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M= Temple of Mentuhotep
T III= Temple of Tuthmosis III
H= Temple of Hatshepsut
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Mentuhotep
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The temple of Mentuhotep II (or I) Neb-Hepet-Re was
the first one built
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Mentuhotep
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in Deir el Bahari. It was called "Akh-set(w)-Nebhepetre:
i.e. "Splendid (or Useful) are the places of Nebhepetre".
Because of its ruinous state, with very few reliefs,
it is seldom photographed.
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Neb-Hepet-Re
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This temple is a transition between the Old Kingdom temple of the pyramid, and
the New Kingdom House of Millions of Years. For the first time, the tomb of the
king is united with its mortuary temple. The New Kingdom will later separate
the tomb (in the Valley of the Kings) from the House of Millions of Years. It
was the (very lucky) Howard Carter who discovered the burial shaft when his horse
stumbled into its rubble-filled entrance in 1900.
The temple was discovered in the 1860’s and was excavated by Edouard Naville
between 1903 and 1907, and then by Herbert Winlockh between 1921 and 1930.
The multileveled construction and the plan were entirely new, with no equivalent
dating from the Old Kindom.
The complex had a valley temple and a 1,2 km causeway leading to the temple itself.
At the lower level there was a pillared lower hall with two rows of octogonal,
decorated, colums.
The upper level had a covered central core dedicated to Mentu-Re (Mentu was a
primeval god of Thebes, revered by the the warrior kings that had to reunify
Egypt after the anarchy of the First Intermediate Period). The roof may have
been flat, or topped by an earth mound. The whole terrace was perhaps conceived
as a replica of the primeval mound. The enclosure contained chapels and shaft
tombs for the king's wives and family.
Around this core was an upper hall with three rows of colums.
The rear part was devoted to the cult of the deified king, who had a statue in
a small chapel. Later this was converted in an Amun sanctuary.
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Plan from The Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt Architecture
(see bibliography) |
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Bibliography
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-NAVILLE Edouard :The XIIth
Dynasty Temple at Deir el Bahari, 30th memoir of
the Egypt exploration fund (3 vols), London, 1910.[republished
by Yare
Egyptology ]
-ARNOLD Dieter : The temple of Mentuhotep at Deir el Bahari, New York,
1979
-ARNOLD Dieter : The Encyclopedia of ancient egyptian architecture,
I.B. Tauris, London, 2003
-WILKINSON Richard : The complete temples of Ancient Egypt, Thames
and Hudson, 2000
-LIPINSKA Jadwiga: The Polish archeology mission at Deir el Bahari,
KMT, 3, 2, 1992
- A web site by Sjef Willockx
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