The Cool Confines of the Luxor Museum

Whether you need a break from exploring the temples of Luxor and Karnak to escape the heat or just want to take a virtual tour, the Luxor Museum is filled with amazing statues and reliefs of King Tut, Akhenaten and other famous pharaohs, as well as Egyptian gods including Amun, Sobek and Sekhmet.

Not too many travelers bother with the Luxor Museum — but that’s a mistake.

A processional route over a mile and a half long once connected the temples of Luxor and Karnak. There’s talk of renovating and reopening this roadway, and it would be an impressive sight, lined with noble sphinxes, with the glittering water of the River Nile twinkling off to one side. To be honest, though, I can’t imagine that long of a walk, with no shelter from the sun god Ra’s blazing heat. 

After you’ve explored Luxor or Karnak Temples, though, you can escape the intense sun with a visit to the Luxor Museum. Even though it’s situated about a 20-minute walk from Luxor Temple, partway to Karnak, it seems as if not too many tourists add this to their itinerary. 

When we suggested it to our guide, Mamduh, he looked a bit surprised, as if we might have been the first people he’s had make the request.

“If you want to see a lot of the statues that once filled the temples of Ancient Egypt, you’ll have to visit a museum.”

The interior is a cool, sleek white space with angles that give it a surprisingly modern feel. It’s not too large of a space, which means you can see the entire collection in an hour or so. 

Guides aren’t allowed to lecture about the various exhibits. So Mamduh, who had been with us all week, educating us on Ancient Egyptian culture and archeology, from Aswan up to Luxor, had to shift his role. He was no longer our teacher; he became a friend exploring the museum with us. Judging from the sparkle in his eye and his childlike sense of wonder, he hadn’t spent much time in the museum and looked at this as an opportunity to increase his education.

The mummified remains of Ramesses I have a colorful past, including a stint at Ripley’s Believe It or Not! in Niagara Falls, Ontario. Unlike at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, you can actually photograph this mummy.

Where Are the Statues of Ancient Egypt?

The temples of Ancient Egypt, once packed with statues, are now sadly bereft of these works of art. I often remarked to Duke how much I wished the niches, sanctuaries and pedestals were still home to the statues that once adorned them. If you want to see these statues, you’ll have to visit a museum — and the one in Luxor fittingly houses numerous carvings that were unearthed at the nearby temples of Karnak and Luxor.

Before we started wandering the museum, we stopped into an auditorium to watch a short documentary about Thebes (the ancient city where Luxor now stands). The fim had a grainy, bootlegged quality that revealed how woefully outdated it is. It reminded Duke and me of the film reels we used to watch in elementary school. To be honest, I don’t recall much about it. If time is limited, this is definitely something you could skip.

Here’s a brief tour of the Luxor Museum, showcasing some of our favorite artifacts.

Senusret I (circa 1971-1926 BCE)

Limestone 

Part of the colossal pillar of Pharaoh Senusret I from the White Chapel at Karnak, the structure was built to commemorate the first anniversary of the Sed Festival, held during the 30th year of his reign. Senusret is depicted in the traditional form of the god of the afterlife, Osiris, with arms folded across his chest and holding an ankh, the symbol of life, in each hand. 

Senusret III (1878-1840 BCE) 

Quartz 

This quartz head, found at Karnak, sporting the double crown and false beard, captures the humanity of the great Twelfth Dynasty ruler. His heavy-lidded eyes and supposed slight smile (I don’t really see it) represent  a break in the sculptural tradition of Egypt’s Middle Kingdom. 

Amenenhat III (1841-1792 BCE)

Black granite

Check out that look of disgust! Stern features like this were typical of the Middle Kingdom statuary.

Ramesses III (1550-1532 BCE)

Graywacke

This cult statue of Ramesses III, the last great warrior king of the New Kingdom, wears a short wig surmounted by the double crown. One part of the sculpture, which decorated the Precinct of Mut at Karnak, was discovered in the 1930s by the Oriental Institute of Chicago. The other was unearthed in 2002 by an expedition team from Johns Hopkins University. 

Thutmose III (1490-1436 BCE)

Graywacke

Shown eternally youthful, Thutmose III is wearing a belt with his cartouche, an oval carving with the pharaoh’s name in hieroglyphics.

Amun-Min relief (1490-1436 BCE)

Limestone

Look at those colors, still so bright after thousands of years! The chief deity Amun is merged with the fertility god Min. The relief, from Deir el-Bahari, was destroyed during the Amarna period and restored by a later pharaoh.

