Location: Lake Nasse Map
The Temples of Abu Simbel are two rock-cut temples
on the western shore of Lake Nasser. They are
located in the Egyptian part of Nubia on the
southeastern edge of the town of Abu Simbel and were
built in the 13th century BC. Built under King
(Pharaoh) Ramses II from the 19th Dynasty of the
ancient Egyptian New Kingdom.
The rock
temples of Abu Simbel, the large temple to the glory
of Ramses II and the small Temple of Hathor in
memory of Nefertari, his great royal wife, have been
on the UNESCO World Heritage List since 1979. Both
temples are no longer in their original location. To
save them from the rising waters of Lake Nasser, the
reservoir of the Nile dammed by the Aswan Dam, they
were dismantled between 1963 and 1968 and rebuilt 64
meters higher on the Abu Simbel plateau. There they
rise today on an island in Lake Nasser, which is
connected to the town of Abu Simbel on the northwest
side by a navigable causeway.
The name Abu
Simbel is a European conversion of the Arabic Abu
Sunbul, a derivation from the ancient place name
Ipsambul. During the time of the New Kingdom kings,
the region where the temples were built was probably
called Meha. However, a secure assignment has not
yet been made.
In today's Sudan, about 20
kilometers southwest of Abu Simbel and a little
north of the second Nile cataract, there was the New
Kingdom town of Ibshek with a temple of Hathor of
Ibshek, who was also worshiped in the Small Temple
of Abu Simbel. This area is now flooded by Lake
Nubia.
Abu Simbel is located in the south of Egypt in the
Aswan Governorate (Aswan), not far from the border
with Sudan. The Sudanese border in the southwest at
the so-called Wadi Halfa Salient is only about 20
kilometers away. Abu Simbel is connected to the
governorate capital Aswan, 240 kilometers northeast,
by a road that leads through the Libyan Desert west
of Lake Nasser. It is mainly used by tourist buses
that take visitors to the two temples of Abu Simbel.
Lake Nasser is navigable, so the temple area can
also be accessed from the lake side. Some cruise
ships only sail on the lake above the Aswan Dam. The
place can also be reached by air through Abu Simbel
Airport.
In the past, Abu Simbel was located
on the west bank of the Nile between the first and
second cataracts. Cataracts are rapids structured by
blocks or rocky bars; they were difficult for Nile
shipping to pass, especially when the water was low.
Today, the two cataracts mentioned near Aswan and
the 65 kilometers southeast of Wadi Halfa in Sudan
have sunk into Lake Nasser, which on the Egyptian
side is named after Gamal Abdel Nasser, the former
Egyptian president from 1954 to 1970. At the time of
Ramses II, the southern border of the pharaonic
empire was located near the second cataract. The
construction of the Abu Simbel temple complex there
was intended to demonstrate the power and eternal
superiority of Egypt over tributary Nubia.
In 1813, the Swiss traveler Johann Ludwig Burckhardt (1784–1817),
alias Sheikh Ibrahim Ibn Abdallah, explored the area south of Kasr Ibrîm
in Nubia. On the way back he learned from locals about a particularly
beautiful temple on the banks of the Nile near Ebsambal, as the place is
later called in Burckhardt's notes. He then reached the Hathor Temple of
Nefertari at Abu Simbel on March 22, 1813. While exploring the area,
Burckhardt also found the Great Temple of Ramses II, which was largely
hidden by a sand dune. The interior of the temple was inaccessible to
him due to the accumulated masses of sand.
About the arrival at
the Great Temple, Burckhardt noted in his diary: “My eye fell on the
still visible part of four colossal statues... They were in a deep
hollow dug into the hill; It's a shame that they were almost completely
buried by sand, which the wind causes to fall from the mountain like the
water of a torrent. The head and part of the chest and arms of one
statue still stick out of the sand. The one next to it is almost
impossible to see because its head is missing and its body is covered in
sand up to its shoulders. Of the other two, only the headdress stands
out.”
