General Notes

Ramses II (reigned 1279-1212 BC), ancient Egyptian king, third ruler of the 19th Dynasty, the son of Seti I. During the early part of his reign Ramses fought to regain the territory in Africa and western Asia that Egypt had held during the 16th and 15th centuries BC. His principal opponents were the Hittites, a powerful people of Asia Minor, against whom he waged a long war. The major battle of this war was fought in 1274 at Kadesh, in northern Syria, and was hailed by Ramses as a great triumph. Neither power achieved a conclusive victory, however, and in 1258 BC a treaty was signed whereby the contested lands were divided and Ramses agreed to marry the daughter of the Hittite king. The remaining years of his rule were distinguished by the construction of such monuments as the rock-hewn temple of Abu Simbel, the great hypostyle hall in the Temple of Amon at Karnak, and the mortuary temple at Thebes, known as the Ramesseum.
Source: "Ramses II," Microsoft(R) Encarta(R) 98 Encyclopedia. (c) 1993-1997 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
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Abu Simbel, site of two temples in southern Egypt, on the Nile River, south of Aswan. The temples were carved into a sandstone cliff about 1250 BC during the reign of Ramses II. The interior of the larger temple is more than 55 m (about 180 ft) in depth and consists of a series of halls and chambers leading to a central sanctuary. This temple was dedicated by Ramses II to the chief gods of Heliopolis, Memphis, and Thebes. It is oriented so that the rays of the rising sun illuminate the statues of the three gods and of Ramses II in the innermost sanctuary. The smaller temple was dedicated by Ramses to his queen, Nefertari, and to the goddess Hathor. The facade of the larger temple has four sitting statues of Ramses II, each more than 20 m (about 65 ft) in height. Smaller statues of Ramses II, Nefertari, and their children adorn the facade of Nefertari's temple. The larger temple has numerous inscriptions and reliefs, some of them of unusual historical interest. A series of reliefs depicts the battle between the Egyptians and the Hittites at Kadesh. Two of the large sitting statues of Ramses have inscriptions in Greek dating from the 6th century BC. They were written by Greek mercenary soldiers and are among the earliest dated Greek inscriptions.
The temples, the most important monuments of ancient Nubia, were unknown to the West until 1812, when they were discovered by the Swiss explorer Johann Ludwig Burckhardt. In 1964 an international project was begun to save the temples from inundation by Lake Nasser, the reservoir of the Aswan High Dam. In a remarkable engineering feat, the temples were cut apart and, in 1968, reassembled on a site 64 m (210 ft) above the river.
Source: "Abu Simbel," Microsoft(R) Encarta(R) 98 Encyclopedia. (c) 1993-1997 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
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The son of Seti I and Queen Tuya was the third king of the 19th Dynasty. Called Ramesses the Great, he lived to be 96 years old, had 200 wives and concubines, 96 sons and 60 daughters. One son, Prince Kha-m-was, was a high priest of Ptah, governor of Memphis, and was in charge of the restoration of the Pyramid of Unas. This son was buried in The Serapeum. Ramesses II outlived the first thirteen of his heirs. Ramesses was named co-ruler with his father, Seti I, early in his life. He accompanied his father on numerous campaigns in Libya and Nubia. At the age of 22 Ramesses went on a campaign in Nubia with two of his own sons. Seti I and Ramesses built a palace in Avaris where Ramesses I had started a new capital. When Seti I died in 1290 B.C., Ramesses assumed the throne and began a series of wars against the Syrians. The famous Battle of Kadesh is inscribed on the walls of Ramesses temple.

Ramesses' building accomplishments are two temples at Abu Simbel, the hypostyle hall at Karnak, a mortuary complex at Abydos, the Colossus of Ramesses at Memphis, a vast tomb at Thebes, additions at the Luxor Temple, and the famous Ramesseum. Among Ramesses' wives were Nefertari, Queen Istnofret, his two daughters, Binthanath and Merytamon, and the Hittite princess, Maathornefrure. Ramesses was originally buried in the Valley of the Kings. Because of the widespread looting of tombs during the 21st Dynasty the priests removed Ramesses body and took it to a holding area where the valuable materials such, as gold-leaf and semi-precious inlays, were removed. The body was then rewrapped and taken to the tomb of an 18th Dynasty queen, Inhapi. The bodies of Ramesses I and Seti I were done in like fashion and all ended up at the same place. Amenhotep I's body had been placed there as well at an earlier time. Seventy-two hours later, all of the bodies were again moved, this time to the Royal Cache that was inside the tomb of High Priest Pinudjem II. The priests documented all of this on the linen that covered the bodies. This “systematic” looting by the priests was done in the guise of protecting the bodies from the "common" thieves.
Source: www.touregypt.net
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So proud was Ramesses II of his extensive progeny that it would be wrong to omit all reference to the long enumerations of his sons and daughters to be read on the walls of his temples. At Wady es-Sebua in Lower Nubia over a hundred princes and princesses were named, but the many lacunae make it impossible to compute the exact figure. From several temples it is clear that the eldest son was Amenhiwenamef, but his mother is unknown and he evidently died early. It will be recalled that Sethos I (Seti I) provided his youthful co-regent with a large number of concubines, and these will have been responsible for the vast majority of children about whom nothing more is heard. The most highly honored were naturally those born to Ramesses II by his successive King's Great Wives. Queen Isinofre was the mother of four who were depicted together with her and her husband. Foremost among them is Ramesse, at a given moment the crown prince, but it was his younger brother Merenptah, the thirteenth in the Ramesseum list, who survived to succeed his father. Another son who perhaps never had pretensions to the throne was Kha'emwise, the high-priest (setem) of Ptah at Memphis. He gained great celebrity as a learned man and magician, and was remembered right down to Graeco-Roman times. It was doubtless in that capacity that he was charged with the organization of his father's earliest Sed-festivals from the first I year 30 down to the fifth in year 42. Ramesses II lived to celebrate twelve or even thirteen in all. A daughter of Isinofre, who bore the Syrian name of Bint-anat, is of interest for a special reason: she received the title King's Great Wife during her father's lifetime. We cannot overlook the likelihood that she served at least temporarily as his companion. Even more frequent are the references to Queen Nofretari-mery-en-Mut, the Naptera of an already mentioned Baghazkoy letter. She is familiar to Egyptologists as the owner of the magnificently painted tomb in the Valley of the Queens on the west of Thebes. This henceforth, the burial-place of many females of the Ramesside royal family. Ramesses II himself had a tomb at Biban el-Moluk no doubt once as large and fine as that of Sethos I, but now closed owing to its dangerous condition. The great king's mummy suffered a fate similar to that of so many of his predecessors, finally finding its way to the cache at Der el-Bahri. Until moved to the mausoleum at Cairo, his corpse could still be seen as that of a shrivelled-up old man with a long narrow face, massive jaw, and prominent nose, conspicuous also for his admirably well-preserved teeth.
Source: www.touregypt.net