Apparently Medinet Habu is one of the less-visited temples in Luxor, which is surprising to me because of the seven temples we visited– Karnak, Medinet Habu, Luxor, Esna, Edfu, Kom Ombo, and Philae– Medinet Habu was the best. It had the most remaining color and lots of deep (and unvandalized) carvings.
Medinet Habu is the mortuary temple of Ramesses III, who ruled about 1100 BC-ish. Ramesses III was a rather bellicose individual, and his major claim to fame was repelling an invasion by the s0-called Sea Peoples. I’m reading a 540-page epic history of Ancient Egypt, so I am sorry to say that while the temple is magnificent, construction on it began just as Egypt’s fortunes were starting to change for the worse.
Kicking ass and taking names is a pretty common motif for all pharaonic narrative weaving. Based on our limited touring of Egypt, this is usually depicted in one of a couple ways: (1) the King holding his enemies by the hair and preparing to strike them with his hand; and (2) Egypt’s enemies being trampled under the King’s feet. Medinet Habu has tributes to the King’s more violent tendencies in many forms.
Here you can see Ramesses holding his enemies by their hair with his left hand, and preparing to smite them with his right. Standing in front of him is the main god, Amun-Ra.
Here is a close-up of Ramesses’ feet. Egypt’s defeated enemies are bound with their hands behind their backs. It’s hard to see in this one, but some of these depictions even capture the different facial features (Nubians, Asiatics, etc) to show who exactly has been defeated.
Same temple, more smiting– I warned you guys this dude was bellicose!:
Here is everyone coming to bring the King some hands– and apparently this is not figurative– Egyptian soldiers really did cut off the hands of their enemies to tally their kills.
Here are some shots of the side walls. It’s hard to see them well here, but the whole temple complex is surrounded by mud brick walls, which protected the temple from becoming inundated during the annual Nile floods.
As mentioned previously, Medinet Habu had some absolutely spectacular color– a fact you have to appreciate when you consider this paint is 2,000 years older than Greek marbles, which has long since lost their colors. Of course, the Egyptians had an extraordinarily dry climate working in their favor, but still….3,000 year old paint!
This is a rather unusual depiction of the god Amun-Ra, in blue!
Just look at the incredible detail in these carvings! These wigs! These necklaces! Carved into stone! Three millennia ago! Here is Amun-Ra giving the ankh, which represents eternal life:
Offering Amun-Ra a puff on an ancient pipe:
The temple also had its fair share of “monumental architecture”:
The two little people that barely come up to Ramesses’ knees are actually his wives.
The back of the temple had the remains of some rather incredible pillars. There were probably 30 or 40 of them in all. Here are two shots, you can really get a sense of scale when you look at Sev standing next to them….
