An Egyptian Villager Stumbled Upon an Inscribed Stone. It Led to a Colossal Head of Ramses II

Khaled el-Shahat Khalil was working on his land in Behbeit el-Hagar, a village in northern Egypt’s Gharbia, when he found an unusual, inscribed stone outside his home. He reported it to the local antiquities authorities, providing the first clue to something extraordinary buried beneath the surface of this ancient landscape.

The initial find prompted an archaeological excavation, as experts set out to determine whether the stone was an isolated relic or part of something much larger. Beneath the plot of…