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Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum facts for kids

Kids Encyclopedia Facts
Rc egyptian museum
The entrance to the Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum, with a statue of Tawaret.

The Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum (REM) is a special place in San Jose, California, USA. It's all about ancient Egypt and is located in Rosicrucian Park. This museum has the biggest collection of ancient Egyptian items in the Western United States. It's supported by a group called the Ancient Mystical Order Rosae Crucis (AMORC), which helps the museum grow and teach people about history and science.

History of the Museum

The person who started AMORC, Harvey Spencer Lewis, loved collecting old things with special meanings. His first Egyptian item was a small statue of the goddess Sekhmet. In 1921, he helped pay for digs in Egypt at a place called Amarna. In return, the Egypt Explorations Society gave AMORC some real Egyptian treasures.

In 1928, Lewis showed his collection to the public. He called it "The Rosicrucian Egyptian Oriental Museum." It was in San Jose because land was cheaper there back then. After Lewis visited Egypt in 1929, the museum got many more items. The collection grew a lot, with over 2,000 exhibits!

Later, in 1966, Harvey Spencer Lewis's son, Ralph Maxwell Lewis, built new buildings for the museum.

At that time, the museum was very special because:

  • It had the largest display of ancient Egyptian items in the Western US.
  • Its buildings were designed to look like ancient Egyptian temples.
  • It had a planetarium next to it, which was one of the first in the United States.
  • The whole park around the museum was designed to look like ancient Egypt.

In 1995, Julie Scott became the director of the museum. The museum now welcomes about 110,000 visitors each year, including many school children. The buildings are also used by the Rosicrucians for quiet thinking and group talks. In 2018, the museum became a "zero-energy building," meaning it produces as much energy as it uses!

Cool Things to See

In 1999, the museum created a traveling exhibit called "Women of the Nile." This show, along with many talks, traveled all over the United States and Canada until 2001. A stone statue of Cleopatra VII from the museum's collection was also shown in big exhibits in Rome, London, and Chicago.

One of the museum's most famous items is a child mummy. In 2005, this mummy traveled to Stanford University to be studied using special CT scans. These scans helped scientists see inside the mummy without unwrapping it. The detailed images were shared on the museum's 75th anniversary. One of these scanning images even won a big science award! In 2017, more x-ray images were released, showing a 3D view of the girl's remains.

A statue of Taweret, an ancient Egyptian goddess who looked like a hippopotamus, used to stand at the entrance. She was the goddess of pregnant women and childbirth. Now, she's moved to the side. Since 2004, the museum has been updated with new themes for its galleries:

The museum also has a very old stone hand ax, which is about 1.5 million years old! But it's not usually shown to the public.

Exploring the Rock-Cut Tomb

The Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum has a special copy of an ancient Egyptian rock-cut tomb. This replica was built using photos and drawings from real tombs in Egypt. It helps visitors feel like they are exploring a real ancient tomb! Inside, you can see scenes from the Book of the Dead, which was a guide for the afterlife in ancient Egypt. The tomb is dark, just like a real one would be.

The Rosicrucian Alchemy Exhibit

Since 2015, the museum has featured The Rosicrucian Alchemy Exhibit. This exhibit celebrates the 100th anniversary of AMORC, the group that runs the museum.

This exhibit takes you on a journey through the seven steps of alchemy. Alchemy was an ancient practice that tried to turn ordinary metals into gold and find ways to live forever. The exhibit has a quiet room for meditation and a full-size copy of an alchemist's workshop. You can also see a copy of the Ripley Scroll, which is an old text with pictures about alchemy.

This exhibit is planned to become the first alchemy museum in the United States and the largest in the world! It will be in the "Rose-Croix University International" building at Rosicrucian Park, which also has a real working alchemy lab.

See also

Kids robot.svg In Spanish: Museo Egipcio Rosacruz para niños

  • List of museums of Egyptian antiquities

Images for kids

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    Rosicrucian Museum grounds

  • Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum grounds2

    Rosicrucian Museum grounds

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    Rosicrucian Museum grounds

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    Rosicrucian Museum sign

  • Early 18th dynasty coffin REM RC 1678 1

    Early 18th dynasty coffin

  • Baboon mummy at Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum

    Baboon mummy. There is in fact no baboon inside, the mummy is formed around a ceramic jar.

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  • Rock cut tomb
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