Top 10 Facts about the Temple of Luxor

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Top 10 Facts about the Temple of Luxor

Luxor Temple is a huge Ancient Egyptian temple compound located on the east bank of the Nile River. It is known by the name Luxor from ancient Thebes. The temple was constructed in 1400 BCE.

The Egyptian refer to it by its native name, ‘ipet resyt’, meaning the southern sanctuary. At the site of the temple, there are several great temples on the east and west banks.

The four main attractions at the site that were frequented by travellers are the Temple of Seti I at Gurnah, the Temple of Hatshepsut at Deir el Bahri, the Temple of Ramesses II.

Unlike the other temples in Thebes, Luxor temple was not devoted to any god or a sacred version of the pharaoh in death by the Egyptians.

Instead, it was dedicated to the coronation of new kingship. It has served as a ceremonial place for most pharaohs of Egypt who received crowns.

When the Romans ruled the region transformed a chapel inside the temple that was dedicated to goddess Mut into a church. Here are 10 facts about the Temple of Luxor.

1. It is said to be the world’s largest outdoor museum

The temple of Luxor earned the title, the world’s largest outdoor museum because the site’s compound has some of the most exotic landmarks attracting millions of tourists annually.

The temple sits at the ancient Egyptian capital in Thebes. Some of its top attractions include Valley of the Kings, Hatshepsut Temple, Colossi of Memnon, and splendid Karnak Temple.

Most of the ruins and artefacts at the site have been preserved and they are as still in their original forms.

The monuments and beautiful carvings still intact have impressed many that have visited the site. Making it the most visited historic monument in Egypt.

Two pharaohs that were involved in the development of the temple have left a significant mark on the architecture of the temple.

There are several towers at the temple that stretch up to 70 yards long. Its northern entrance is lined in a sacred way and is also known as the avenue of sphinxes.

Its massive courtyard has some the preserved columns on its eastern side, the courtyard dates back to the first pharaoh of Egypt.

There are at least 32 columns that lead to the inner chambers that served as a church during the Roman empire.

The birth shrine built by the Pharaoh III and a boat shrine that was used by Amun and built by Alexander is still in good shape.

2. It has always been a sacred site

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As its name suggests, the site was treated as a sacred site since it was constructed. It served as a temple for the pagans in Egypt and later when the Romans took over, they used a chapel in the Temple as a church and a monastery, a Coptic church is on the west side on the temple’s compound.

The temple got buried beneath the streets and houses of Luxor as the city expanded. Later on, a mosque was erected over it in the 13^th century, the Abu el-Haggag Mosque and exist till date as a place of worship.

Before the pharaohs constructed the temple, the site had a much older temple and is believed to have been built by the fifth Pharaoh of the 18^th century. After the new structures were brought up, only a small pavilion of the older temple was left.

The older temple is believed to have a shrine dedicated to the god Amun.

3. The temple was built to celebrate the Opet festival

The Temple of Luxor was built to serve the purpose most temples built in the New Kingdom era; as a place of worship and a ceremonial site.

The Pharaohs built the temple specifically for the Opet festival. This is an annual celebration where the statues of gods Amon, Mut, and Khonsu, were carried and followed by a large procession. It was celebrated when the Nile river flooded.

The celebrations marked rebirth, fertility and marriage. The celebration would culminate with the re-coronation of a pharaoh to reinforce his claim to the throne.

One temple the stands out at Luxor is the Karnak temple. It is connected to temple of Luxor through a long street that is 2 miles long and has around 700 sphinxes carved out of sandstone.

This street was built by the monarchs of the 30th Dynasty who had improved the features of the sphynxes by giving them the resemblance of a human head.

The Opet procession would start from the Karnak temple and proceed to the Luxor temple. The festival lasted between 11 days to almost a month.

4. The temple served as a burial site for the royals

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The pharaohs built the Temple of Luxor to serve their different needs. On of the purpose of the temple was to be resting place for the pharaohs.