Unknown officer (1440-1400 BCE)

Sandstone 

This uninscribed Eighteenth Dynasty painted statue depicts an officer wearing a shebyu collar. While these necklaces were often worn by New Kingdom pharaohs, they were also given as a reward for valor or distinguished service.

Amenhotep II relief (circa 1426-1400 BCE)

Red granite

Amenhotep II was particularly proud of his prowess as an athlete and warrior. He’s shown shooting arrows through a target. In the inscription, he boasts of being so much stronger than normal men that he uses copper for target practice rather than wood, through which his arrows pass like papyrus.

Sobek and Amenhotep III (circa 1386-1353 BCE)

Calcite, Egyptian alabaster

The crocodile-headed deity holds an ankh to bestow life to the youthful ruler. The statue was usurped by Ramesses II.

Iwnit (1405-1367 BCE)

Diorite, possibly

This statue of Iwnit, a minor goddess from the Amduat and consort to the god Montu, was created during the reign of Amenhotep III. With dimples at the corner of her mouth, which give the impression of a fleeting smile, some call this the Mona Lisa of Karnak.

Amenhotep III (circa 1386-1353 BCE)

Quartzite

This New Kingdom figure of Amenhotep III was originally adorned with gold that was removed in antiquity, leaving some rough spots visible where armlets once were. 

Sekhmet

Gray granite  

The war goddess Sekhmet personified the fierce protective aspects of women and was known as the Mistress of Dread (coolest nickname ever?). In the New Kingdom she belonged to a group of goddesses known as the Eye of Ra. Here she’s shown with a broken sun disk above her head.

Amenhotep, son of Hapu (1400 BCE) 

Granite 

This statue of a seated scribe with stylized fat folds represents Amenhotep, son of Hapu, an important official under Pharaoh Amenhotep III. A palette with two inkwells, one for red and one for black, hangs over his left shoulder. As overseer of all the king’s works, a post he reached later in life, he was responsible for many of Amenhotep’s ambitious building projects. Like Imhotep, he became deified after death. 

Wall painting of Amenhotep III (circa 1386-1353 BCE)

Painted stucco

Sadly, all that’s left of this wall painting from the tomb of an official are fragments. The image shows Pharaoh Amenhotep III seated under a canopy, with his mother behind him and his enemies beneath him, a position of power. If you want to see what this would have looked like in full, the facsimile painted in 1914 by Egyptologist Nina de Garis Davies can be viewed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. 

Amenhotep III (circa 1386-1353 BCE)

Granodiorite 

This sculpture from north Karnak depicts the kneeling figure of Pharaoh Amenhotep III, a popular figure at the Luxor Museum. Holding a pair of flails, the king is kneeling during his coronation by the god Amun-Ra, whose now-missing hand would have originally rested upon Amenhotep’s crown. 

Temple wall of Amenhotep IV aka Akhenaten (circa 1380-1335 BCE)

Sandstone

This partially restored wall from a razed temple dates from the first five years of Amenhotep IV’s reign. The fragments,  known as talatat, were used as filling material and removed from the interior of the ninth pylon at Karnak. This scene depicts the so-called Heretic King and his wife Queen Nefertiti worshipping the multi-armed Aten, with images of daily life associated with the temple storehouses, workshops and breweries.

Akhenaten (circa 1380-1335 BCE)

Sandstone 

These are the remains of a colossal statue in the easily identifiable Amarna style (which we both love) found east of the Amun-Ra temple precinct, in an open court dedicated to the solar god Aten, built by Akhenaten in the third year of his reign. The colossi were knocked down and left in situ during the reign of Horemheb. During an excavation in 1925, Henri Chevrier, chief inspector of antiquities at Karnak, uncovered 25 fragments.

Tutankhamun sphinx (1347-1336 BCE)

Calcite

The face of this sphinx from Karnak Temple appears to bear the features of King Tut — most noticeably in the eyes and chin. This likeness wears a nemes headdress and originally had human arms that held a vase. 

Tutankhamun as Amun (1347-1336 BCE)

Limestone

Amun, the patron deity of Thebes, is depicted in the form of the legendary Boy King. Tutankhamun restored the cult of Amun (and the other gods) after the death of monotheistic, monomaniacal Akhenaten.

Atum and Horemheb (circa 1300-1292 BCE)

Diorite

The militaristic Pharaoh Horemheb kneels before the solar deity Atum, offering two nw jars. Atum is seated on a throne, holds an ankh and wears a long wig and a curved false beard, topped with the double crown of Egypt. Carved into the side of the throne is the sema tawny, lung and windpipe, symbolizing the union of the two lands (Lower and Upper Egypt). The well-preserved artwork was discovered in 1989, buried beneath the solar court of Amenhotep III at Luxor Temple. 

