A hospital in Barcelona has developed technology which allows archaeologists to reconstructed the faces of Egyptian of a 2,000-year-old mummy. I’ve looked everywhere for a photo to accompany this story. If you come across any photos, please post the links in A Forum About History and I’ll replace the image above.

Update: Sybil sent in an image captured from this video. Thanks!

According to a report in the Barcelona Reporter, the presentation of the newly reconstructed face was given by Drs Felix Scales, Xavier Perich and Jordi Clos, president of the Egyptian Museum in Barcelona.

They showed the technological advances used in the facial reconstruction process that so far had not been used for archaeology, and the visible effect on the mummy.

Scales said that the project is quite important because thanks to advances in science, it is now possible to probe the internal structure of a mummy without having to open the shroud.

There is also no need to invade the mummy and destroy the original composition.

“It is very different from analyzing tissue straight out of surgery that one from more than 2,000 years ago,” said Scales.

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A 4,000-year-old burial chamber which belongs to an ancient Egyptian queen has been found outside Cairo.

The necropolis of Saqqara outside Cairo has yielded a string of new discoveries as 10 different teams excavate a previously untouched area of these burial grounds were used continuously for more than 2,000 years until Roman times.

French mission head Philippe Collombert said the mummy of Queen Behenu was destroyed, but the chamber contained green hieroglyphics picked out on white stone known as the “Pyramid Texts.”

“We are excited because the texts are well conserved,” he told The Associated Press, adding the queen’s titles were written on the walls of the 33 by 16 foot (10 metre by 5 metre) burial chamber inside her small pyramid.

The text is primarily concerned with protecting the queen’s remains and her transition to afterlife.

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A massive red granite head of Amenhotep III has been unearthed in Luxor. [Thx Saturn]

The 3,000-year-old head of Amenhotep III – grandfather of Tutankhamun – was dug out of the ruins of the pharaoh’s mortuary temple.

Experts say it is the best preserved example of the king’s face ever found.

The 2.5m (8ft) head is part of a larger statue, most of which was found several years ago.

Antiquities officials say the statue is to be reconstructed.

“Other statues have always had something broken – the tip of the nose, or the face is eroded,” said Dr Hourig Sourouzian, who has led the Egyptian-European expedition at the site.

“But here, from the top of the crown to the chin, it is so beautifully carved and polished, nothing is broken.”

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A 3,000-year-old Egyptian sarcophagus which was seized by customs in 2008 is set to return home.

The nearly 5-foot-long wooden coffin was confiscated by U.S. customs officials at Miami International Airport from a Spanish merchant in 2008.

The dealer did not possess the necessary documentation to prove ownership of the artifact.

Suspecting that the object might have left Egypt illegally, U.S. authorities began an investigation.

“They determined that the coffin had left Egypt after 1970 as the earliest public record of the piece dated to 2007 when it was exhibited in Madrid,” Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities said in a statement.

Arrangements are currently underway for the coffin to be handed over Hawass on March 10 in Washington, D.C., during an official gala ceremony.

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The Avenure of Sphinxes in Luxor, Egypt, it undergoing excavation and restoration in order to turn it into part of an open-air museum.

Built by the 30th Dynasty king Nectanebo I (380-362 BC), the avenue is 2,700 meters long and 76 meters wide, and lined with a number of statues in the shape of sphinxes. Queen Hatshepsut recorded on her red chapel in Karnak temple that she built six chapels dedicated to the god Amun-Re on the route of this avenue during her reign, emphasising that it was long a place of religious significance.

The Avenue of Sphinxes is one of the most important archaeological and religious paths in Luxor, as it was the location of important religious ceremonies in ancient times, most notably the Beautiful Feast of Opet.

The Opet Festival was celebrated annually in Thebes, during the New Kingdom period and later. The statues of the gods of the Theban Triad – Amun, Khonsu and Mut – were escorted, hidden from sight in a sacred barque, in a joyous procession down the Avenue of Sphinxes from the temple of Amun in Karnak, to the temple of Luxor in order to relive their marriage.

Dr. Hawass said that developing the Avenue of Sphinxes is part of the SCA’s collaboration with the Luxor government – one of the issues is to tackle air pollution damaging the monuments – to develop the whole city into an open-air museum.

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