After his return to Cairo, Burckhardt described the temples
he had discovered to the Italian adventurer Giovanni Battista Belzoni
(1778–1823), and he also introduced him to the British Consul General
Henry Salt. On behalf of Salt, Belzoni traveled to Nubia in 1817 and
visited Abu Simbel. On August 1, 1817, he freed the upper part of the
entrance to the Great Temple from sand and penetrated inside. Belzoni
wrote of the temple: “Our first impression was that it was obviously a
fairly large structure; Our astonishment increased when we discovered
that it was an extraordinarily rich sanctuary, decorated with
bas-reliefs, paintings and colossal statues of great beauty.”
The
scientific study of the temples began in 1828 by a Franco-Tuscan
expedition under Jean-François Champollion and Ippolito Rosellini, who
created documentation of the temple's condition. Further expeditions to
Abu Simbel were led by Robert Hay in 1830 and by Karl Richard Lepsius in
1844. Robert Hay was the first to use technical measures to protect the
large temple from being constantly filled with sand. As the temples of
Abu Simbel became known in Europe, many travelers to Egypt visited the
rock shrines on the Nile as early as the 19th century. Some immortalized
themselves by carving their names on the temple facades. At the end of
the century, the sand on the seated colossal statues of Ramses II was
increasingly removed. However, it was not until 1909 that the facade of
the Great Temple was completely exposed to sand.
In the 1950s, the planned construction of the Aswan High Dam
threatened the accessibility and architectural integrity of the two
temples of Ramesses II at Abu Simbel. They would have been flooded by
the planned Lake Nasser alongside the temples of Philae, Kalabsha and
others. As early as 1955, an international documentation center was
founded with the aim of covering the area from Aswan to across the
border of Sudan. On March 8, 1960, UNESCO asked for international help
to save the temple complex. Among the numerous proposals and plans to
save the structures, a Swedish project received approval in June 1963;
It called for the dismantling of the temples, the removal of the entire
rock mass and the reconstruction at a higher location.
The
relocation of the two Abu Simbel temples finally took place between
November 1963 and September 1968 as a worldwide joint project. The work
was carried out by Egyptian, German, French, Italian and Swedish
construction companies. Hochtief led the consortium under the planning
of Walter Jurecka. The plan to saw up the temple came from the Swedes.
At the inauguration of the dam on January 15, 1971, the then Egyptian
President Anwar as-Sadat praised the relocation of the 23 Nubian temples
and shrines: “Peoples can achieve miracles when they work together for a
good cause.”
For removal and reconstruction, 17,000 holes were
first drilled into the rock in order to solidify the rock with 33 tons
of epoxy resin. Iron clamps were also used for stabilization. The
temples of Abu Simbel were then cut into 1,036 blocks using a wire saw,
each weighing between 7 and a maximum of 30 tons. The cuts of the
individual blocks are now visible from the outside. Their new location
should be approximately 180 meters northwest and 64 meters above the
level of the old temple area, with particular emphasis being placed on
the exact original orientation (alignment) of the temples. The first
block was loaded on May 12, 1965 with the number GA 1A01. In addition to
the temple blocks, 1,112 pieces of rock from the immediate surroundings
were added to create a true-to-original replica of the temple view at
the new location. The completion of the relocation of the temple complex
was celebrated with a solemn ceremony on September 22, 1968.
The
interior of the temple is held - partly hanging - by reinforced concrete
domes above; that of the Great Temple measures 140 meters. So these are
no longer real cave temples. The dome is externally hidden by heaped
sand, rubble and original rocks (including the original facade),
preserving the original impression of a rock temple. For the time, this
represented a structural engineering achievement that is occasionally
compared to the construction of the temples by Ramses II. The cost of
the temple relocation was approximately $80 million, donated by over 50
countries. Abu Simbel was one of the occasions for the adoption of the
1972 UNESCO World Heritage Convention and for the creation of the UNESCO
World Heritage List.
As a “branch of the royal palace”, the temples took over the
representation as a “divine abode” in which the king symbolically
invokes the deities through his divine legitimacy as an earthly ruler in
order to come into contact with them. The temples thus function as a
link between heaven and earth within the framework of the divine
celestial cosmology.
Exact data about the planning and
construction of the temples at Abu Simbel do not exist, but it can be
assumed that the work took place during the time of the Nubian viceroy
Iunj: an inscription found near the small temple indicates that the king
had entrusted one of his closest confidants to oversee the initial work.