Seti I (1323-1279 BCE)

Alabaster

Wally thinks the spot where his penis would be was a light switch. Seti I was a warrior king like his father Ramesses I before him. He was the husband of Queen Tuya and the father of Ramesses II also known as Ramesses the Great. A passionate builder, he’s responsible for the hypostyle hall at Karnak. 

Nebre (circa 1292-1189 BCE)

Sandstone

This work was discovered at a fortress that protected the western border of Egypt from the Libyans. Nebre served as a commander under Ramesses II and held multiple titles, including troop commander, charioteer of the king, overseer of foreign lands and chief of the Medjay, an elite police force. He holds the staff of office, topped by the lion head of Sehkmet, goddess of war. –Wally

 

The Glorious Decay of Karnak Temple

The sprawling temple complex in Luxor is considered one of the greatest architectural feats of all time.

Areas like this on the massive temple grounds of Karnak evoked Ancient Rome for Wally

For much of the history of Ancient Egypt, Karnak was the epicenter of worship, situated in the great city of Thebes (modern-day Luxor). Over 3,000 years ago, 30 or so pharaohs each wanted to put his or her stamp upon the temple, adding structures and elements, on and on through the centuries. In less-prosperous times, like the reign of Ramesses VI, the pharaoh simply recarved the additions made by his predecessor, Ramesses IV, and claimed them as his own. And Horemheb replaced King Tut’s name with his own on several monuments at Karnak, in a bid to sever all ties with the heretical lineage of Akhenaton. 

The site sprawled, and today it is the largest surviving religious complex in the world.

“The great temple complex of Karnak was where Hatshepsut first started her genderbending iconography — all before she declared herself pharaoh.”

So much of Karnak as it is today began during the reign of that fascinating figure Hatshepsut, a female pharaoh who ruled during the 15th century BCE. Before her, Karnak was mostly mud brick but she embarked upon an ambitious construction program that included rebuilding Karnak with sandstone, making it more permanent and the basis of the massive complex we can still explore to this day. 

The scale of these massive columns is difficult to describe without experiencing it yourself

Wally loves exploring ancient temples so much, he just had to jump for joy

I’ve mentioned before that a large part of the charm of visiting Egypt is that each temple has something utterly unique about it, and for Karnak it’s the massive scale of the site. In addition, because its stones were plundered for other construction projects, much of the complex lies in a semi-ruined state, which evoked Ancient Rome to me. It’s fun to clamber past large fragments of stone as you explore the temple.

Rows of sphinxes welcome you to Karnak

A Tour of Karnak

We call the temple Karnak today, but that name came from a nearby village, el-Karnak. In ancient times it was known as Ipetisut, “the Most Select of Places.” The main part of the temple was dedicated to that great god, Amun (aka Amon, Amen), who was responsible for fertility and whom Egyptians trusted to keep their country prosperous.

Other, smaller, temples surrounded it, such as the one to Mut, the mother goddess and Amun’s consort.

Admission costs 150 Egyptian pounds, or less than $10, per person. You enter Karnak through an avenue of sphinxes bearing the heads of rams to honor Amun. Between each of their leonine paws, their chins resting on his head, stand small statues of Pharaoh Ramesses II, who commissioned the project.

Ram-headed, lion-bodied sphinxes protect diminutive statues of Ramesses II between their paws

Past these stone guardians, to the right, is a shrine to house the solar barque, used to transport the statue of the god during festivals. Built by Ramesses III, the exterior is lined with statues showing the pharaoh in mummy form with arms crossed to draw a connection with the god Osiris, ruler of the afterlife.

There’s much to explore at Karnak, so be sure to give yourself a couple of hours at least

The Great Hypostyle Hall

Pass under the Second Pylon to come to Karnak’s Great Hypostyle Hall, row upon rows of papyrus columns — 134, in fact. Unlike many other Ancient Egyptian temples, this colonnade is predominantly open-roofed. Blue sky can be seen above, and the sun blazes down upon you. Historians posit that this airy hall was the site of a ceremony called “uniting with the sun” and is supposed to resemble the primeval swamp, part of the creation myth.

The open-air nature of the Great Hypostyle Hall hints at the worship of Amun as a sun god

It’s near impossible to fully comprehend how gigantic some of these columns are, as you stand on the ground, gazing up. But the columns stand six stories high, and it’s said that some of the capitals, or tops, would fit 50 people!

