Temples along Lake Nasser

Temples along Lake Nasser (Sunday, February 05, 2012)

Internet signal tonight for the first time since Friday.

6 AM wake up call, quick cup of coffee, and transfer to a motor launch. We visit the temple at Wadi es Sedua, now relocated to the west side of Lake Nasser. It is a New Kingdom temple approached by an avenue of sphinxes, some with the face of a falcon rather than lion. The temples all fall into a familiar pattern—a series of rooms (or spaces) going from large to small, from light to dark, and from profane to sacred. The final room could only be entered by the Priest and the reigning monarch. Familiar, right?

Leaving the temple, several of us (including me) board camels to take us for about a mile or more to a Temple from the Greco-Roman period. The same familiar form but our guide and archaeologist disagree whether the carved face refers to a late Ptolemy or to Augustus. During this late part of antiquity, the cartouche only spelled “Pharaoh” with no personal name. The carvings and hieroglyphs here are very well preserved

Back to the boat before 9 for breakfast. After breakfast back to the motor launch.

We visited the tomb of an Egyptian (or Nubian who worked for the Egyptians) as an important local functionary in the New Kingdom period and Amada and  a Nubian Temple with life-size reliefs that were more like folk-art rather than the elegant stylized carvings we have seen elsewhere. A mile or so away (which I covered in  a donkey cart) was the Temple of Dakka, also from the New Kingdom (about 1300 BCE), with well preserved reliefs still showing some color and a large  panel of hieroglyphs extolling the victories of Thutmose III.

Sunday night- Sound and light show at Abu Simbel. Tacky script; amazing monuments. Daytime visit tomorrow.