Pyramid of Queen Amanishakheto

16.9385°N, 33.7490°E.

The pyramid of queen Amanishakheto at Meroë, built for one of the most powerful Kandakes (queens regnant) of the Meroitic kingdom, who ruled approximately 10 BCE to 1 CE. Original base approximately 9 metres per side; original height around 17 metres at the steep Meroitic slope. The pyramid was demolished above the burial chamber in 1834 by the Italian treasure-hunter Giuseppe Ferlini, who used dynamite to blow off the upper portions in search of gold — and found it: a hoard of gold rings, necklaces, armlets, pectorals, and amulets bearing Amanishakheto's name and titles, the largest single cache of Meroitic royal jewellery ever recovered. The collection was sold by Ferlini to private collectors in Europe and is now divided between the State Museum of Egyptian Art in Munich and the Egyptian Museum in Berlin. Excavated archaeologically by John Garstang and George Reisner in the early twentieth century.

A pyramid for one of the queens who ruled Meroë in her own right, whose tomb produced the largest gold hoard from any African kingdom of the Roman period — and which a single Italian doctor blew up to find it.