Before venture any further with our actual travel blog, I feel it is important to give some overall context of what we are seeing and what it might all means. Over the next several days we are going to visit a number of Egyptian Temples and their overall layout is quite similar as are the designs on the walls. Additionally, the time period of each is important. The history of ancient Egypt is divided into three main periods: the Old Kingdom (about 2,700-2,200 B.C.E.), the Middle Kingdom (2,050-1,800 B.C.E.), and the New Kingdom (about 1,550-1,100 B.C.E.). The New Kingdom was followed by a period called the Late New Kingdom, which lasted to about 343 B.C.E.
The major difference is the King (pharaohs) who had the work completed and how he is represented. Additionally, it is noteworthy that Eqypt was historically divided into two areas – Lower and Upper. The Crowns for each region were depicted by what looks like a large champagne bottle for the upper region and the lower region looked like a bucket! The combined crown looks a lot like a bottle of champagne inside a wine bucket (as described by Assem our guide). These show up on the temple walls frequently.
The image on the left represents the Upper Region, the one on the right is the Lower Region and of course the one in the middle is the Combined Kingdom.
We will visit two principal kinds of temples – cult temples and funerary (or mortuary) temples. The cult temple accommodated the images of deities, the recipients of the daily cult; the latter were the shrines for the funerary cults of dead kings.
It is generally thought that the Egyptian cult temple of the Old Kingdom owed most to the cult of the sun god Ra and was portrayed as a man with the head of peregrine falcon, adorned with a sun disk with a Cobra around it, and shared characteristics with the sky-god Horus.
The layout was essentially a reception pavilion at the desert edge connected by a covered corridor on a causeway to the open court of the temple high on the desert, within which stood the benben of limestone (a sacred stone usually in the shape of a pyramid) and a huge alabaster altar. Fine reliefs embellished the covered walls and ceilings of the corridor – many of which still retain the original colors they were painted.
Mortuary temples (or funerary temples) were typically erected adjacent to, or in the vicinity of, royal tombs. The temples were designed to commemorate the reign of the Pharaoh under whom they were constructed, as well as for use by the king’s cult after death.
Most temples followed the same general design. The layout consists of an imposing open court with colonnades of graceful lotus columns, a smaller offering hall, a shrine for the ceremonial boat of the god, an inner sanctuary for the cult image, and a room in which the divine birth of the king was celebrated. The approach to the temple was made by a colonnade of huge columns with open papyrus-flower capitals. The first, open courtyard, was available all but as you moved further into the complex restrictions applied. First the general population (courtyard), then the royalty (Hypostyle Hall), then the priests the king (Sanctuary). The entire complex was controlled by the priests and no one was allowed into the Temple after dark.
The cult temple achieved its most highly developed form in the great sanctuaries erected over many centuries at Thebes. Architecturally the most satisfying is the Luxor Temple, started by Amenhotep III of the 18th dynasty (from 1550 to 1292 BCE.). More on the Luxor Temple later in this adventure.
A listing of the Gods of Ancient Egypt
The Kings of Ancient Eqypt
One final note, before we continue our adventure, the King (male and female) always was depicted with a wooden or metal false beard, or postiche, which was a sign of sovereignty and always worn by royalty.
