We take a quick look at Luxor Temple, stunningly lit at night to amaze visitors from all around the globe!
Today a bit of a shorter post, as returning to work has been rather busy! During our Egyptian journey, we enjoyed a wonderful time in Luxor. From that locale you will have seen the 3 part series of posts on the Karnak Temple Complex.
We follow the avenue of the sphinxes to this great temple…
Luxor Temple
Here we see the entrance Pylon of the Luxor Temple. You may notice that there is only a single obelisk, which creates an asymmetry. The companion to this obelisk is in Paris on the Place de la Concorde.
This temple is connected with the Karnak Temple Complex by the avenue of the Sphinxes. This 2,700m road was restored and re-opened in 2021, so that one can walk from one temple complex to another.
The Great Hypostyle Hall at Karnak Temple is characterized by its massive scale, featuring 134 columns that symbolize a primeval papyrus swamp linked to Egyptian creation myths.
In yesterday’s post about the Karnak Temple Complex, we focused on the walk into the Amun-Re precinct and the first courtyard. Today, we’ll explore the Great Hypostyle Hall, which easily could have its own series of posts.
The first thing that we notice about the Great Hypostyle Hall is the massive scale of this part of the structure. Here we’re walking towards the hall, as we’re crossing the 2nd Pylon…
2nd Pylon
The Great Hypostyle Hall consists of 134 columns in 16 rows with the middle rows being the tallest at 24m high and 10m circumference. These columns supported a roof and covered an area of 5,000m2 (54,000 sq.ft.).
Looking up to the sky along these columns, we can imagine what the impact on worshippers of Amun-Re might have been…
Center Row Columns
The 134 columns represent a primeval papyrus swamp from which Atum, the primordial God in Egyptian mythology, arose from the waters of Nun, the oceanic abyss. This is part of the ancient Egyptian creation myth. The hall itself was created during the height of Seti I.
Here, we get a sense of how small we are among the papyrus swamp…
Great Hypostyle Columns
Even though the hall was built during Seti I’s reign, a keen observer will notice that many of the cartouches are from Ramses II. This is due to decorations of the southern wing being completed during Ramses II’s time.
We can also see that there were windows up high in the transition from the taller center rows to the outer rows of columns…
View to Windows
The level of detail in the decorations is astonishing, as we can see here…
Column Detail
A project has been under way to restore the vibrance of the colors by removing the layers of soot and dirt that obscure the beauty of the decorations and hieroglyphs. Also in these images we see the new roof sections that have been placed to give a sense of what the original might have looked…
Column Detail
Looking at the immensity of scale and the exquisite skill of the architects and artisans, we can’t help but stand in awe of this hall that was built more than 3,000 years ago.
More to come and we’ll go into some of the finer details in future posts.
More from our trip to Egypt, focusing on the Karnak Temple Complex. This historical site contains temples spanning from the Middle Kingdom to the Ptolemaic Era.
As I’m starting to go through the many photos from our trip to Egypt, I will write a series of blog posts to delve a bit deeper into each area. Today, I’m starting with the Karnak Temple Complex, also known as Karnak.
A couple of things to note both about Karnak, in general. The Karnak complex sees temples from many time periods extending from the Middle Kingdom (c. 2000-1700 BCE) to the Ptolemaic Era (305 – 30 BCE). The area of the complex was named Ipet-isut in ancient Egyptian, meaning ‘The Most Select of Places’. The modern name Karnak comes from the nearby village of el-Karnak, which means ‘fortified village’.
Let’s start with the entrance toward the 1st Pylon…
Entrance towards 1st Pylon
In this approach, we look at the 1st pylon, large trapezoidal walls that form the entrance toward the courtyard. This pylon is 113m wide and 15m thick at its base. The entrance way is lined with a procession of ram-headed sphinx statues, representing Amun-Re, whose temple one enters. Construction of this pylon was started in the 30th dynasty and never completed.
As we enter the courtyard, let’s take a closer look at the rightmost of the 1st pylon trapezoids…
Karnak – 1st Pylon
There are still ancient mud bricks piled up against the inside of the pylon, which would have been used as ramps during the construction phase.
As we enter the courtyard, we get a sense of the scale ahead of us…
Kiosk of Taharqa
Here we’re looking at the Kiosk of the pharaoh Taharqa, one of the Kushite rulers of Egypt. The columns of this kiosk were 21m tall, and the one remaining column on the right gives us a sense of that size.
Also in this courtyard we find a colossal statue of Ramses II…
Colossus of Ramses II
Ramses II is one of the best known pharaohs due to the length of his reign and his volume of construction. In this statue we see Ramses II wearing the nemesis headdress with the double crown of Upper and Lower Egypt. At his feet is the Princess Bent’anta, holding a flower and wearing a Uraeus crown of rearing cobras. The princess’ name, Bet’anta, is Syrian, meaning Daughter of Anath (Anath is a Canaanite goddess).
In the next episode, we’ll go into the great hypostyle hall.
