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About
The museum presents the ancient history of the isthmus of Suez, revealed by the excavations that accompanied the building of the canal.
Opened in 1932 and funded by the Suez Canal Company, the Ismailia Museum is one of the oldest regional museums in Egypt. It was built to house antiquities discovered during the digging of the Suez Canal and the Sweet Water Canal, notably from Tell el-Maskhuta (Pithom), and holds some 4,000 objects from the Pharaonic to the Islamic periods, including statues and stelae of Ramesses II, a Phoenician-Egyptian sarcophagus, Greek and Roman marble sculpture, and records of the ancient canal of Darius. Its centrepiece is a large Roman floor mosaic from Sheikh Zuweid in North Sinai depicting Phaedra and Hippolytus and the triumph of Dionysus.
Why this museum matters
Exhibo editorial
Mohamed Ali Street in El Afrang, the old European quarter of Ismailia — a 1932 building in Egyptian style with a sculpture garden, one of the oldest regional museums in the country, paid for by the Suez Canal Company. It was built for what the canal dug up: statues of Ramesses II from Tell el-Maskhuta, the Pithom of the Bible; a Phoenician-style sarcophagus; records of the canal Darius cut long before de Lesseps. The highlight is the floor mosaic found at Sheikh Zuweid in Sinai — Phaedra sending her letter to Hippolytus, Dionysus in a chariot driven by Eros. Small, quiet, few visitors. History of the canal before the canal.
Visit
Hours, tickets, and directions for Ismailia Museum.
Address
Mohamed Ali Street, El Afrang, Ismailia, Egypt
Opening hours
- Monday
- 09:00 – 15:00
- Tuesday
- 09:00 – 15:00
- Wednesday
- 09:00 – 15:00
- Thursday
- 09:00 – 15:00
- Friday
- 09:00 – 15:00
- Saturday
- 09:00 – 15:00
- Sunday
- 09:00 – 15:00