At the Manchester Museum in England, behind a locked glass cabinet, there's a row of small ancient Egyptian statues. And one statue in particular - it's about 10 inches tall - is doing something unexpected and mysterious. It has been spinning in place, very slowly, turning so slowly that it took time-lapse photography over a week in April to show it making about a three-quarter rotation. It's made full rotations, though.
The statue is a figure of a standing man, with three seated figures next to it. Only the figure of the standing man is spinning on its own. The case is sealed, with an active alarm to protect against burglary. Dr. Campbell Price who is the Egyptology curator at the museum, is the only one with the key.
The statue is a representation of a high-ranking official named Neb-Senu, who lived around 1800 B.C. The time-lapse photos seem to show that it only moves when people are walking around it, which leads to the most credible theory that the vibrations from all the pedestrian traffic are the cause of the spinning. But that raises a new question-- why aren't any of the other figures affected as well? Others believe that the mysterious movement is due to a pharaoh's curse.
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