An avenue of sphinxes once led all the way to Luxor Temple, two miles away — and there’s talk of restoring it

In ancient times, statues of deities would have been placed throughout this forest of columns. That’s one of the things that bummed me out most about these temples. As awesome as they are, most are devoid of statuary. I suppose they’ve been relocated to museums around the world — though I wish they had kept at least a few here and there. 

That being said, Karnak is one of the few sites in Egypt where you’ll see quite a few statues on the grounds, though most are of pharaohs not gods. 

You’ll spot quite a few statues as you wander Karnak

Pharaoh after pharaoh repurposed materials to rebuild portions of Karnak over the centuries

Reliefs cover the exterior of the hall, one showing Ramesses II’s Battle of Kadesh, which ended as a stalemate — though the pharaoh proclaimed victory. This was his favorite piece of revisionist history. He depicted his “triumph” at numerous temples, including Karnak, where he had a poem carved that told of his miraculous victory over the Hittites. His army was about to be defeated, but his father, the god Amun, made him invincible — and he single-handedly vanquished 2,500 of his enemies. 

Hatshepsut depicted herself as a pharaoh blessed by the gods on one of her obelisks, now on its side by the Sacred Lake

The great temple complex of Karnak was where Hatshepsut first started her genderbending iconography. A carving shows her wearing a masculine wig and the atef crown, which sported ram’s horns and two feathers — all before she declared herself pharaoh.

It’s truly astounding that the Ancient Egyptians found a way to carve obelisks from a single stone and raise them, where they remain standing, thousands of years later

Obelisks: The Sun Made Stone

Obelisks were the most impressive of architectural feats. Carved from a single block of red granite, the top halves of them were covered in electrum, silver-gold sheets beaten flat. There was no stronger tie to the solar cult than these tall, thin structures resembling the sun’s rays, and, indeed, the metal caught the light, blinding onlookers.

One of the obelisks Hatshepsut erected at the site honors her patron deity, Amun, whom she once served as his “wife.” The inscription reads, in part: “I know that Karnak is Heaven on Earth, the sacred elevation of the first occasion, the eye of the Lord to the Limit, his favorite place, which bears his perfection and gathers his followers.”

Love among the ruins, Wally and Karnak style

A couple of obelisks tower above visitors to this day, and I’m not ashamed to say I was a little freaked out standing beneath them, imagining how easily they could become off-balanced and come crashing down upon us. 

In fact, one obelisk does lie on its side, though it was probably done so purposefully. It’s on these remains, in front of the Sacred Lake, that you can see depictions of Hatshepsut as pharaoh. 

No swimming allowed! The Sacred Lake was where priests would cleanse themselves before rituals

The Sacred Lake

The lake supplied Karnak with water, in part for its priests to cleanse themselves for rituals. 

Nearby is a statue of a scarab (a word that sounds a whole lot cooler than “dung beetle”). Our guide Mamduh told us we should circle it three times for good luck, and a guy on Flickr complains: “Crazy tourists circumambulate — 3 times for luck, 7 times for love, and 10 times for wealth. Makes it hard to get a decent photo.”

Join the throng and walk in circles around the statue of Khepri, the scarab god, by the Sacred Lake. It’s said to be good luck

This is also where you’ll find a café, where we met up with our guide, smoking a cigarette and drinking coffee. He tried to convince us that hot beverages are better for your body in extreme heat, but we ignored his advice and went for ice-cold waters and ice cream treats.

Hatshepsut and Thutmose III make offerings to Amun in the carvings inside the Red Chapel

Hatshepsut’s Red Chapel

Egyptologists gush about Hatshepsut’s Red Chapel, but I don’t get it. To me, it’s not all that impressive, especially compared to all the other marvels found throughout the country, from massive colonnades to towering statues. It’s just a rectangular-shaped building.

Inside this deep red quartzite chapel in the heart of Karnak, Hatshepsut depicted herself as a male ruler. In fact, her images are difficult to tell apart from those of her nephew and co-pharaoh, Thutmose III.

Much like Hatshepsut’s, King Tut’s reign was stricken from the official record

After Hatshepsut’s death and toward the end of his reign, Thutmose III began a campaign to obliterate his co-ruler’s legacy. At Karnak, he took apart her sacred Red Chapel, leaving its bricks in rubble piles nearby. And at the Eighth Pylon, Thutmose III reassigned two colossal statues of Hatshepsut as pharaoh to his father, Thutmose II. The idea was to connect himself with the traditional patriarchal lineage — and hopefully have everyone forget the unconventional time he shared Egypt’s throne with a woman.

