他出生于非王室的軍隊指揮官的家庭，是第十八王朝末代法老霍倫海布的庭臣。在第18王朝的最后10年里，一直在后來的國王霍倫海布的身邊參加戰(zhàn)斗，深得霍倫海布的寵愛。他在軍隊中服役以其卓越的成就達到了顯要的地位。他曾是一個軍隊指揮官，騎兵部隊長官，具有將軍的身份，又是“尼羅河口”（尼羅河三角洲支流）的管理人。普拉美斯還被霍倫海布任命為維西爾，又得到了埃及首席大祭司和阿蒙高僧的頭銜，擔(dān)負(fù)了行政和全國宗教的重要職務(wù)。作為非王家血統(tǒng)家世出身的霍倫海布寧可拋開他親生系統(tǒng)的后嗣，任命了他的維西爾普拉美斯為繼承人。大約在公元前1320年霍倫海布去世時，普拉美斯登上王位的寶座成為拉美西斯。拉美西斯一世加冕后僅僅一年零四個月就去世了，被葬于帝王谷，霍倫海布墓的附近。拉美西斯一世在位的時間雖然較短，卻標(biāo)志著統(tǒng)治埃及的法老由穩(wěn)定埃及發(fā)展的哈倫海布轉(zhuǎn)移至如塞提一世及拉美西斯二世等強權(quán)的法老——這兩位法老將埃及的國勢推至頂峰。

拉美西斯一名意為“拉塑造了他”，他的王位名“門帕提拉”可解釋為“拉的權(quán)利是持久的”。這個稱號是拉美西斯一世作為對新王國的創(chuàng)建者阿赫摩斯一世的頌辭而得到的。這些名稱說明了新的王權(quán)對拉神的崇拜與信仰。在新王國時代，拉神已經(jīng)和阿蒙神融合為一體，所以，作為新王朝的國王的第一個行動是恢復(fù)和整修卡納克的阿蒙大神廟。

在拉美西斯一世登基后不久，他就指定了他的兒子塞提一世作為共同攝政王，而他的兒子已經(jīng)是一名軍隊指揮官，熱衷于遠征敘利亞，并企圖恢復(fù)埃及在那里逝去的地位。但是，拉美西斯一世加冕后僅僅一年零4個月便去世。拉美西斯一世被葬于帝王谷，霍倫海布墓附近的一座倉促建造的陵墓中。

拉美西斯一世的木乃伊曾在19世紀(jì)埃及木乃伊瘋狂盜賣中被當(dāng)?shù)厣畟H轉(zhuǎn)移并保護起來，但是仍被倒賣至加拿大尼亞加拉瀑布博物館，后輾轉(zhuǎn)至美國。經(jīng)一系列現(xiàn)代科學(xué)鑒定，確認(rèn)其身份就是埃及新王國時期（18-20王朝）的19王朝的開國法老拉美西斯一世，最后于2003年回贈埃及，與其子孫塞提一世、拉美西斯二世等法老一同陳列。

Around 1290 BC, the pharaoh Ramesses I, ancestor of Egypt’s most illustrious rulers, was buried in a richly painted tomb in the Valley of the Kings. Ramesses entered his tomb expecting to undertake an arduous journey through the underworld. The king could hardly have imagined that his journey would take over three thousand years, winding a path to Atlanta, Georgia.

At the close of the Eighteenth Dynasty, the Egyptian royal family was in disarray, allowing Horemheb, a military commander of non-royal blood to become the last king of the dynasty. Since he had no heir, Horemheb appointed his military comrade and most trusted advisor, Paramessu, to be his successor. Paramessu, son of Seti, a judge and troop commander from Avaris in the northeastern Delta, began his career as a mid-level military officer, rising rapidly through the ranks. During the reign of Horemheb, Paramessu reached the highest levels of power, surpassing his father’s position as troop commander to become "master of horse, commander of the fortress, controller of the Nile mouth, charioteer of His Majesty, king’s envoy to every foreign land, royal scribe, colonel, and general of the Lord of the Two Lands."

Paramessu took the name Ramesses when he claimed the throne and founded the 19th Dynasty, becoming the first of eleven rulers by that name, including his grandson, Ramesses the Great. Ramesses had reached at least middle-age when he became king and ruled for only two years. This left him little time to erect temples, statues, or other monuments, and leaves us with little evidence of his reign. In fact, Ramesses did not even have time to complete his tomb (KV 16) in the Valley of the Kings at Thebes.

The tomb of Ramesses I was located in October 1817 by the Italian explorer Giovanni Battista Belzoni. Inside, Belzoni found several wooden statues and a red granite sarcophagus with cursorily painted decoration and damage on the lid, where it had been pried open in antiquity.

The plan and decoration of the tomb were abbreviated in comparison to others in the Valley due to the brevity of the king’s reign; the niches along the corridor were left unfinished and only the burial chamber itself was decorated.The bulk of the funerary equipment was absent, having been stolen during the late New Kingdom, when tomb robbery in the Valley of the Kings went unchecked. The mummy of Ramesses I was also missing from the tomb.

According to both textual and archaeological evidence, Ramesses I was reburied in a cache of royal mummies during the Third Intermediate Period. At that time, Thebes was ruled by a series of military leaders who also held the prestigious title of High Priest of Amun, the preeminent god of Egypt whose worship was based at Karnak temple. It was the priestly officials of Thebes who re-consecrated and reburied the kings whose tombs had been violated. Recent scholarship has even suggested that the priests themselves stripped the gold and precious materials from the royal mummies and coffins, enriching the Amun Temple through officially sanctioned tomb robbery.