Temples of Karnak

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Of these various temples that of Amen-Ra is incomparably the largest and most imposing. Its construction extended through the whole duration of the New Empire, of whose architecture it is a splendid résumé. Its extreme length is 1,215 feet, and its greatest width 376 feet. The sanctuary and its accessories, mainly built by Thothmes I. and Thothmes III., cover an area nearly 456 × 290 feet in extent, and comprise two hypostyle halls and countless smaller halls and chambers. It is preceded by a narrow columnar vestibule and two pylons enclosing a columnar atrium and two obelisks. This is entered from the Great Hypostyle Hall, the noblest single work of Egyptian architecture, measuring 340 × 170 feet, and containing 134 columns in sixteen rows, supporting a massive stone roof. The central columns with bell-capitals are 70 feet high and nearly 12 feet in diameter; the others are smaller and lower, with lotus-bud capitals, supporting a roof lower than that over the three central aisles. A clearstory of stone-grated windows makes up the difference in height between these two roofs. The interior, thus lighted, was splendid with painted reliefs, which helped not only to adorn the hall but to give scale to its massive parts. The whole stupendous creation was the work of three kings--Rameses I., Seti I., and Rameses II. (XIXth dynasty).

In front of it was the great court, flanked by columns, and still showing the ruins of a central avenue of colossal pillars begun, but never completed, by the Bubastid kings of the XXIId dynasty. One or two smaller structures and the curious lateral wing built by Amenophis III. interrupt the otherwise orderly and symmetrical advance of this plan from the sanctuary to the huge first pylon (last in point of date) erected by the Ptolemies.

The smaller temple of Khonsu, south of that of Amen-Ra, has already been alluded to as a typical example of templar design. Next to Karnak in importance comes the Temple of Luxor in its immediate neighborhood. It has two forecourts adorned with double-aisled colonnades and connected by what seems to be an unfinished hypostyle hall. The Ramesseum and the temples of Medinet Abou and Deir-El-Bahari have already been mentioned. At Gournah and Abydos are the next most celebrated temples of this period; the first famous for its rich clustered lotuscolumns, the latter for its beautiful sanctuary chambers, dedicated each to a different deity, and covered with delicate painted reliefs of the time of Seti I.

GROTTO TEMPLES

Two other styles of temple remain to be noticed. The first is the subterranean or grotto temple, of which the two most famous, at Ipsamboul (Abou-simbel), were excavated by Rameses II. They are truly colossal conceptions, reproducing in the native rock the main features of structural temples, the court being represented by the larger of two chambers in the Greater Temple. Their façades are adorned with colossal seated figures of the builder; the smaller has also two effigies of Nefert-Ari, his consort. Nothing more striking and boldly impressive is to be met with in Egypt than these singular rock-cut façades. Other rock-cut temples of more modest dimensions are at Addeh, Feraig, Beni-Hassan (the "Speos Artemidos"), Beit-el-Wali, and Silsileh. At Gherf-Hossein, Asseboua, and Derri are temples partly excavated and partly structural.

PERIPTERAL TEMPLES

The last type of temple to be noticed is represented by only three or four structures of moderate size; it is the peripteral, in which a small chamber is surrounded by columns, usually mounted on a terrace with vertical walls. They were mere chapels, but are among the most graceful of existing ruins. At Philae are two structures, one by Nectanebo, the other Ptolemaic, resembling peripteral temples, but without cella-chambers or roofs. They may have been waiting-pavilions for the adjoining temples. That at Elephantine ( Amenophis III.) has square piers at the sides, and columns only at the ends. Another by Thothmes II., at Medinet Abou, formed only a part (the sekos) of a larger plan. At Edfou is another, belonging to the Ptolemaic period.

LATER TEMPLES

After the architectural inaction of the Decadence came a marvellous recrudescence of splendor under the Ptolemies, whose Hellenic origin and sympathies did not lead them into the mistaken effort to impose Greek models upon Egyptian art. The temples erected under their dominion, and later under Roman rule, vied with the grandest works of the Ramessidae, and surpassed them in the rich elaboration and variety of their architectural details. The temple at Edfou is the most perfectly preserved, and conforms most closely to the typical plan; that of Isis, at Philae, is the most elaborate and ornate. Denderah also possesses a group of admirably preserved temples of the same period. At Esneh, and at Kalabshé and Kardassy or Ghertashi in Nubia are others. In all these one notes innovations of detail and a striving for effect quite different from the simpler majesty of the preceding age. One peculiar feature is the use of screen walls built into the front rows of columns of the hypostyle hall. Light was admitted above these walls, which measured about half the height of the columns and were interrupted at the centre by a curious doorway cut through their whole height and without any lintel. Long disused types of capital were revived and others greatly elaborated; and the wall-reliefs were arranged in bands and panels with a regularity and symmetry rather Greek than Egyptian.

ARCHITECTURAL DETAILS

With the exception of a few purely utilitarian vaulted structures, all Egyptian architecture was based on the principle of the lintel. Artistic splendor depended upon the use of painted and carved pictures, and the decorative treatment of the very simple supports employed. Piers and columns sustained the roofs of such chambers as were too wide for single lintels, and produced, in halls like those of Karnak, of the Ramesseum, or of Denderah, a stupendous effect by their height, massiveness, number, and colored decoration.

The simplest piers were plain square shafts; others, more elaborate, had lotus stalks and flowers or heads of Hathor carved upon them. The most striking were those against whose front faces were carved colossal figures of Osiris, as at Luxor, Medinet Abou, and Karnak. The columns, which were seldom over six diameters in height, were treated with greater variety; the shafts, slightly tapering upward, were either round or clustered in section, and usually contracted at the base. The capitals with which they were crowned were usually of one of the five chief types described below. Besides round and clustered shafts, the Middle Empire and a few of the earlier monuments of the New Empire employed polygonal or slightly fluted shafts, as at BeniHassan and Karnak; these had a plain square abacus, with sometimes a cushion-like echinus beneath it. A round plinth served as a base for most of the columns.