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Michael S. Yamashita/Corbis

Now installed in the Sackler Wing of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New york, the Temple of Dendur was built by the Roman emperor Augustus (31 B.C.–14 A.D.). Located south of Aswan, the temple would have been submerged by the waters of Lake Nasser following the construction of the Aswan High Dam in 1960. An international campaign, led by UNESCO and a number of the world’s major museums, saved many Egyptian and Nubian monuments from the floodwaters—moving some temples stone by stone to higher ground. The Egyptian government gave the Temple of Dendur to the United States as an expression of gratitude.