In 1997, the French Institute undertook the challenge of rebuilding what they refer to as la Chapelle Rouge. Today you can visit the Red Chapel, and hopefully you won’t have the space crowded with tourists and a woman doing an Instagram photo shoot out the back.

Beyond the Red Chapel, at the back of Karnak, off to the left, you can wander through Thutmose III’s Festival Hall.

Off to the side of the complex is the Akh-Menou, or Thutomose III’s Festival Hall, featuring tentpole columns

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After exploring the rest of the complex, Duke and I wandered past the Sacred Lake, out to the Tenth Pylon. The gateway was closed off, but beyond was once an avenue of sphinxes that led to the Temple of Mut. The road took a turn and joined up with another avenue of sphinxes, this one leading all the way to Luxor Temple, two miles away. Everyone’s abuzz at the prospect of renovating and reopening that avenue — though it didn’t appear much progress had been made when we visited. –Wally

The temple grounds are a mishmash of architecture from many different pharaohs’ reigns

Much of Karnak lies in ruins

Hatshepsut built the Eighth Pylon, making it one of the oldest parts of the temple complex

Historic renderings of Karnak

Even if you don’t read French, this map can help you navigate the Karnak complex

 

The Tomb of Ramesses III in the Valley of the Kings

Explore KV11, one of the largest tombs in Luxor, and learn why it takes a strange and sudden turn.

Most tombs have a long, straight corridor — but this one takes a slight turn because it ran into a neighboring burial site!

Egypt is a country steeped in myth and history, and one of the most interesting places to see this can be found on the West Bank of the Nile River — the direction of the setting sun and the underworld of Ancient Egypt. Known as the Valley of the Kings, it was part of the capital city of Thebes and was where the tombs of the deceased New Kingdom pharaohs were built. 

As mentioned in an earlier post on the Valley of the Kings, the admission price (160 Egyptian pounds, or about $9) includes three tombs. We had read about the richly decorated tombs filled with spells and scenes from the Book of the Dead and couldn’t wait to see them with our own eyes. 

“Ramesses III’s mummy was so unappealing that it became the model for Boris Karloff’s character in the 1930s film “The Mummy.””

Rasha from Egypt Sunset Tours arranged our itinerary, including our guide and driver, and could not have been more accommodating and flexible. One of the tombs included on our visit  was KV11, that of Ramesses III. (These kings are sometimes spelled Ramses or Rameses, though we’ve gone with the most widely used by Egyptologists, Ramesses.)

The pharaoh is welcomed to the afterlife by the falcon-headed god Horus.

Ramesses III, the Great Bull

Usermaatre-Meryamun, or Ramesses III, was the second ruler of the Twentieth Dynasty and considered to be one of the last great pharaohs of the New Kingdom, before Egypt plunged into chaos. Being king meant that he had five royal names. His Horus name, which he adopted upon taking the throne, was something along the lines of Kanakht Asnesyt, which translates to the Great Bull, Great of Kingship. (Names typically have multiple spelling variants after transliteration, aiming to preserve sound and given differences in the languages’ sounds and writing systems.) 

The walls of the tomb are covered with spells from the Book of the Dead.

Ramesses III chose to finish the tomb his father abandoned.

Although Ramesses III’s reign was fraught with conflicts, his troops secured the empire’s borders against foreign invasion attempts by Libya and the mysterious Sea Peoples of the Mediterranean (depicted on the walls of his mortuary temple and royal palace, Medinet Habu), earning him the reputation as a mighty warrior king. 

Using Ramesses II as his model, he took a harem of many wives — though they would ultimately lead to his demise. The god-king’s 31-year reign ended when he fell victim to an elaborate assasination plot known as the Harem Conspiracy. A minor wife, Tiye, hatched a plan to have the monarch killed and seize the throne from Ramesses’ designated heir for her son, Prince Pentaware. 

The assailants succeeded in killing Ramesses III — the throat of his mummified remains reveals that his throat was slit — but failed in its goal of crowning Pentaware. Queen Tiye, Prince Pentawere and dozens of others were caught and put on trial.

The mummy of Ramesses III. The wrappings hid the fact that the pharaoh’s throat was slit when he was assassinated during a massive coup.

Fragmentary documentation known as the Judicial Papyrus of Turin details the court trial that followed, including the accusations and punishment against its multiple conspirators. How the law dealt with Queen Tiye is unknown, but Pentawere was found guilty and forced to commit suicide. 

The four-pillared hall leads into the burial chamber.