The burials at the temple were based on religious beliefs as they believed it was the home to Amun the god. The Egyptian royalty believed they were immortal and gods too.

On the west bank of River Nile lies the valley of the Kings; this is where the noblemen and pharaohs were buried in tombs that were carved into the rocks.

These tombs were among the recent excavations that were unveiled by Egypt’s ministry of antiquities.

5. It is one of the most preserved temples

Several ancient temples in the world are archaeological sites today but most are in ruins with little preservation and have been vandalized.

This is not the case with Luxor temple, it is considered as one of the well-preserved temples of all of the ancient monuments.

Most of the structure; massive pylons, sculptures, and carvings are still undamaged. this makes Luxor Temple one of the most outstanding tourist attraction in the whole of Egypt.

Due to the frequent flooding of the Nile River, parts of the temple’s compound were buried under the mud and silt that had accumulated over time. This was after the temple was abandoned after the reign of the pharaohs.

When the careful work of excavation was done, they unveiled the mosque which was still in good condition and is an important part of the site to date.

The Luxor compound was used as a sanctuary for most of the pharaoh’s treasures. These massive tombs were called the temples of a million years, they were meant to last for eternity.

6. Separate sections of the temple served different purposes

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This grand temple is a glorious structure with many separate sections, each of which was designed with a specific purpose with and most specifically relating to their annual festival.

Parts of the temple served as a coronation area for new and existing pharaohs, another served as a shrine for the god Amun, another served as a vault for their treasures that was to last forever.

The temple also served as a place of worship for the pagans, Christians and Muslims.

7. Parts of the Artefacts excavated from the site of the temple are in The British Museum

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Historians believe that the first modern European explorer to discover the city of Thebes was a Jesuit, Claude Sicard who visited the area in 1715.

When he went back home and shared his findings, he got his fellow Europeans excited and curious about the new land, Egypt.

A group of European explorers then headed to Egypt to see the city for themselves, this group was part of the Napoleon army.

The explorers them measured and took records of the Temple of Luxor in the early 19^th century.

During their expedition they came across the Rosetta stone that has inscriptions of a decree that was issued in Memphis Egypt, it was written in hieroglyphics.

The Rosetta Stone can be found in the British National Museum, it has been there since 1802.

Other statues and crypts found at the site can be viewed at the Luxor Museum in Egypt.

8. One pillar from the Temple was swapped for a mechanical clock

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Other than Britain, Paris also owns one of two pillars that were erected at the back of the courtyard of the Temple of Luxor.

They were the largest pillars at the temple and were erected by Ramses II.

The pillars, made of red granite, are both 25meters long and are more than three thousand years old. One still stands at the Temple while the other is the centre of Place de la Concorde.

Muhammad Ali Pasha, the ruler of Ottoman Egypt, gifted it to France in 1833 in exchange for a French mechanical clock that was discovered to be faulty. The clock was mounted at the clock tower at Cairo Citadel, it still does not work.

9. Only two of the six gigantic statues at the temple remain

The ancient Temple of Luxor had 6 massive statues of the pharaoh Ramesses the Great. He was the third pharaoh of the 19th-century reign.

Presently, only two of the statues are still intact. These two were discovered between 1958 and 1961 after excavation by archaeologist Dr Mohamed Abdel-Kader.

The statues however disintegrated and the Egyptian government decided to restore them using its original red granite stone although this raised a lot of controversies. The statues were restored to the Osirian position also known as death position with the statue’s feet equal, this is contrary to how statues of Kings were placed.

10. There is a shrine in the temple for Alexander the Great

In one of the huge halls in the Temple of Luxor, is a granite shrine that was dedicated to Alexander the Great. The shrine is surrounded by two rows of papyrus columns to replicate the papyrus plant in the bud.

The shrine was initially dedicated to Amun-re and is also known as the Antechamber. Alexander the Great reconstructed the shrine.

The representation in the shrine of Alexander the Great is him standing before figures of the ithyphallic Amun.