Biahmu

Biahmu is a village in Egypt's Fayyum Basin that lends its name to an archaeological site lying just outside the modern settlement, roughly seven kilometres north of Madinat al-Fayyum. The site preserves the badly eroded pedestals of two colossal statues of Amenemhat III, a Middle Kingdom pharaoh who ruled around 1800 BCE. The figures — originally seated on massive limestone bases and visible across the surrounding farmland — are thought to have been connected to a cult centred on the ancient Lake Moeris, which once filled much of the Fayyum depression. Herodotus recorded seeing two great figures here during his Egyptian travels; what survives today are fragmentary stone bases rising from flat, sun-bleached ground. The site is almost entirely unmanicured and sees very few visitors, making it an unusually raw encounter with Middle Kingdom Egypt.