Repurposing His Father’s Abandoned Tomb

The plan of KV11, the designation of the royal tomb of Ramesses III, is comprised of an inclined entrance passage with steps cut into the floor, a descending central corridor, a pillared hall and A burial chamber. Its first three corridors were started by his father, Setnakhte, the last king of the Nineteenth Dynasty, but abandoned when it collided with KV10, the earlier tomb of the deposed pharaoh Amenmesse while excavating the fourth corridor. The cartouches of Setnakhte were later plastered over and reinscribed with the name of Ramesses III.

Not wanting to waste the resources already put into excavation, Ramesses III resumed work on the abandoned tomb, realigning the axis to the right and extending the corridor. The tomb is one of the longest in the valley, measuring a total of 180 meters, or 262 feet. The relatively straight axis represented the sun god Ra’s western descent into the tomb and his ascension in the east. 

Scottish explorer James Bruce took some artistic license in his drawing of a scene from Ramesses III’s tomb in his series Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile

Tomb of the Harpers

This tomb contains colorful well-preserved relief scenes, with the first two corridors depicting the 74 manifestations of Ra. Ramesses III added small side alcoves to the second corridor, one of which contains a relief of two blind harpists. Scottish explorer James Bruce drew attention to it with the publication of his illustrated five-volume Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile, which features a beautiful but inaccurate take on the scene. Worried for his safety, Bruce quickly sketched one of the harpists and later drew it from memory, giving it a Victorian flourish, and for a time, KV11 was referred to as the Tomb of the Harpers.

Just some of the 74 depictions of the sun god Ra seen in the tomb

A narrow yellow ribbon runs through the center of the ceiling and contains additional spells and funerary texts from the Litany of Re. 

On the doorframe between the second and third corridors are symbols of a different kind: two knots of Isis with djed pillars (the symbolic backbone of Osiris, meaning stability) and ankhs (symbolizing life) holding animal-headed was scepters (power). 

The fourth corridor rises to clear the underlying chamber of KV10, descends to a shallow well shaft and continues on to a pillared hall with another passage leading to a pair of anterooms and the burial chamber. 

On the wall here, Ramesses III offers incense before the seated god Ptah-Sokar-Osiris. He holds three vessels, their contents spilling onto the platform on which the god sits. Behind the triple deity stands the goddess Isis. The pharaoh’s titles are listed in front of him: Ramesses the ruler of Heliopolis and his coronation name, which translates to “The Justice of Ra, Beloved by Amun.” 

The identification of Rameses III with the greatest of gods, Amun, ensured that he would experience endless regeneration, a necessity for his eternal well-being in the afterlife. 

In the fourth corridor is a scene from another funerary text, the Amduat, depicting a goddess with the Red Crown of Lower Egypt, standing in front of a guardian serpent with four legs and a human head. The narrative illustrates the nocturnal voyage of the sun god Ra-Horakhty, who travels through the underworld from the time when the sun sets in the west to when it rises again in the east. The underworld, as the Ancient Egyptians saw it, is divided into 12 hours of the night, each representing different allies and enemies for the pharaoh/sun god to encounter. The iconography and symbolism here is wonderful.

Some of the carvings depict the monsters and deities of the underworld.

Adding elements of temple architecture, Ramesses commissioned a four-pillared hall decorated with scenes and texts from the Book of Gates that depict him and various deities on their nightly journey through the netherworld — the fifth hour on the left side and the sixth hour on the right. Also on the right is a side chamber with scenes where Ramesses III is led by the gods Thoth and Horus and offers ma’at (the concept of justice and balance) to Osiris. A double scene on the rear wall immediately before the burial chamber shows the king making offerings to Osiris. 

In the burial chamber, the name of the king was inscribed within a disk formed by the entwined bodies of two serpents. By placing his name within this device, the king identified himself directly with the solar deity and joined his cyclical daily journey. 

Sadly, the quartz sarcophagus was removed by Italian explorer and former circus performer Giovanni Batista Belzoni and currently resides in the Louvre in Paris. Its lid is in the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, England. Prior to the establishment of the Egyptian Antiquities Service, it wasn’t uncommon for unregulated foreign excavators digging in the valley to ship statuary and crates filled with tomb friezes back to Europe, where they found their way into collections such as that of the Louvre and the British Museum. The empty burial chamber ends with an anticlimactic darkened hallway and gate.