In general, the years between 1260 and 1250 BC apply. BC as the presumed
time of temple construction. The death of the great royal wife Nefertari
Meritenmut around 1255 BC occurred during this period. BC, which played
a prominent role at the court from 1279 to 1213 BC. King Ramses II, who
reigned in BC, played. It is last mentioned in the 24th year of Ramses
II's reign on the occasion of the inauguration of the two temples at Abu
Simbel.
The colored reliefs inside the temples provide clues to
the time when they were built. In the large temple, for example,
military campaigns of Ramses, also from the time as co-regent of his
father Seti I, are depicted, which could be dated using other sources.
Further clues to the time when the temple complex was built can be found
in the way individual people are depicted or positioned. The third-born
son of Ramses II, Prince Ramses, son of the second great royal wife
Isisnofret, who died before the 26th year of the king's reign, is
immortalized three times in the great temple without the death symbol
typical of the ancient Egyptians, which indicates a dating of the
Interior decoration began before 1253 BC. BC can be concluded.
The daughter of Ramses II and Isisnofret Bintanat was initially referred
to with the simple title “King's Daughter” on her sculpture at the feet
of the southern colossal statue of the seated king on the outer facade
of the large temple, but appears on the lower band of the relief in the
large pillared hall, also called Pronaos, already as a great royal wife,
a title she had already held before her mother's death in 1246 BC.
received. The interior work of the Great Temple must have been completed
in the 34th year of Ramses II's reign, as the so-called “wedding stele”
to commemorate the king's wedding to the Hittite princess
Maathorneferure no longer found a place inside the temple, but rather on
the rock wall at the end of the south facade.
The two temples of
Abu Simbel were built like traditional Egyptian rock tombs and
underground quarries; they were completely cut into the rock massif.
Dieter Arnold describes them as “masterpieces of rock architecture,
whose importance is only comparable to the Indian rock temples of
Ellora”. The Hathor Temple of Nefertari is about half the size of the
main temple of Ramses II, which was driven into the rock formation to a
depth of 63 meters (measured from the front edge of the foundation). The
builders of the king's Great Temple were "a multitude of workmen taken
captive by his sword" under the supervision of the chief sculptor Piai,
according to an inscription inside the temple.
In terms of architectural elements, the great temple of Abu Simbel is
the transfer of an Egyptian holy of holies temple into a rock. Here the
mountain side serves as a gate system (pylon), where the architect was
able to dispense with the flank towers. The temple facade is modeled on
such a flank tower. Inside the temple, several halls decorated with
writings and wall reliefs line up one behind the other leading up to the
sanctuary. The images of the gods worshiped in the temple are placed
there. The large temple of Ramses is dedicated to the “Imperial Triad”
of the 18th to 20th dynasties, the gods Ptah of Memphis, Amun-Re of
Thebes and Re-Harachte of Heliopolis as well as Ramses.
In
addition, Horus of Meha (also Harmachis) was worshiped in the relief
depictions of the interior of the temple, whereby the god Horus in his
sub-form Harachte was also worshiped by merging with Re to form
Re-Harachte. Horus and Re-Harachte have the falcon-headed face in
common; the difference was the representation of Re-Harachte with a sun
disk and uraeus serpent. In some cases, Re-Harachte of Heliopolis was
considered to have the same essence as the god Horus, for example in
Upper Egyptian Behdet (Edfu). The Horus cult in Meha goes back to this
god through King Sesostris III. consecrated four places in Nubia, which,
in addition to Meha, included Baki (Quban), Mi'am (Aniba) and Buhen
(Wadi Halfa). The royal consecration of Horus in the 12th Dynasty was
intended to integrate lower Nubia into Egypt.
The worship of
Horus of Meha only played a secondary role in Ramses II's choice of
location for the great temple of Abu Simbel, since Horus of Meha was a
local god. Rather, as an expression of ancient Egyptian royal
philosophy, the temples of Abu Simbel were intended to be symbols of
power that sent clear signals to regions near the border. Ramses II
wanted to emphasize his status as the “personified son of the god” and
his divine legitimacy on earth. This mythological relationship was also
manifested in the Pharaoh's name Horus.
