Berlin opens new home Nefertiti

[SergeiSK]

Official opening of Berlin's new museum, the most popular exhibit which is a bust of Queen Nefertiti, was held on Friday, October 16, 2009 in the presence of Chancellor Angela Merkel, said agency DPA. The first visitors to the museum be allowed on Saturday, October 17.
Destroyed during the Second World War and renovated by British architect David Chipperfield building open for the preliminary examination in March 2009 for two days, and interest in it was great: he was visited by 35 thousand Berliners said AFP.
The new museum, which demanded the reconstruction of 212 million euros, viewers will see the 9000 exhibits on four floors with total area of 8000 square meters. The collection includes numerous Egyptian antiquities, including the papyri, as well as a collection of exhibits on the history and culture of the Old World from the Paleolithic to the Middle Ages.
The new museum is part of the Museum Island, a protected UNESCO monument of culture and architecture of the XIX century.
Bust of Nefertiti is also the pride of the museum, and his headache: the Egyptian authorities suspect that the archaeologist Ludwig Borchardt, who discovered the image of Queen in 1912, smuggled discovery in Germany in 1913. However, in Berlin, are convinced that the transaction was legal, and ready to defend this view.
(Lenta.ru)