The Luxor Museum of Ancient Egyptian Art was inaugurated in 1975 in a modern building, specially designed for that purpose by Dr. Mahmud El-Hakim. It is situated on the main street of the tourist center of the city, along the corniche of the Nile. Its well,presented collection consists of objects, mainly statuary and steles, of Theban provenance. Several ancient sites of the general area surrounding Luxor, particularlÿ Sumenu, are also represented. The most important addition to the initial collection was a hoard of large statues representing kings and deities, which were unearthed in the Temple of Luxor in 1989. The cache of statues was accidentally discovered under the pavement of the court of Amenhotep Ill, while the Egyptian authorities were examining the causes of a certain instability of the columns in that court. The new monuments are housed irk-a special gallery, open to the public.
Most of the items in the collection of the Luxor Museum date from the New Kingdom or slightly later. It was, in fact, during this period that the region saw its most spectacular development. The scope of the collection, however, covers the entire pharaonic history as well as the prehistoric, the Graeco-Roman and the Coptic eras.