There are indications of
the appearance of Ramses II as Horus of Meha in the relief depictions of
the large temple. The falcon-headed god with a human ear and a ram's
horn on the first southern pillar of the large pillar hall, above the
depiction of Hathor of Ibshek, the wife of Horus, bears the full first
name of Ramses User-maat-Re-setep-en-Re, Ramses himself offers gifts. On
the west wall of a side room in this hall, Ramesisumeriamun (Ramses'
personal name) with a falcon's head, known as the "Great God", takes the
place of Horus of Meha, who is missing there. In addition to him, the
scenes there are dedicated to the gods Amun-Re of Thebes, Re-Harachte of
Heliopolis, Horus of Buhen, Horus of Mi'am and Horus of Baki.
The
great temple of Abu Simbel served in particular to provide a new
understanding of the royal philosophy of Ramses, who wanted to be seen
as a divinely legitimate ruler on an equal footing with other deities.
This can be seen in the four 21 meter high colossal statues of Ramses
with the double crown of Upper and Lower Egypt (Pschent) shown above,
whose seated images “guard” the entrance to the Great Temple. The
distance between each figure's ears alone is more than four meters, and
the lip line is more than a meter long. The two northern seat images
bear the inscription: “Ramses, the lover of Amun” and “Ramses, the lover
of Atum”, the southern statues “Ramses, sun of the rulers” and “Ramses,
ruler of the two lands”.
The royal figure south of the temple
entrance is incomplete; parts of the head and torso lie on the ground in
front of the facade. It was damaged by an earthquake shortly after the
temple complex was built in the 34th year of Ramses II's reign. The
colossal statues of the Pharaoh form the main eye-catcher of the 38
meter wide and 32 meter high facade structure. The seated images are
placed in pairs on a terrace to the right and left of the temple
entrance. A nine-step staircase leads in the middle to its level, from
where the gate to the temple can be walked through.
Above the
temple facade there is a frieze made up of 16, at least partially
preserved, of the former 21 crouching, approximately 2.5 meter high
baboons, the so-called sun monkeys or sacred monkeys. It was this frieze
that, when the temple was rediscovered in 1813, drew the attention of
the Swiss Jean Louis Burckhardt to the Great Temple, which was otherwise
completely silted up. The baboon frieze, pictured above this paragraph
in a 2009 photo, is the first part of the temple to be illuminated by
the rising sun. Below the frieze, placed on the convex cornice of the
façade border, a groove with uraeus snakes and characters adorns the
upper outer edge of the temple. The snake frieze served to symbolically
protect the building. Directly below the uraeus snakes, as part of the
actual temple facade, an inscription in hieroglyphs was made as a
dedication.
Above the temple entrance in the middle of the
facade, Re-Harachte, the sun god of Heliopolis, emerges frontally from a
niche. It is provided with the attributes of the sun disk of Re, holding
the Wsr symbol in the right hand, a head and stylized neck of an animal
meaning "user" - "strong, powerful", and the mate figure in the left for
the Egyptian representation of the world order. These symbols can be
read as Ramses II's throne name: "User-Maat-Re" - "Strong/powerful is
the Maat of Re", which makes the king an incarnation of Re, the "Great
Soul of Re-Harachte", becomes. The depiction of Re with the falcon's
head also symbolizes the "Red Horus" or "Horus in the Horizon"
(Harmachis), a personification of the sunrise, which corresponds to the
eastern orientation of the temple entrance. The figure of the god is
flanked on both sides by bas-reliefs in which Ramses II offers an image
of the goddess Maat to Re-Harachte.
At the feet of the four
seated colossal statues of Ramses II at the entrance to the Great Temple
are smaller statues representing members of the king's family. To the
side and between his legs are the sculptures of his Great Royal Wife
Nefertari, his mother and wife of Seti I, Tuja, who bore the title
Mut-Tuja as co-regent of Ramses II, and some of the king's children.
These include the princes Ramses and Amunherchepeschef as well as the
princesses Bintanat, Nebettaui and Meritamun. A fourth princess pictured
is nameless. All statues are elevated on the throne bases of the four
seated images of Ramses above the terrace level. The bases have reliefs
of Nubian and Asian prisoners on the front and sides.
