THE MAGIC OF BUILDING EGYPTIAN TEMPLES
Today, in the modern era, certain materials, techniques and knowledge, as well as machines and manpower are needed to build any building. In the ancient world, the construction of the ancient Egyptians can be called timeless. They used all the tools that were available at the time and built one of the most magnificent buildings in the world, and it is precisely for this that their ingenuity is most appreciated. The construction required a huge team of workers, usually slaves, to consolidate the materials into usable and durable structures. The earliest inhabitants of Egypt were very likely farmers who went about their business, their homes being made of reeds and dried mud.
By the end of the predynastic period around 3000 BC. The main materials for construction were: mud, reeds and straw. They also later used wood, and the mud was pressed into rectangular molds and left in the sun to dry. To get something similar to brick, more cohesive chopped straw was added, and the result was a solid building block that could be made in large quantities. The only disadvantage of such material was that it wears out very quickly because it was often destroyed by rains and winds. This type of construction was present until the reign of Pharaoh Djoser. Sun-dried bricks began to be used even during the Nagada II culture. and III., and during the time of King Khasekhem of the Second Dynasty (2890–2686 BC) the first stone structure was built. It was the granite floor for his tomb at Abydos. The stone blocks were not well carved, but only roughly and poorly joined. The real revolution in stone construction was triggered by the construction of Djoser’s step pyramid in Saqqara. At first, the tomb resembled a typical mastaba, it was a carved underground tomb with square masonry platforms on top.
Djoser or his chief architect Imhotep decided to extend the structure above ground. It was first a staircase that was lower than the walls of the mastaba built around it, and then smaller mastabas were built on top, one next to the other, forming steps that probably represented a ladder to ascend to heaven. The Egyptians experimented with stone as they built, seeing what it could do. They built a step pyramid that was surrounded by a stone and mud brick temple complex. Tombs and temples became a sign of the power of Egyptian rulers. The spread of such large-scale construction projects across the landscape created logistical and labor problems for them.
Most of such large projects were carried out by volunteers. Only a small group of people would work on construction projects throughout the year, they were mainly: architects, engineers, craftsmen, and also doctors who were obliged to repair injuries if they happened, and bakers whose task was to supply the workers with bread. Next to the great pyramid of Khufu, a small town was built for the workers, it had individual homes, shops, a place to eat and supplies. As the Egyptians themselves say, “Egypt is the gift of the Nile”, the Nile River was for them a means of transporting various materials, including stone. During Khufu’s era granite or limestone blocks would have been carved into the rock. Workers would cut the rocks, creating a narrow trench into which wooden stakes would be driven. Special piers were even built near certain places, and stones would be brought to the construction site by sledges.
THE EGYPTIAN TEMPLE AND ITS PARTS
It is often thought that the ancient Egyptians taught mankind how to build. Over many centuries, the Egyptians learned how to design and build structures such as temples, temple gates, palaces and pyramids. In the modern period, the sign of the temple serves to represent the deity. Temples in ancient Egypt represented the house of the gods, which was used for their worship, and was also called the “house of eternity”. There were various temples, and they began to develop from the pre-dynastic period. Mortuary temples were made in memory of the dead, for example a king, to serve as the permanent abode of his soul. They were made of reeds or wood, and later temples were built of stone and brick.
We associate such temples with the archaic period, and various divine rituals and sacrifices were performed there. The most famous temples associated with that period are precisely those on the Giza plateau. There are also temples that represented certain cults, such as the cult of the sun, and in such temples only a selected deity was worshiped, and we can recognize them by the divine statue placed next to the altar. By the middle of the first millennium, each temple became a symbolic place that tells its own story about the creation of the world around it. These stories refer to holy cities, and among the more famous ones are Memphis, Heliopolis and Hermopolis. On the walls of the temple, the pharaoh acts as an intermediary between people and the gods, and he represented and offered the gods all kinds of food, drink, clothes, incense, and ultimately himself in order to guarantee the well-being of the country. The primary function of the temple is the performance of divine rituals, and its main goal was to attract the people needed to perform the same rituals.
The origin of the Egyptian temples comes from the mythological model, the so-called “Island of Creation”, the statue of the deity was located in the sanctuary, and the deity was served by priests who offered sacrifices. Accordingly, the site of the temple itself was specially chosen and had to comply with certain rules. Each part of the temple was decorated with various reliefs, which usually depicted a god, customs or some historical events. The key axis of the temple represents the path of the sun, and in it there is a pylon that symbolizes that path from sunrise to sunset. Every temple in Egypt contained at the entrance a huge pylon with gates that led to the courtyard, and the temple itself had huge fortress-like walls around it. All these walls were covered with various decorations of mythological concepts. In addition to the mentioned inner courtyard, there is also an outer courtyard covered with columns, which is symbolized as the link between the outer world and the divine one. Lavishly painted and carved, the walls depict the pharaoh as a hero, military leader and lover of the gods. There were often pharaonic statues and statues of their dignitaries in the courtyard.
After passing the inner and outer courtyards, you reach the hypostyle hall, that is, the sacred area of every Egyptian temple. The hypostyle hall represents a gloomy lofty place with a large number of richly decorated columns. Its second name was “Island of Creation, which is associated with the belief that the decorated pillars of the hall formed the vegetation of the original island.” For this reason, the columns were decorated with various motifs of nature. After the hypostyle hall, an important part of the temple consisted of rooms and crypts accessible only to the priests and the pharaoh and his family. These were various rooms, for example storerooms, priest’s rooms, rooms for performing rituals and kitchens. The most important part of the temple, and at the same time the furthest away, was the sanctuary of the gods. The sanctuary was usually made of stone and was richly decorated with bronze or gold. The sanctuary contained various divine representations, and a square altar on which sacrifices were made. The walls depicted gods and goddesses and the pharaoh making a sacrifice, and in the hidden part of the sanctuary there is a small room that kept the moving holy ark of the gods. Other parts of ancient Egyptian temples, but no less important, were the nilometer, sanatoria, sacred lakes and houses of birth and life.
Bibliography:
Gondlach, Rolf 2001. „Temples“ “. U: Redford, Donald B. (ur.), The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt, vol. III. Oxford: 363–385.
Olson, Richard G. 2010. Technology and Science in Ancient Civilizations. Santa Barbara.
Tomorad, Mladen 2009. „Dizajn za život“ — staroegipatski hramovi: povijest, razvoj i funkcija“, Radovi Zavoda za hrvatsku povijest Filozofskog fakulteta Sveučilišta u Zagrebu vol. 41: 11–31.
Tomorad, Mladen 2016. Staroegipatska civilizacija, sv. I. Povijest i kultura starog Egipta. Zagreb.
