Temple of Esna

• 16 / 5 / 2023

The temple of Khnum is an ancient Egyptian temple in the city of Esna in the Luxor governorate of Upper Egypt, about 55 kilometers south of Luxor. It bore the ancient Egyptian name Hout khnumu ("House of Khnum"). The only surviving part of the temple is the pronos, the temple vestibule. The hall, supported by 24 columns and with an intact roof, is located in the city center on the Nile, 200 meters west of the river bank.

The temple of Khnum was dedicated to the ancient Egyptian idol Khnum, who created both men and idols. In his incarnation as Khnum-Hapi, he revived the springs of the Nile every year to bring about the flooding of the Nile. In addition, his wife Minhet, the city goddess Neptu, and the gods haka and NIT were worshiped. The uncovered temple is located nine meters below street level in the city of Esna in a carved depression. Stairs lead to the entrance to the temple. The parts of the temple visible today date back to the Ptolemaic and Roman times.

History

The temple of Khnum in Esna was built on the ruins of an earlier Temple of the XVIII Egyptian dynasty, the last of which was the era of Thutmose III. The new building was built under the reign of King Ptolemy VI and Ptolemy VIII in the II century BC. The main Ptolemaic part of the building, the Naos with the Khnum sanctuary was lost in the Middle Ages, in Roman times, Emperor Claudius (41-54) began to build the remaining pronaos, which was completed during the reign of Emperor Decius (249-251). Due to the annual rise of the waters of the Nile and the accompanying floods, the temple area gradually sank under silt, the amount of which grew to the current street level of the city of Esna.

At the beginning of the modern era, the floor reached the crowns of the columns of pronos When the French invaded Egypt, it was said that the inhabitants of the city protected themselves from the French under the roof of the temple, bullet holes were still visible above the crowns. Then the French soldiers made a partial excavation in the gorge of the Brunos River. The first scientific excavations were carried out by Auguste Mariette in the middle of the XIX century.

In modern Egyptian history, the restored temple of Khnum has become one of the main sights of the city of Esna. Due to its close location on the Nile, visiting the building is an integral part of river cruises between Luxor in the North and Aswan, 135 kilometers to the South. The road from the pier east of the temple of Khnum leads through the streets of Esna Bazaar.

Temple complex

The original structure of the temple of Khnum at Esna included the preserved building of pronos, an adjacent colonnade hall equipped with six columns, the temple behind it, and a wall surrounded by bas-reliefs. Structurally, the construction was similar to the temples of Edfu and Dendera. The loss of the Ptolemaic southwestern parts of the building makes the temple of Khnum a stump today. Only a few monuments indicate the arrangement of the destroyed parts of the temple. The rich inscriptions of pronos compensate for the fact that the overall picture of the complex has not been preserved.

The still-standing Portico of the Brunaus is 33 meters wide and 16.5 meters deep. The roof is supported by 24 columns more than 13 meters high with composite crowns with plant figures. Vibronos Temple of Khnum in Esna, for example, is larger than the Edfu temple. The columns of the first row of columns, like those of the Edfu, on both sides of the central main entrance are connected by six half-height walls between the columns. Three of them have open doors. Bird barriers were placed above the walls to protect the interior of the pronaos.

On four of the walls connecting the columns on both sides of the central entrance, on the front side, the facade of the temple, there are inscriptions depicting the Roman emperors Tiberius, Claudius, and Nero as Egyptian kings with various Egyptian idols. On the left Claudius appears in a typical purification scene, where Thoth with the head of an ibis, and Horus with the head of a Falcon, in the presence of the head of the lion menhet, pours water on the ruler's head, and Tiberius is crowned with a double crown. In front of Khnum stands the child God haka-BA-Sherid on a pedestal with the symbol of the "Union of the two countries". This is also interpreted as the son of Khnum with Menhet as the mother. There are two scenes depicting Nero on the walls to the right of the entrance to the central temple. At the entrance next to the main one, he was taken to Neith by the month, while the other wall, where there is an open door, shows his coronation with the double crown of harsis and Thoth.

The former connection to the Ptolemaic temple complex can be seen on the back of the rear wall of the colonnaded Hall in the southwest. The wall of the colonnaded Hall of the temple, which in the past was adjacent to the pronos, is only half its height and was incorporated into the disproportionately large Roman Portico. There are three openings in the wall of the building. The middle entrance, the Ptolemaic entrance, leads to the sanctuary inside the temple. The two side openings were the doors for the passage around the actual Temple House. The inscriptions around these two doors date back to the reign of Emperor Marcus Aurelius and his son and successor Commodus. They show the two rulers as Egyptian kings in front of the idols.

The external side walls of pronos are also completely decorated with bas-reliefs. They depict the Roman emperors Titus, Domitian and Trajan, with Titus appearing only in smaller reliefs, such as on the Southeast wall stabbing a turtle in front of the goddess Sekhmet and killing Oryx antelopes in front of the goddess minhet. From each of the four levels of representation, two reliefs were especially emphasized due to their size, including the double elevation on two levels. They are similar not only in size, but also in content.

On the right side of the south-eastern wall, Domitian killed a group of enemies of Egypt in the manner of Egyptian kings in front of the gods Khnum and menhet. He grabs her by the locks of hair. Templar Khnum presents the ruler, who is accompanied by a lion, with a curved sword-Khopesh. Menhet accompanies the scene behind Khnum with one hand raised while holding the sign of life Ankh in the other. The northwest wall of brunaus shows the same scene of the murder of opponents, only an inverted mirror. Here it is Emperor Trajan who catches the enemies of the country with tufts of hair. Even the lion accompanying the ruler is repeated in the inscription as is the case with the delivery of Khnum to the chibish. Only the drawing of the goddess Neith standing behind menhet deviates from the relief of Domitian.

The reliefs and bas-reliefs of the interior of pronos, which can be found on the walls and columns, are in a good state of preservation. The ceiling of the hall is covered with religious astronomical frescoes. The signs of the ancient Egyptian zodiac can be found here, as well as the depiction of the "day and night flight" of the sun on the six north-western and south-eastern roof panels of the central panel. The moon was depicted on the north-western strip of the roof. The so-called decimal stars are also located there and in the southwestern part of the roof. The heavenly images are dedicated to the special times of the gods under which they act at the corresponding festivals.

The internal walls and columns of the hall, like the external reliefs, were created largely in the post-Vespasian era, starting with Titus, but especially under Domitian and Trajan. During the reign of Nero and Vespasian, only a few points of decoration were worked on. In the time of Vespasian, the ceiling of the central part began to be depicted. This was completed only after him. Under Titus and Domitian at least ten of the columns of pronos were decorated. Only two inscriptions, one on a pillar, the other on the back wall above the wall of the Ptolemaic temple, remind us of Nerva's short reign, which did not exceed two years. The latter shows the emperor offering incense to the idols in front of the boat.