“A visit to… Philae Island Temples “Part III”

By Nasr Salama

In the second part of our visit to the temples of Philae, we continued with a detailed explanation of Nagtanbu’s chapel and the eastern and western columns of the outer courtyard
And the story of the myth of Isis and Osir
In part three, we continue our visit to the temples of Philae with the main entrance to the Temple of Isis, which we call Pylon
The main entrance to the Temple of Isis
When you look at a building, try to have a comprehensive view of it and then follow the details, this building was not just an entrance to the temple halls, it is a huge edifice consisting of two eastern and western towers, and despite the enormity of the two towers, you will not notice any difference in height, width or internal inclination angles, all measurements of the two towers prove that they are completely identical between them
Before talking about the main entrance to the temple, we stop a little to describe some of the artifacts in front of it, and we see two statues of two lions made of pink granite, carved in a form and style completely different from Egyptian art, and it is likely that they belong to the Roman era, and there is no temple in Egypt with two lion statues in front of it Except for the Temple of Isis on the island of Philae, and about the reason for their presence in this way, perhaps they served as guards for the main temple entrance, and behind the two statues there were two obelisks, one of which is missing and the other is currently displayed in Kingston Square in England, and only the base of one of them remains on the site
Note that you will have to climb some steps to reach the temple edifice
The main temple edifice
The ancient Egyptians used to build a number of edifices at the front of their temples for two reasons. To hide behind it all the architectural elements that were considered sacred elements that should not be shown to the general public, and the second. To utilize the walls of the edifice to record the king’s courage and his relations with the ancient Egyptian gods, especially the idols of the temple itself
The origin of the idea of the two towers that make up the pylon is due to the belief that when the sun rose for the first time, it rose between two mountains, and these two towers symbolize the two mountains with a partition between them, and that the king or the high priest used to ascend through internal stairs to stand at the top of the entrance in the middle of the two towers and thus become himself a symbol of the sun
Description of the great edifice
The height of the edifice reaches about 18 meters and its width is about 32 meters from east to west, it is a fully built edifice, hollow, contains stairs and internal rooms, and consists of two towers in a flowing shape, and is characterized by the presence of two entrances, the first is the entrance leading to the natural temple path, and the second leads to the birth house
The middle entrance dates back to the reign of King Nectanebo (Thirtieth Dynasty), and the construction of the edifice dates back to King Ptolemy V, while its inscriptions and writings date back to the era of King Ptolemy XII
The inscriptions on the edifice show the strength and courage of the king, where we see him holding some enemies by their hair while his other hand falls on them to kill them, and we also see the king offering gifts and offerings to the temple idols, headed by Isis, Hathor, Horus and Osiris, which are traditional scenes that we see on most Egyptian temple edifices
Upon entering from the main entrance and at a height of about two meters on the right side, we see a manuscript written in French, recording the arrival of a force of French soldiers led by General Dizyah during the French campaign in Egypt, where the force chased the Mamluks until this area
From the main entrance, we reach the second courtyard of the temple, which is an open courtyard surrounded by architectural buildings on four sides, so we find a colonnade on the east side, consisting of 10 columns, and this colonnade serves as a link between the first and second pylon, and the birth house on the west side, and from the south we see the back of the first pylon and from the north the face of the second pylon, and what we want to talk about now is the birth house
The House of Birth (Mamizi)
Established in the Greco-Roman era to glorify the family relationship as well as to emphasize the king’s right to rule and the birth of the divine king, which is an evolving tradition from an old tradition that Queen Hatshepsut started with a scene representing the divine birth of her on the walls of her temple in Deir el-Bahri, where she was depicted in the scene as being from the heart of the idol Amun who met with her mother and gave birth to her from his body, to show her right to the throne because Egyptians were not used to female rule over them. King Amenhotep III used the same thing because his nation was non-Egyptian, so he depicted the story of his divine birth from the core of the idol Amun, who met with his mother as Hatshepsut did, and this scene remained and developed in the era of the Ptolemies to demonstrate their right to the throne, where the scene turned in the Greco-Roman period into a very small temple called (the Birth House of Birt)
When you watch the birth house to the west of the second courtyard, you find a view at the top with 7 Hathoras, standing and playing tambourines in front of Isis and Hathor, and each of these goddesses had an important function, which is to preserve the birth during the first seven days, so the number 7 is considered one of the It was their belief that the life of the newborn is dangerous during the first 7 days and their safe passage is considered a guarantee and safety for his life and that he is beyond the stage of danger, so the celebration of the birth was on the seventh day, which is the same tradition that Egyptians do today with their different beliefs.
This western side extends to the second edifice with a number of 7 columns topped with plant capital and above them are heads representing Hathor towards the four sides, and there are wall curtains between these columns with different scenes, the most important of which is a scene of King Ptolemy 12 in the scene of purification between the gods Thoth and Horus pouring holy water on the king in an alternating form from the signs of ankh “life” and wass “strength and stability in judgment
Another scene, which we call the coronation, shows the king wearing the double crown between the two goddesses, Nekhbet and Wadjet
As for the building of the birth house, it consists of a hallway whose roof rests on four columns, then two rooms and a mihrab, and all the walls have inscriptions of the Ptolemaic kings making offerings and gifts to the Egyptian goddesses
Among the most important scenes we see in the last room is a view of the idol Horus in the form of a falcon wearing a crown wearing a crown and around him units of papyrus flowers, some blooming and others buds, and this scene is meant to represent Horus’s hiding place in the delta forests to protect him from his uncle Horus, and another scene of Isis breastfeeding Horus, surrounded by six goddesses
We return to the second courtyard to see the  details of the second temple edifice

 See you in part four