Page:A History of Art in Ancient Egypt Vol 1.djvu/425

 The Temple under the New Emtire. 335 restoration of one built, in the first instance, in honour of Ousourtesen III. This latter prince was deified at Semneh after his death, and his worship continued for more than ten centuries. His temple, which had fallen into ruin during the first reigns of the eighteenth dynasty, was reconstructed by Thothmes, and that prince is represented doing homage to the local deities, among whom Ousourtesen may be discovered presenting his pious successor to the other gods. Many more instances might be given, but the monuments of the second Theban empire demand our attention. A Thothmes or an Amenophis, a Seti or a Rameses, could dispose of all the resources of a rich country and of an aged civilization for the construction of their edifices, edifices so great and splendid that they ran no risk of being destroyed in later times for the sake of constructing others still more sumptuous ; besides which they were built at the zenith of the national greatness, at the moment when, in the Egyptian character, all the energy of an unconquered people was combined with the knowledge and experience resulting from an old and complex social system. In the later ages of the monarchy a few unimportant additions were made, an obelisk or a pylon here, there a court, a colonnade, or a few chambers ; but the great temples of the New Empire have come down to us with few modifications beyond those caused by the three thousand years through which they have existed, and we have little difficulty in restoring them, on paper, to the condition In which they were left by the great monarchs of the eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth dynasties. The later additions, although they render the ground-plans more complicated, fail to hide or materially affect the general characteristics of the buildings, and in no way prevent us from recognizing and defining the spirit and originality of their conception. § 3. The Temple tinder the New Empire. Before we cross the threshold of the great Theban temples and attempt to evolve order out of their complexity of courts, halls, porticos and colonnades. It may be convenient to describe their approaches. Each temple had its external and accessory parts which had their share in the religious ceremonies of which It was