The Ancient Egypt Film Site

Production info

Ben-Hur
USA, 1959
Charlton Heston, Stephen Boyd, Jack Hawkins, Finlay Currie
Directed by William Wyler

This legendary movie features one Egyptian character in the person of 'Balthasar of Alexandria' who is seen in the opening scene as one of the 'Wise Men' bringing gifts to the newborn child Jesus. He reappears later when at an oasis he confronts Judah Ben Hur thinking that he may be the grown man whom he saw as a baby in the stable in Bethlehem. Balthasar soon realizes that Judah is not that man, but the two strike up a friendship. Interestingly, Balthasar is solely identified as an Egyptian by his rather impressive collar which he wears over his heavy cloak!

NOTICE - This website contains documentation and other information about motion pictures, television movies and episodes from television series related to ancient Egypt and Egyptology. It reports these materials to serve the study of ancient Egypt as a phenomenon in modern popular culture media. As such, the material on this site is provided solely for the purpose of non-commercial, non-profit educational use, comment, scholarship and research. Though the copyright to most photographic material presented here is owned by third parties, the editor wishes to express that in line with the aforementioned use no copyright infringement is intended. For this reason all images are limited to low resolution thumbnail size. In this respect the visitor should be aware that the use of image material from this site for purposes other than private viewing may infringe copyrights owned by others. The further copying, redistribution, or publication of any part of this site is therefore prohibited. Any concern about or objection to material placed on this site can at all times be made known to the editor and will be addressed. This website does not feature ads, does not generate money or profit in any way and does not use cookies.