The temple
complex, which extends 63 meters into the rock from the edge of the
foundation on the facade to the sanctum, the rearmost chamber with the
statues of the gods, begins with the large three-aisled pillared hall or
pronaos. Two four statue pillars with reliefs divide the 18 meter long
and 16.7 meter wide room into three areas. The statues placed in front
of the ten meter high pillars form a trellis along the central aisle
into the next hall. They show Ramses II, depicted with the attributes
and posture of Osiris, on the right with the ancient Egyptian double
crown, on the left with the crown of Upper Egypt. However, the
inscriptions speak against equating the Pharaoh with Osiris; they place
the king in a very complex relationship with the three deities Amun,
Atum and Re-Harachte (according to R. Gundlach).
The central nave
of the large pillared hall with the royal statues is about twice as wide
as the two side aisles behind the four pillars, which are connected to
each other by architraves. On the ceiling of the central nave there is a
painting with crowned vultures of the goddess Nekhbet spreading their
wings, protectively holding feather fans around the king's cartouche in
their claws. On the north wall is a 17 meter long and 9 meter high
relief depicting the Battle of Kadesh in 1274 BC. BC against the
Hittites, in which neither side was able to force a decision, but it was
glorified as a victory. The text, written in hieroglyphs, comes from the
court poet Pentaur (pntAwr.t). Even if the victorious depiction did not
correspond to the actual events, it still gives an insight into how the
Egyptians fought at the time. After further minor disputes, Ramses II
concluded in 1259 BC. BC signed a peace treaty with the Hittite Empire.
In the hall you can also see scenes from the battles against Libya,
Kush and Retjenu, which the king defeated. The decorations of the hall
glorify the military deeds of Ramses II as the victor. In the rear area
of the large hall you can access a total of eight side chambers from the
side aisles on both sides through four door openings, two of which were
antechambers, which were probably used to store supplies or utensils for
cult activities in the temple.
On the temple axis, behind the
large pillared hall, through an originally two-leaf door, you reach the
smaller four-pillared hall with pillars arranged in pairs on both sides
of the main aisle, which, like the eight pillars of the large hall,
divide the room into three areas under architraves. The pillars are
decorated with depictions of the pharaoh's reception and embrace by the
gods, a sign of community and favoritism. On the walls of the hall there
are liturgical scenes: sacrifice and worship rituals as well as the
procession of the sacred barge, the Sunbark. Another door opening leads
to the transverse anteroom of the sanctuary. From there you can look
into the holy of holies, the sancta sanctorum, on the back wall of which
the life-size statues of Ptah, Amun-Re, Ramses II and Re-Harachte are
lined up from left to right, sitting on a low stone bench. Here the
pharaoh is equal to the triad of gods.
It is striking that the
quality of the relief work, in terms of technique and accuracy,
gradually decreases towards the rear area of the temple. Additional
supporting walls also prove that the Great Temple was damaged by an
earthquake during Ramses II's lifetime. This may have been the same
quake that brought down the colossal statue of the pharaoh south of the
temple entrance.
In front of the temple there are two small
chapels to the south and north, of which the northern one is unroofed
and represents a sun sanctuary. In the center is an altar with four
baboons worshiping the sun, flanked by two obelisks. The northern chapel
may represent a birthplace.
The “Sun Miracle” of Abu Simbel is an event that takes place twice a
year. During a certain period of time, the sun's rays penetrating
through the temple entrance illuminate for about 20 minutes three of the
four statues of gods depicted in a sitting position in the sanctuary
located deep in the temple: Amun-Re from Thebes, the deified Ramses and
Re-Harachte from Heliopolis. The leftmost statue of Ptah of Memphis, an
earth god associated with the realm of the dead, remains out of sunlight
except for his left shoulder.
After the temple complex was
completed, this always happened in the fourth month of the seasons Peret
(February 21) and Achet (October 21) during the reign of Ramesses II.
The different length of a mean solar year compared to the calendar year
is responsible for the fact that the azimuth of the sun's position
shifts every year. In addition, the leap day that occurs every four
years influences the date of the “miracle of the sun”. This results in a
fluctuation range of one day in both directions. For this reason,
different information about the day of the miracle of the sun is
published in the literature and in publications. Assumptions that the
relocation of the temple was the cause of the changing days can be ruled
out from an astronomical perspective.
Since the miracle of the
sun always occurs around the days of October 21st and February 21st, the
often stated statements that it takes place on the equinoxes in March
and September are also incorrect. The equinoxes between March 19th and
21st and September 22nd or 23rd mark the astronomical beginning of
spring and autumn, respectively. They are the same everywhere on earth
and do not shift like the calendar equinoxes, so the miracle of the sun
has no connection with them.
