Egyptian Obelisks in Rome

Rome 🇮🇹 was my Nonno’s favorite place, and when we visited Rome as a family, it became my favorite city. The combination of ancient and modern is something that Nonno and I absolutely loved.

While my sister (who is in the picture with me) was excited to visit Piazza Navona because of the book “Angels and Demons,” (which I totally recommend – it’s an incredible book), I was most excited to see the obelisk 𓉶! The obelisk 𓉶 was commissioned by Emperor Domitian. The hieroglyphs 𓊹𓌃𓏪 on the obelisk 𓉶 state that Emperor Domitian rebuilt the Temple of Isis at Philae.

Since we are on the topics of Egyptian Obelisks 𓉶𓏪 in Rome, here’s a picture of my sister and I in Piazza San Pietro (Saint Peter’s Square) in Rome 🇮🇹!

What’s different about this obelisk 𓉶 is that there’s no hieroglyphs 𓊹𓌃𓏪 on it – it’s completely blank! Of the 13 obelisks 𓉶𓏪 in Rome, eight of them are completely Egyptian, while the other five were procured by Romans after they conquered Egypt 𓆎𓅓𓏏𓊖.

The Vatican Obelisk was brought to Rome by Emperor Caligula. But the question is: why are some obelisks 𓉶𓏪 inscribed with hieroglyphs 𓊹𓌃𓏪 and some not? This question has baffled historians, but Egyptologist Bob Brier has come to the conclusion that the inclusion/non inclusion of hieroglyphs 𓊹𓌃𓏪 simply has to do with the Roman emperor’s attitude towards Egypt 𓆎𓅓𓏏𓊖. Some emperors had positive views of Egypt 𓆎𓅓𓏏𓊖(Domitian, Hadrian), while some Emperors had very negative views of Egypt 𓆎𓅓𓏏𓊖(Augustus, Caligula). For example, Augustus hated Egypt 𓆎𓅓𓏏𓊖 because he lost a lot of Roman men in battle there.

Fun fact: Rome has a total of 13 obelisks 𓉶𓏪! That is the most obelisks 𓉶𓏪 in any city outside of Egypt 𓆎𓅓𓏏𓊖!