The Inspiration for Karloff’s Mummy

French Egyptologist Gaston Maspero is credited with finding a cachette of royal mummies, including that of Ramesses III. But it was actually discovered by accident, when a straying goat fell into a concealed tomb shaft in Deir el-Bahari. The unwrapped mummy is now on display in Cairo’s Egyptian Museum, and its features were considered so unappealing that they found fame as the model for Boris Karloff’s character in the 1930s film The Mummy. –Duke

 

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Read More About Ramesses III

Medinet Habu: A Reflection of Ramesses III’s Military Might

This Luxor temple depicts the victory over the Sea Peoples and includes carvings of severed penises. It’s also the site of the murderous Harem Conspiracy.

When in Luxor, be sure to visit Medinet Habu, an often-overlooked temple

The temple wasn’t even on our itinerary, but it ended up being one of our favorites. We had some extra time after a morning wandering the cool tombs of the Valley of the Kings and Hatshepsut’s mortuary temple. Rasha, who runs the highly recommended guide service Egypt Sunset Tours, suggested we add on the Tombs of the Nobles and Medinet Habu.

Admission to the temple costs a mere 80 Egyptian pounds (about $4.75), making this the cheapest of all the sites we visited.

The exterior wall is yet another sign that Medinet Habu was built to resemble a fortress

On one hand, all the temples of Ancient Egypt begin to blur together, their elements similar: a heavy pylon entranceway, staggeringly tall colonnades, small, secret sanctuaries at the back.

But, in truth, each temple has its own distinct personality. Karnak sprawls, much of it in ruins, its piles of rubble evoking Ancient Rome. Dendera has a magical feel, with its turquoise blue ceiling painted with astrological iconography. Luxor’s colonnade is open to the sky, reveling in the light and warmth of the sun.

And Medinet Habu, too, has a unique design; it evokes a feeling of military might not found in other temples. This martial flair is fitting, for Ramesses III built the structure to celebrate the victory of a battle that threatened to end the Egyptian Empire for good.

Duke and Wally loved visiting the temple complex, which was quite deserted

“New evidence revealed that Ramesses III did meet a gruesome end at the hands of his conspirators.

CT scans of his mummy found a deep slash across his throat.”

The bas-reliefs on the pylon gateways depict Ramesses III’s victory over the fierce Sea Peoples

Pirates of the Mediterranean: The Sea Peoples’ Slaughter

They came from the sea, though historians aren’t quite sure of their homelands. They were fierce, ruthless and mighty warriors. All around Ancient Egypt, neighboring empires fell under the Sea Peoples’ barrage. They even conquered the Hittites, Egypt’s sometimes-friends, sometimes-foes.

Some of the bas-reliefs were still works in progress

Chariots helped Egypt gain advantages in battle

If you defeat warriors who were undefeated, you brag about it, like Ramesses III did

So when they finally came for Egypt in 1179 BCE, Ramesses III must have been worried. He staged the war on two fronts. One, a land battle at the delta of the Nile, was successful, but its lack of detail belies the probability that losses were severe (and therefore glossed over in the official record).

We know more of the second battle, which went more strongly in Egypt’s favor. This naval skirmish wiped out the Sea Peoples, beginning with a hail of arrows and ending with the capsizing of the Mediterranean ships.

Ramesses III turned his mortuary temple into a war memorial, calling it the Mansion of Millions of Years of King Ramesses, United With Eternity in the Estate of Amun. That’s quite a mouthful, so I’m glad the site now goes by its Arabic name.

The temple is infamous for being the site of the Harem Conspiracy

Inside Medinet Habu

The imposing entrance pylon façade strikes the visitor immediately as severe, a brutal sand-colored monolith. This is the fortified gatehouse Ramesses III built and was modeled on Syrian migdol gates he had encountered on his military campaigns. Adding to the fortress feel was a high mud-brick wall that once enclosed the complex.

Upon entry, there are decaying statues of Sekhmet, the lioness-headed goddess of war

Aside from towering depictions of pharaohs, you don’t see many statues in temples

What deity did Ramesses choose to feature immediately inside the gate? Why, none other than Sekhmet, the fierce lioness-headed goddess of war.

It was in these rooms at the top of the structure where Ramesses III hung out with his many wives — and where he met his demise

Treason in the Harem

The top floor of the gatehouse was where Ramesses hung out with his harem. The carvings here show Ramesses III in intimate poses with various wives or relaxing in a chair playing board games.

But all wasn’t as idyllic as pictured. “There was something about the claustrophobic atmosphere that fed the bitter jealousies and personal rivalries of the king’s many wives,” writes Toby Wilkinson in The Rise and Fall of Ancient Egypt. “With little to occupy their minds besides weaving and idle pleasures, the more ambitious concubines nurtured resentments, angry at the lowly status of their offspring and wondering how they might improve their own and their children’s fortunes.”

