the 2.5-metre walls,

walls decorated with bas-reliefs, featuring the king and the gods,

like these, also from Tanis.

Imagine the feeling of entering this imposing throne room

and walking between these columns toward the king.

The power of Ramses, embodied by this dramatic architecture,

overwhelmed everyone he received.

Everything confirms what the ancient texts describe.

it was here that Ramses II chose to establish

the central hub of his rule.

But why choose such an unconventional location,

compared to Thebes, the ancient capital?

And why choose a place so far from Upper Egypt

and its architectural treasures?

Some answers have been provided

since the initial excavations carried out by Edgar Pusch

at Qantir...

Evidence of an extensive weapons manufacturing industry

REGINE: What was here is so unusual,

it's something that Pusch defined as assembly line workshops.

This means it's not one small workshop besides the other.

It's really huge production area planned as a unit.

And that showed us also that it was very essential

to have a huge production for the army,

to protect the influence of the Ramses emperors

through this area.

- 252. This is here.

NARRATOR: This hypothesis is confirmed

by a number of artefacts discovered by archaeologists

in the remains of these workshops.

- What we have here is objects, for instance relating to workshops

where arms were produced,

and so what we can see is the metal weapons

that are amongst the best that were found in Egypt.

Here we have a kind of harpoon, really a beautiful piece,

and an arrowhead, a kind of winged arrowhead

made of bronze, and this is really hi-tech of the late Bronze Age.

We in fact have evidence now

that not for the troops themselves,

but for the production of weapons

that these troops might have used.

NARRATOR: Another relic is even more significant -

a remnant from an exceptional military building.

- So this is a fragment of a door lintel from the royal stable.

so what we see here is a horse

and the names of Ramses II.

Ra-me-su...

There's s missing, but it's the God Amun.

So it's Ramses beloved of Amun.

Over every box in the stables, boxes of six horses

and there were dozens of these.

Over every box there was a door lintel like this

with a horse, kind of adoring the names of the king, of Ramses.

NARRATOR: Once again, magnetometry was used to discover these stables.

And it took Edgar Pusch 12 years to uncover them.

REGINE: Nothing like this had been discovered before in Egypt

or in other places.

So everyone was very excited

and this was also one of the reasons

why then immediately the idea came up

to start excavation in this place.

NARRATOR: These stables, the largest ever discovered in Egypt,

covered an area of 14,000 square metres.

They were divided into five rows of ten stalls.

Each row ended with a 250 square metre room,

which was used by the stablemen.

The ceiling of this room was supported by ten columns,

modelled after palm trees.

The stables were accessed through an impressive entrance,

supported by four columns,

decorated with the cartouche of Ramses II,

and bas-reliefs representing the pharaoh conquering his enemies.

Each stall could hold six horses.

Their urine was collected and used to tan leather.

At the back of the stalls, a rough sleeping area

could accommodate a stablehand.

When full, these stables could house up to 460 horses.

When Edgar Pusch excavated this site,

he discovered several objects related to the horses,

such as this bronze bridle, incredibly well preserved

after 3,000 years underground.

As well as these parts carved in stone -

ornaments, decorating the war chariots pulled by...

the horses of Ramses II.

REGINE: We have not found full chariots,

but we did find a lot of parts of the chariot,

parts which were made on one side of course from stone,

but also from other materials.

And by looking for all this material,

we could find out that they belonged to a huge production of chariotries,

and we also could reconstruct them.

This was also very interesting,

because they look a little bit different.

NARRATOR: War chariots were the weapons of choice

for the pharaoh's shock troops.

It was a fearsome weapon, designed for battle.

But to battle whom?

In this case, the geographical location of Pi-Ramses

provides some clues.

REGINE: Besides the Egyptian empire,

there was a second huge empire, the empire of the Hittites.

They were opponents of course

and both interested in the eastern Mediterranean area,

particularly in the east.

They wanted to have influence to this area,

not only for trade, but also for their natural resources,

and therefore there was a strong competition

and this was really dangerous.

NARRATOR: When Ramses II ascended the throne of Egypt,

the Hittites already controlled the territories of present-day Syria

and Lebanon.

If they succeeded in conquering Palestine,

Egypt would soon be under their control as well.

REGINE: I think this is one of the main reasons

why it became so important to have a capital

which is more near to this area,

a capital in the east part of Egypt,

a place where any kind of arms,

any kind of chariots,

the horses are available as quick as possible

if there is any kind of danger from the Hittites

to influence this area in a way the Egyptians don't like.

(clamour)

NARRATOR: We now know why Ramses II chose to build his capital

so far away from the traditional centres of Pharaonic power:

He wanted to block the threatening advance of the Hittite empire.

But archaeologists are only just beginning

to unravel the mysteries of Ramses' forgotten city.

Was it only a garrison town?

And if so, why was it so large?

Why did Ramses build a palace there?

In Qantir, Henning Franzmeier's team

continues to dig in search of answers.

Subtitles by Sky Access Services