Amenhotep I - British Museum, London, UK
N 51° 31.129 W 000° 07.575
30U E 699373 N 5711437
This statue of Amenhotep I is displayed in the British Museum in Bloomsbury, London. Amenhotep I was king of Egypt from 1526BC to 1506BC. The museum is free to enter and is open daily 10.00–17.30 Fridays until 20.30.
Waymark Code: WMNBP3
Location: London, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 02/08/2015
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The British Museum's website gives some information about the king:
Amenhotep I, King of Egypt (1525-1504 BC)
Amenhotep I was the second king of the Eighteenth Dynasty. He succeeded his father, Ahmose I, who expelled the Hyksos kings from Egypt. Amenhotep I probably ascended the throne as a child, when his mother Ahmose Nefertari may have acted as regent. Amenhotep I and his mother, Ahmose Nefertari, were revered for nearly five hundred years as local Theban deities.
Little is known of the reign of Amenhotep I. A few events can be established from inscriptions in private tombs. According to the autobiography of a soldier, Ahmose son of Ibana, Amenhotep I led a campaign to Kush. An inscription in the tomb of Ahmose Pen-Nekhbet states that the king also led an expedition to Libya. His chief architect, Ineni, mentions that he commissioned building work at Karnak.
The exact location of the tomb of Amenhotep I at Thebes is unknown, but it is mentioned in the Abbott Papyrus, which documents an inspection of the royal tombs under Ramesses IX. Amenhotep I's mummy was found in the royal cache at Deir el-Bahari in 1881. It was re-wrapped by priests in the Twenty-first Dynasty, and remains the only royal mummy which has not been unwrapped in modern times.
Wikipedia tells us:
Amenhotep I was the second Pharaoh of the 18th dynasty of Egypt. His reign is generally dated from 1526 to 1506 BC. He was a son of Ahmose I and Ahmose-Nefertari, but had at least two elder brothers, Ahmose-ankh and Ahmose Sapair, and was not expected to inherit the throne. However, sometime in the eight years between Ahmose I's 17th regnal year and his death, his heir apparent died and Amenhotep became crown prince. He then acceded to the throne and ruled for about 21 years.
Although his reign is poorly documented, it is possible to piece together a basic history from available evidence. He inherited the kingdom formed by his father's military conquests and maintained dominance over Nubia and the Nile Delta but probably did not attempt to maintain Egyptian power in Syrio-Palestine. He continued the rebuilding of temples in Upper Egypt and revolutionized mortuary complex design by separating his tomb from his mortuary temple, setting a trend in royal funerary monuments which would persist throughout the New Kingdom. After his death, he was deified as a patron god of Deir el-Medina.
In Amenhotep I's ninth regnal year, a heliacal rise of Sothis was observed on the ninth day of the third month of summer. Modern astronomers have calculated that, if the observation was made from Memphis or Heliopolis, such an observation could only have been made on that day in 1537 BC. If the observation was made in Thebes, however, it could only have taken place in 1517. The latter choice is usually accepted as correct since Thebes was the capital during the early 18th dynasty; hence, Amenhotep I is usually given an accession date in 1526 BC, although the possibility of 1546 BC is not entirely dismissed.
Manetho's Epitome states that Amenhotep I ruled Egypt for twenty years and seven months or twenty-one years, depending on the source. While Amenhotep I's highest attested regnal year is only his Year 10, Manetho's statement is confirmed by a passage in the tomb autobiography of a magician named Amenemhet. This explicitly states that he served under Amenhotep I for 21 Years. Thus, in the high chronology, Amenhotep I is given a reign from around 1546 to 1526 BC and, in the low chronology, from around 1526 to 1506 BC or 1525 to 1504 BC, though individual scholars may ascribed dates to his reign that vary from these by a few years.
The museum's information board, next to the 2.7m high limestone statue, tells us:
Statue of Amenhotep I
18th Dynasty, about 1510 BC
From Thebes, Deir el-Bahari
Amenhotep I is here shown as Osiris, god of the dead, wrapped in a tight-fitting robe with his arms crossed on his chest. Holes in the clenched fists were intended to hold wooden royal insignia. The brick temple of Amenhotep I at Deir el-Bahari was dismantled and this statue moved to one side, placed near to the statues of Senwosret III which are also in this gallery.