About 150 meters northeast of the Great Temple of Abu Simbel stands
the so-called small temple; It is dedicated to the goddess Hathor of
Ibshek and Nefertari and was called “Nefertari, for whose sake Re
shines”. In Egyptian mythology, Hathor was the wife of Horus and the
main goddess of the ancient Egyptian town of Ibshek near the temple
complex. The appearance of Ramses II in relation to his kingship
corresponded to the falcon-headed Horus in the large temple. With a
similar theological focus, he had the smaller temple built for his great
royal wife Nefertari, who here represents the goddess Hathor as the
royal wife. A pillar inscription inside the temple reads: "Ramses,
strong in truth, beloved of Amun, created this heavenly abode for his
beloved royal consort Nefertari."
The facade of the small temple
is also sunk into the rock. The figures carved out of the rock face,
standing upright and at ground level, with each left leg placed slightly
forward, show Ramses II and his wife Nefertari as Hathor. The six
statues are separated from each other by pillars with deeply carved
hieroglyphs and are all the same size, over ten meters high. This
represented a special distinction for Nefertari, as the wives of the
kings were usually depicted smaller than them, as was also the case in
the large temple at Abu Simbel. Here the children of the royal couple
stand in reduced size next to the statues of their parents, the princes
Amunherchepeschef, Paraherwenemef, Merire and Meriatum as well as the
princesses Meritamun and Henuttaui.
The two figures of the queen
carry on their heads the sun disk with two large feathers between the
horns of the “cow goddess” Hathor, each holding a sistrum in their left
hand, an instrument consecrated to Hathor. They are each flanked by four
differently depicted royal statues. On the left side of the facade, the
two statues of the king wear the crown of Upper Egypt, the statue to the
right of the entrance is decorated with the double crown of Upper and
Lower Egypt and the head of the statue of Ramses on the right side of
the facade is covered with a headdress with ram's horns, which is
surrounded by a sun disk surmounted by two large ostrich feathers. This
is the Henu crown, also called the “ostrich feather crown” or “Henu
crown of the morning house” (Egyptian: henu en per-duat aa cheperu).
Among other things, it was an insignia worn at coronations and possibly
a sign of royal rebirth. The images of the king are depicted with the
typical Egyptian apron and ceremonial beard.
The small temple
leads 21 meters into the rock formation, built like the large temple
with the sanctuary at the end, but with a simpler floor plan. The gate
to the temple is crowned by a bas-relief beneath a frieze of uraeus
snakes. Above the snake frieze are the cartouches with the name Ramses
II. In the entrance area there are relief depictions on both sides, on
the left hand with the king paying homage to the goddess Hathor by
giving a gift, on the right with a scene of worship of Isis by
Nefertari. You then enter a three-aisled hall, the three areas of which
are divided by three pillars each connected with architraves along the
central aisle. Towards the central nave, the pillars have stylized heads
of the face of the goddess Hathor. Among them, events from the lives of
Nefertari and Ramses are described in hieroglyphs.
The six-pillar
hall of the small temple, the first room in the temple also called
Pronaos, is predominantly decorated with scenes of a religious nature.
Various deities from Egyptian mythology are depicted on the sides of the
Hathor pillars. The walls of the hall show ritual killings of Libyan and
Nubian enemies by Ramses II in the face of the gods Re and Amun,
accompanied by Nefertari standing behind him with a Hathor headdress. In
other scenes, the king presents offerings to various deities.
From the six-pillar hall you can reach the transverse anteroom of the
sanctuary through three door openings, corresponding to the division of
the hall with the Hathor pillars into three areas. There is an unadorned
room on each of its north and south sides. In the middle of the room, on
the main axis of the temple, another doorway opens the way to the inner
sanctum of the small temple of Abu Simbel. In a niche slightly to the
right on the back wall, the goddess Hathor is depicted in the form of a
sacred cow between two pillars. Nefertari is addressed here as a
manifestation of the goddess Hathor, which is comparable to the
depictions of Hatshepsut in her temple in Deir el-Bahari. The reliefs
show coronation scenes and the protection of the queen by goddesses of
love and fertility.