Edfu urban area is situated ranging from Luxor and you will Aswan in the southern area area of Egypt. The city, that is on the western bank of your Nile, try world-famous for the forehead, which had been built from inside the Ptolemaic period. The fresh Forehead away from Edfu , intent on new god Horus, is the 2nd biggest temple during the Egypt. Pursuing the Roman months, the new forehead was slowly buried by the wasteland sand, and you may silt on Nile. Because of this, this new forehead is actually forgotten, and was just rediscovered during the 19 th century. Apart from the dimensions and you can condition regarding conservation, this new Temple regarding Edfu is even known because of its great number out-of inscriptions, collectively referred to as Edfu Messages, and that apparently safety all the offered epidermis.
Forehead regarding Edfu On the Old, Center and you will This new Empire Episodes
The town from Edfu is known plus by a number of other names. This new ancient Egyptians, for example, understood the town just like the Behdet, because the Greeks and you will Romans titled they Apollonopolis. It latter identity are a reference to the city’s master goodness, Horus, which the Greeks identified along with their individual jesus Apollo. Even when Edfu is most well-known for the Ptolemaic forehead , the brand new city’s record offers far next back in its history.
For instance, archaeological excavations in the west and northern elements of the town keeps exposed point on the earlier periods of one’s town’s job. These are typically mastaba tombs on Old Empire , and you can burials relationships on Middle Kingdom . It has additionally been discovered you to within the The new Kingdom quarries are made for slav posta sipariЕџ gelin siteleri the Install Silsilah (towards the south regarding Edfu town). Sandstone try acquired from the quarries and you can transferred all-over Egypt to possess structure works.
In New Kingdom, a forehead to help you Horus is based in the Edfu. That it forehead is smaller compared to the current framework, and you will expanded can be acquired. Truly the only ability one remains regarding the The brand new Empire temple is actually its pylon (a great Greek identity to the monumental portal away from a keen Egyptian forehead), which is found toward east of your own the fresh new forehead, and face the latest obtaining stage into the Nile. It is because the truth that new Ptolemies depending a great the latest forehead on the website of your elderly one.
The fresh pharaoh who first started the building of the Forehead of Edfu was Ptolemy III Euergetes, the 3rd leader regarding Ptolemaic Kingdom . Throughout his reign, and this lasted out-of 246 in order to 222/step one BC, Ptolemy managed to get back Egypt and Cyrenaica, and triumphed along side Seleucids when you look at the 3rd Syrian Battle. Egypt’s indigenous temples benefitted considerably out-of Ptolemy III’s rule. Apart from opening this building the latest Forehead from Edfu, Ptolemy III plus produced donations for other temples, and you can restored the newest divine sculptures plundered on the temples by the Persians. By the way, his epithet, ‘Euergetes’, form ‘Benefactor’.
While the construction of your Temple away from Edfu first started in the 237 BC, it was not accomplished once regarding Ptolemy III’s death. Nonetheless, this building of one’s temple proceeded. It absolutely was in the end completed in 57 BC, for the rule out of Ptolemy XII Auletes. The development of one’s temple got way too long in order to over due to the of several nationalistic uprisings in Upper Egypt during that point and this interrupted the development procedure.
Decrypting the fresh Forehead from Edfu and the Edfu Texts
This new Ptolemies were not simply up against inner issues, however, exterior of them too. By the point from Ptolemy XII, the latest fortunes away from Ptolemaic Empire had waned, and it try no more the fresh mighty and you may prosperous county it was once. As a matter of fact, the newest Ptolemies was basically to your verge out of losing their empire, given that Egypt are engrossed from the Rome in the 30 BC, following history Ptolemaic ruler, Cleopatra VII Philopator , is deposed of the Octavian (the long term Emperor Augustus).