Joseph Bonomi the Younger into debt and was eventually happy to accept a modestly paid commission to accompany Robert Hay on an expedition, via Malta, to Egypt in 1824. This began a lifelong interest in Egyptology. From 1824 to 1826, he was a member of Hay's expedition where he sketched many antiquities. At Abu Simbel in 1825, Bonomi – responding to Hay's demands for great accuracy – devised a drawing frame (a viewfinder-type device equipped with a sight and a string or wire grid) to help them draw the temples' interior decorations. The expedition then moved on to Kalabsha, where Bonomi laboured to produce
Kadesh inscriptions reliefs. Eight copies survive today on the temples at Abydos, Karnak, Luxor and Abu Simbel, with reliefs depicting the battle. In addition to these lengthy presentations, there are also numerous small captions used to point out various elements of the battle. Outside of the inscriptions, a hieratic copy of the "Poem" is preserved in the "Raifet-Sallier papyrus", of which the first page is lost, the second page ("Papyrus Raifet") is in the Louvre and the third page ("Papyrus Sallier III") is in the British Museum. However, this is considered to be an inaccurate copy. Cuneiform references to the battle have