(Clockwise from top left) Kneeling figure of Nekhthorheb; carved out of quartzite, ca. 595-589 B.C.; Head from a statue of Thutmosis III; carved out of graywacke, ca. 1479-1425 B.C.; Pectoral plaque of Amenemhat IV Before Atum; gold, ca. 1808-1799 B.C.; Ostracon sketches of lion head and nestlings; painted on limestone, ca. 1295-1069 B.C.

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Kneeling figure of Nekhthorheb; carved out of quartzite, ca. 595-589 B.C.

Head from a statue of Thutmosis III; carved out of graywacke, ca. 1479-1425 B.C.

Ostracon sketches of lion head and nestlings; painted on limestone, ca. 1295-1069 B.C.

Pectoral plaque of Amenemhat IV Before Atum; gold, ca. 1808-1799 B.C.

A great stone lion guards the entrance to the new Egyptian exhibit at the Albuquerque Museum.

Built 3,400 years ago as part of a set that once guarded the temple of Pharaoh Amenhotep III, the lion sits relaxed, feet crossed, waiting to inspect a new generation of visitors from the Land of Enchantment.

It's a feature piece in the "Temples and Tombs" exhibit, on loan from the British Museum, which opens Sunday at 9 a.m.

"During his reign, Egypt had become a great empire that stretched from modern-day Iraq to modern-day Sudan," said Marcel Marée, an Egyptologist from the British Museum, pointing to a giant stone head that once sat on a statue of Amenhotep.

"These lions - this is one of a set of two - acted as guards," Marée said, refocusing on the lion. "On the base it mentions that Tutankhamun refurbished this monument for his forefather, but if you look closer you see that Tutankhamun's name has been erased."

King Tut, as he's been affectionately called, was associated with a negative time in Egyptian history because his father had outlawed all but one god.

Tutankhamun restored all the gods and temples, but he was still associated with his father's ideas, and his name has been wiped out of most records, Marée said.

The Albuquerque Museum has been working for more than three years to bring this traveling exhibit to the Duke City, and visitors should not confuse it with the separate "Excavating Egypt" exhibit running through Jan. 6 at the New Mexico Museum of Art in Santa Fe, said Connor O'Laughlin, a spokesman for the Albuquerque Museum.

"Their exhibit is more focused on smaller objects," O'Laughlin said. "Ours has giant stonework. These are major museum pieces."

The lion, for instance, weighs about 6,000 pounds, O'Laughlin said.

The exhibit, which runs through Feb. 10, cost $300,000 and was paid for by the Albuquerque Museum Foundation, O'Laughlin said.

It's the last stop for the pieces on a six-year, 15-city tour of the U.S. and Canada before they head back to England, Marée said.

Walking among the statues, which range from refrigerator sized to finger sized, Marée noted that the variation isn't as random as it appears.

"Statues get smaller the deeper you go into a tomb or temple," Marée said. "And only the priests were allowed in the deeper areas."

The exhibit's smallest statues would have been forbidden for the eyes of all but a few prominent Egyptians.

Another thing to look for is any piece from the dynasty of Ramses II, who reigned around 3,200 years ago.

Ramses had a nasty habit of stealing older art and reclaiming it as his own, Marée said, looking slightly peeved.

"He put his name on many statues that weren't his, and he destroyed the faces of many, which is really obnoxious for us Egyptologists," Marée said. "It makes it harder to date older statues."

Visitors can also see intricate jewelry, delicate inscriptions and evidence of the process Egyptian artists went through to create some of the massive stone works. In one area, artists' doodles of lion heads, birds and people are preserved on limestone chips called ostracons.

"The Egyptian artists didn't use papyrus when they were just trying their hand," Marée said. "Limestone flakes littered the desert and were used as notepads."

A few pages of the Book of the Dead line the back walls of the exhibit, with some history on how Egyptians viewed the afterlife.

At the end of a series of obstacles with passwords, demons to fight and gates to open, the dead Egyptian would find himself facing the lord of the underworld.

There, his heart would be weighed against a feather - an Egyptian symbol for truth - and if the weight balanced, it would mean the person could stay with the gods.

If it didn't balance, he'd be eaten by a nasty monster made up of several different animals, Marée said.

"Needless to say, they were quite afraid of that," Marée said.