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Giant new ancient Egypt museum opens next to pyramid

A side view of the museum at night, with a man standard next to one ofd the walls that has a brick-like pattern similar to a pyramid. Bright lights can be seen in the night sky. Getty Images

A new museum has opened in Egypt, with around 100,000 artefacts on show.

It covers around 7,000 years of the country's history from pre-dynastic times to the Greek and Roman eras.

The Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM) has been described as the world's largest archaeological museum.

For the first time the tomb of former Pharoah Tutankhamun has been displayed in full, including his spectacular gold mask, throne and chariots.

View of inside the museum from above. A huge statue is seen in the middle of a foyer with lots of people walking past and some are seen sitting on benches. Getty Images

The museum has opened close to the Great Pyramid of Khufu at Giza, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.

The outside of the building is covered in hieroglyphs and translucent alabaster cut into triangles with a pyramid shaped entrance to tie in with it's surroundings.

Construction started 20 years ago - and the museum is estimated to have taken as long to complete as the Great Pyramid itself - and it's cost around £910m to set up.

It's also huge with its 500,000 square metres size making it roughly the same as 70 football pitches.

Inside of the museum with visitors seen walking around looking a lots of statues from the time of Ancient Egypt.Getty Images

It's hoped the museum will give a huge boost to Egyptian tourism, attracting up to 8 million visitors a year.

Apart from the Tutankhamun exhibit, some of the other highlights are a 3,200-year-old, 16m-long suspended obelisk of the powerful pharaoh, Ramesses II, and his massive 11m-high statue.

A giant staircase is lined with the statues of other ancient kings and queens and on an upper floor a huge window offers a perfectly framed view of the Giza pyramids.

There is also a new display of the spectacular, 4,500-year-old funerary boat of Khufu - one of the oldest and best-preserved vessels from ancient times.