Treasures of the Pharaohs at the de Young
Travel Back to Ancient Egypt at the de Young
A treasure hunt for grown-ups through glittering gold, mysterious gods, royal ambition and the everyday lives of ancient Egyptians.
By Robert McKean
Treasures of the Pharaohs, de Young museum, San Francisco
August 1, 2026–January 31, 2027
Egyptian Museum, Cairo / Luxor Museum. Photograph by Massimo Listri.
Imagine standing face-to-face with a king who lived more than 4,500 years ago. His eyes look straight ahead, his body is carved from stone and he stands between two Egyptian deities. All three figures advance with their left feet, as though they are still moving toward eternity.
That is how visitors begin their journey through Treasures of the Pharaohs, an extraordinary exhibition at the de Young museum in Golden Gate Park. Featuring 130 ancient objects, the exhibition spans more than 3,000 years of Egyptian history through monumental sculpture, gilded coffins, royal jewelry, household objects, religious imagery and discoveries from a recently excavated city.
The exhibition is serious in scale and scholarship, but that does not mean it must be approached solemnly. In fact, one of the most rewarding ways to experience it is with a sense of play.
Look for recurring symbols. Compare the faces of kings and workers. Search for animals hidden in jewelry. Imagine the weight of a nine-and-a-half-pound gold necklace resting on your shoulders. Decide which object you would rescue first if the galleries suddenly vanished.
The great pleasure of the exhibition lies not only in admiring ancient masterpieces, but in learning how to look closely—and having fun while doing it.
More Than Mummies and Gold
Egyptian Museum, Cairo. Photograph by Massimo Listri.
The exhibition opens with the towering Triad of Menkaure. The pharaoh stands between the goddess Hathor and another deity, composed and physically idealized. The three figures appear calm, powerful and permanently prepared to rule.
Ancient Egyptians understood the pharaoh as far more than a political leader. He served as an intermediary between the human and divine worlds, responsible for maintaining order, pleasing the gods and protecting the prosperity of Egypt.
From this monumental introduction, the exhibition moves through six thematic sections examining royal authority, the people who served the pharaoh, religious beliefs, daily life, discoveries from the Golden City and preparations for death and the afterlife.
The gold is spectacular, but some of the exhibition’s most affecting objects portray ordinary work. Look for a scribe reading from a papyrus scroll, a worker brewing beer and a carpenter named Inty-Shedu whose painted eyes remain strikingly lifelike.
These figures quietly challenge the traditional focus on kings and tombs. Ancient Egypt was built by thousands of laborers, artists, brewers, farmers, administrators, scribes and craftspeople whose names rarely appear in popular histories.
“Never has this happened in our land since the time of the gods.”
This phrase, associated with royal announcements, was a way of declaring that an achievement was unprecedented, miraculous or almost beyond belief. In contemporary terms, it was excellent branding.
A Coffin That Still Glitters
One of the exhibition’s unforgettable sights is the gilded outer coffin of Thuya. Its face and hands are covered in gold, while its eyes are formed from pale calcite and dark obsidian. Across the surface, the wings of Nut, goddess of the sky, extend protectively over Thuya’s body.
The craftsmanship is immediately impressive, but the family history makes the coffin even more compelling.
Thuya and her husband, Yuya, were not pharaohs, yet they occupied a remarkably influential position within the royal family. Their daughter became Queen Tiye, one of the most powerful women of the 18th Dynasty, and their great-grandson was Tutankhamun.
When the tomb of Yuya and Thuya was entered in the early 20th century, it was among the most complete burials then discovered in the Valley of the Kings. An American associated with the excavation later recalled that the first thing he could distinguish in the darkness was the glitter of gold.
Standing before Thuya’s coffin, consider what a burial can reveal beyond death. Coffins, clothing, furniture and personal possessions offer evidence of family relationships, social status, artistic practices, religious beliefs and ideas about memory.
Look more closely: Are we seeing an object made for a person, or an object made for the version of that person intended to last forever?
A Warrior Queen and Three Golden Flies
Another royal treasure tells a story that is easy to miss without looking closely.
Queen Ahhotep II was buried with a necklace featuring three golden flies. To a modern observer, flies may seem like an odd choice for precious jewelry. In ancient Egypt, however, they represented persistence and courage. Flies were tireless, tenacious and extremely difficult to drive away.
The golden flies were a form of military recognition sometimes described as the “gold of valor.” Their presence suggests that Ahhotep was remembered not simply as a queen and mother of kings, but as a leader associated with bravery during a period of conflict.
It is also an invitation to consider how cultural symbols change. The same insect that might annoy someone at a picnic could become an emblem of endurance in another time and place.
