From the Neolithic cave paintings in Wadi Sura—created long before it was a desert when the region was savannah grassland—to the Valley of the Kings to the rock-cut temples at Abu Simbel, and from the vast temple complexes at Karnak and Luxor to the funerary mask of Tutankhamun and, of course, to the pyramids and the Sphinx, Ancient Egypt is a hugely colorful guide to the surviving wonders of Egyptian antiquity. Today the exceptional beauty and scale of the antiquities is legendary, drawing millions of visitors to Egypt’s monuments each year.