The Second Courtyard later became a Christian church in the 9th century

The statues were preserved because they were covered in mud by the Coptics

In 1155 BCE, one of the pharaoh’s secondary wives, Tiy, plotted to assassinate Ramesses III as well as his heir apparent, Prince Ramesses, and install her son, Pentawere, on the throne. The plot, known as the Harem Conspiracy, grew to include a mutiny in the army and a revolution in the countryside. But as the plan became intricate, more and more people became involved, and eventually someone blabbed.

The conspirators were arrested and tried at a tribunal. Found guilty, they were forced to commit suicide. Those who were involved to a lesser degree were horribly disfigured, their noses and ears hacked off to permanently mark them as convicts.

Not only was this a mortuary temple, it was also Ramesses III’s palace. It was very unusual to combine both of these buildings into one complex

New evidence revealed that Ramesses III did meet a gruesome end at the hands of his conspirators, though. Researchers reexamined his mummy with CT scans and found a bone-deep slash across his throat that would have been fatal.

Medinet Habu is a beautiful structure — and the site of a pharaoh’s assassination

The underside of this gateway shows the winged sun amongst other paintings

Like many other Ancient Egyptian temples, you proceed through a series of courtyards

From Temple to Amun to Mortuary Temple to Christian Church

The temple within dates to 1490 BCE and was dedicated to Amun, the god of creation and fertility, by Hatshepsut and Thutmose III. It was deemed a magical site, and even today, local farmers are said to believe in the protective powers of Medinet Habu.

Is Duke feeling the magic that Egyptians to this day believe is imbued in this holy site?

Medinet Habu includes a larger version of the Ramesseum. Seems like Ramesses III had to one-up his father

Ramesses III chose this spot for his mortuary temple. It’s essentially a larger-scale version of the Ramesseum, Ramesses II’s mortuary temple — which makes me feel less bad that we skipped visiting that particular temple in favor of this. The pharaoh enclosed the temple within his own, larger complex.

The site functioned as the administrative center of western Thebes, and it was here that the workmen who constructed the royal tombs in the Valley of the Kings went on strike when their payment was late.

The shaded parts of the colonnade still have blue paint visible

These symbols were ankhs (representing life) with arms holding was scepters (power, dominion)

Shh! Don’t tell anyone, but Wally liked Medinet Habu better than Hatshepsut’s temple

After the Ramesside period, Libyans took control of Egypt, and Medinet Habu gained a dubious claim to fame. The Libyan rulers plundered the tombs of the pharaohs, taking all the riches to the state treasury, and unwrapped the royal mummies in the hunt for hidden jewels. Under the orders of Butehamun, the scribe of the necropolis, in 1066 BCE, the mummies were taken to Medinet Habu for processing and rewrapping before being unceremoniously dumped into the tomb of Amenhotep II.

Hundreds of years after Medinet Habu was built, in the 9th century, Rome’s dominion stretched into Egypt, and the Coptic Christians established the first church in the country. Its ruins remain, off to the right side of the complex. The monk cells behind the church were used for medical experiments, our guide Mamduh told us. Yes, there once was a time when religion and science were seen as compatible.

Look closely: In addition to hands, soldiers are presenting war trophies of chopped-off penises to claim their bounty

Chopped-Off Hands and Penises

In the first courtyard, there’s a window of appearances, where the pharaoh would greet his subjects and reward military commanders. This portico connects the temple to the palace. One of the bas-reliefs on the wall here shows soldiers collecting their bounty by presenting the severed hands of their enemies to the pharaoh. But, Mamduh told us, some of the soldiers tried to double up on their rewards by cutting off both of their victims’ hands. So the king decided to come up with another prize to collect. Gee, what’s portable, and something men only have one of? If you look at the carving, you’ll see that in addition to tossing out hands, the soldiers are also presenting severed penises.

A popular design element in Ancient Egypt was the lotus column, constructed to mimic the plant that symbolized Upper Egypt

Out back is the Great Hypostyle Hall, modeled after Karnak’s — again Ramesses III gained inspiration from his father, Ramesses II

Only the bases remain of most of the columns

There are four rose granite statues at the very back of the complex. They depict Ramesses III with Maat, the goddess of truth and justice, and Thoth, the god of wisdom

This delightfully grisly scene is just one reason this temple, so rich in history, is well worth visiting. So don’t dick around — add this to your Luxor itinerary. –Wally

The design of Medinet Habu borrows from the military gatehouses Ramesses III encountered in Syria