Ask your companions: Which animal, bird or insect would you choose to represent courage today—and what would that choice say about you?
The World’s Heaviest Ancient Necklace
Egyptian Museum, Cairo. Photograph by Massimo Listri.
The broad gold collar of King Psusennes I contains more than 6,000 beads arranged in seven rows and weighs approximately nine and a half pounds.
To understand the scale, imagine wearing a necklace about as heavy as a large house cat.
The collar is considered the heaviest known piece of jewelry from the ancient world. It is an astonishing display of wealth, but its significance extends beyond ornamentation.
Gold did not corrode or decay, qualities that connected it to permanence, the sun and the gods. Ancient Egyptians described gold as the flesh of the gods, making it an especially powerful material for royal burials and transformation in the afterlife.
The piece also raises a practical question: Was it truly meant to be worn, or was its weight itself part of the message? Its excess communicates status, divine association and eternal authority before the viewer reads a single word.
Finding the Families Behind the Pharaohs
Not every memorable object is covered in gold.
A black-granite statue of Sennefer, the mayor of Thebes, shows him seated closely beside his wife, Senetnay, with their daughter positioned between them. Although the family lived roughly 3,400 years ago, the intimacy of the pose feels familiar.
The statue is especially notable because it records the names of the sculptors who created it. That detail encourages visitors to look beyond the subjects of ancient art and consider the people responsible for making it.
How long did it take to carve? How many assistants helped? What tools were used? Did the family approve the likeness? Did the artists feel pride when their own names were inscribed?
Another personal object is the armchair of Princess Sitamun. The chair bears evidence of actual use rather than having been created solely as burial furniture. Sitamun later placed it in the tomb of her grandparents, perhaps as a gift, a memory or a means of preserving her presence in their afterlife.
Such objects make the ancient world feel less remote. The exhibition’s subjects were not merely rulers and officials. They were spouses, children, grandparents, artists and workers who worried about legacy, affection, status and remembrance.
The Pharaoh Who Changed the Gods
One relief depicts Pharaoh Akhenaten and Queen Nefertiti worshipping Aten, represented by the disk of the sun. Rays extend toward the royal family, ending in tiny hands that present ankhs, symbols of life.
Akhenaten attempted one of the most dramatic religious and political transformations in Egyptian history. He elevated worship of Aten, diminished the traditional pantheon and moved the royal capital to a newly constructed city.
The visual style of his reign also changed. Royal bodies became elongated, family scenes appeared unusually intimate and the sun’s rays reached visibly toward the king, queen and their children.
After Akhenaten’s death, many of his changes were reversed. His son Tutankhamun restored the traditional gods and abandoned the new capital.
While looking at the relief, count the small hands at the ends of the sun rays. Then consider the image as royal communication. Is it primarily devotional, political, domestic—or all three at once?
Discoveries From a Lost Golden City
Some of the exhibition’s newest archaeological material comes from the Golden City, an ancient settlement on the west bank of Luxor uncovered in 2021. Known in antiquity as the “Dazzling Aten,” the city housed workers during the reign of Amenhotep III.
Excavations revealed workshops where residents produced pottery, jewelry, cloth, tools and other goods. Objects on view include sandals, tools and a mold used to create protective eye-shaped amulets.
When Akhenaten moved the capital, the settlement appears to have been abandoned. Everyday objects remained behind, preserving a vivid record of life outside palaces and royal tombs.
This section provides a useful corrective to the popular image of archaeology as a hunt for gold. A broken vessel, worn sandal or ordinary tool can be just as revealing as a royal treasure.
These objects help archaeologists reconstruct how people organized work, prepared food, manufactured goods, moved through their homes and responded to sudden political change.
Play archaeologist: Which object in your kitchen, office or bedroom would tell a future excavator the most about your life?
Looking at Death by Looking at Life
Death and the afterlife are central to the exhibition, but the funerary material often reveals as much about life as it does about burial.
Ancient Egyptians believed death began another stage of existence. Bodies and tombs were prepared carefully because the deceased would require protection, identity and sustenance in the next world.
Food, clothing, furniture, jewelry, amulets and ritual objects were placed in tombs not merely as displays of wealth, but as equipment for eternity.
Rather than approaching the coffins and funerary masks only as macabre curiosities, look for evidence of the living world within them: clothing styles, craftsmanship, family relationships, religious anxieties and personal aspirations.
The desire to be remembered is hardly ancient. The exhibition simply presents that desire in stone, wood, gold and pigment.
Why This Exhibition Is Special
The 130 objects in Treasures of the Pharaohs come from the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, the Luxor Museum and excavations at the Golden City. Together, they span Egyptian history from the earliest dynasties around 3100 BC through the Ptolemaic period.
