A 2,000-year-old temple is being restored to its original spectacular colors, adding new meaning to its ancient Egyptian inscriptions

• The temple of Edfu is over 2,000 years old and centuries of dirt had built up on its walls.
• All the grime covered vibrant colors that add a new layer of meaning to the inscriptions.
• Restoring the colors was a painstaking process that sometimes involved climbing tall scaffolds.

A restoration team is transforming the Temple of Horus from a dusty, grimy sight into a glimpse of the colorful masterpiece it once was.

“The Temple of Horus at Edfu is considered the icon of a typical Egyptian temple and part of any sightseeing tour in Egypt,” Martin A. Stadler, director of the project at the University of Würzburg, told Business Insider via email.

Yet, for decades tourists have been missing out on its true splendor.

The temple is covered, up to its ceiling, with inscriptions, images, and hieroglyphs that Egyptians painstakingly created more than 2,000 years ago.

But for many centuries, dirt and grease had turned many of the ancient walls a dingy, uniform grayish brown.

Recently, the restoration team from the University of Würzburg and the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism have uncovered some of the vivid colors underneath, changing the way experts see the structure and adding new significance to the words and images.

Take a look at the transformation and how it’s shaping experts’ understanding of the people who built it.