The de Young presentation is the United States premiere of the international touring exhibition, giving Bay Area visitors an unusual opportunity to see objects that would ordinarily require a journey to Egypt.
The exhibition also arrives at a significant moment for Egyptian museums and archaeology. The Grand Egyptian Museum opened beside the pyramids of Giza in November 2025 after two decades of delays, political upheaval and a global pandemic.
Its opening was staged not as a conventional ribbon-cutting, but as a vast national spectacle. Thousands of drones assembled above the Giza plateau to form the golden death mask of Tutankhamun. Lasers traced the belt of Orion, fireworks illuminated the pyramids and an orchestra accompanied dancers, Coptic hymns and Sufi chants beneath the Sphinx.
The billion-dollar museum covers approximately half a million square meters and holds more than 100,000 artifacts spanning seven millennia. Visitors enter beneath a triangular glass façade and encounter an 11-meter-tall granite colossus of Ramses II.
Its most celebrated galleries bring together the complete burial collection of Tutankhamun—more than 5,000 objects displayed in one place for the first time since Howard Carter entered the king’s tomb in 1922. The golden mask, throne, chariots and nested shrines are presented as a single story rather than as isolated masterpieces.
The museum represents more than an ambitious cultural project. Egyptian officials have described it as an expression of national identity, economic ambition and cultural “soft power”—a statement that the fullest story of ancient Egypt belongs beneath the pyramids where it began.
From Giza to Golden Gate Park
The opening of the Grand Egyptian Museum provides a fitting backdrop for the arrival of Treasures of the Pharaohs in San Francisco. The de Young exhibition offers West Coast audiences a glimpse of the same renewed global attention surrounding Egypt’s royal history, archaeological discoveries and extraordinary artistic legacy.
Read more about the drones above the pyramids, the gathering of kings and dignitaries, the complete reunification of Tutankhamun’s treasures and Egypt’s billion-dollar museum in Gods Over Giza: The Grand Egyptian Museum Opens Beneath the Pyramids from The Monthly.
The de Young exhibition was organized in cooperation with Egypt’s Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities and the Supreme Council of Antiquities. Its audio tour includes commentary from archaeologist Zahi Hawass, who recounts discoveries and provides additional historical context.
Is the Audio Tour Worth It?
The exhibition contains a great deal of visual and historical information. Visitors who prefer a deeper experience will likely find the audio tour worthwhile, particularly for understanding the archaeological context of individual discoveries.
However, it is not necessary to listen to every entry.
A useful strategy is to move through the first gallery without headphones, allowing the scale and appearance of the objects to make an immediate impression. Then use the audio tour selectively for the pieces that intrigue you most.
Museum fatigue is real. Ten carefully observed objects can produce a more satisfying visit than rushing through 130.
A Golden Journey Through History
The de Young has created an exhibition that is visually spectacular without losing sight of the people behind the treasures.
Visitors may arrive expecting pharaohs, coffins and gold, but they also encounter scribes, brewers, carpenters, sculptors, queens, grandparents and children. Monumental art sits beside the evidence of daily labor. Royal propaganda shares space with household furniture and worn sandals.
The final golden funerary mask of King Amenemope brings many of the exhibition’s themes together. Calm, luminous and apparently timeless, it presents the pharaoh not merely as a dead ruler, but as a transformed and eternal being.
Go for the glittering gold. Stay for the political ambition, family stories, hidden symbols and unexpectedly ordinary objects that bring one of history’s most fascinating civilizations to life.
Most importantly, give yourself permission to enjoy it. Search for the tiny hands at the ends of the sunbeams. Choose the necklace you could never lift. Find the object that seems most human.
History is often most memorable when it becomes a game of looking closely.
Treasures of the Pharaohs is on view at the de Young museum in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, from August 1, 2026, through January 31, 2027. It will then travel to the Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth, where it is scheduled to appear from March 14 through September 19, 2027.
Continue Exploring Ancient Egypt
For a family fun museum adventure through Ancient Egypt, read Robert McKean’s family visit notes, A Family Adventure Through Ancient Egypt: Treasures of the Pharaohs at the de Young, published by Parents Press.
To explore the spectacular opening of the Grand Egyptian Museum, the reunification of Tutankhamun’s complete burial collection and Egypt’s effort to reclaim its archaeological story beneath the pyramids, read Gods Over Giza.
Source notes: Exhibition facts, dates, object descriptions, organizing partners and tour itinerary are based on exhibition materials and articles published by The Monthly and provided by the de Young Museum. Images and photographic credits were provided by the de Young Museum and no reproduction is allowed without de Young Museum express permission.
