Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 1.djvu/466

 878 NORTH- EAST AFRICA. every crypt, and every step just as they left it 1,600 years ago. "Without replac- ing a single stone, the votaries of the divinity might march in solemn procession and in the prescribed route throughout the sacred precincts which have so long been desecrated; and should they have forgotten, during their long sleep, the purpose and use of each chamber, the inscriptions, marvellously well-preserved, would inform all who could read the hieroglyphics of the object to which each hall and cabinet was devoted. As regards preservation, Edfu is superior even to Denderah, for there the outer portions of the temple have disappeared, all but one propylon, and here no part has suffered any considerable injury. " The sanctuary of Edfu was dedicated to the great god Ilorus, who overthrew the evil principle Seth, or Typhon, for his father's sake ; and the town to which it belonged was therefore called by the ancient Egyptians Hut, after the winged sun- disc, or the city of the throne of Horus, or the city of the raising of Ilorus (to the throne of his father Osiris), or sometimes the city of the piercing (tebu*) of Typhon, in the form of a river-horse. The Greeks compared Horus to their Apollo, the god of light or the sun, and called the city of Horus Apollinopolis. " The sanctuary seems to have been founded at a very early date. Indeed Ptah, the oldest of the gods, is said to have built it for Ra. Kings of the. twelfth dynasty, as well as Thothmes III., took part in the services carried on in it. The venerable structure was still intact at the time of the Persian dominion ; but under the first Ptolemies it had become necessary to erect a new temple on the old site. " Euergetes I., the third of the Lagide kings, began the building in accordance with the plans of the best Egyptian architects. It is a mighty structure, which was not finished till one hundred and eighty years later under Ptolemy Dionysius, or Auletes, the father of Cleopatra, in the year 57 B.C. Huge pylons stood at the entrance facing those worshippers who approached the sanctuary, decorated with the likeness of the Pharaoh as victor over his enemies. The visitor entering the bronze portals found himself in a vast peristj'le surrounded on three sides by colonnades, and at the upper end of it rose a tall hypostyle, into which no glimpse was possible, since the walls connected the pillars which closed in the peristyle in front. "The actual temple-building is closely allied to that of Denderah as to the arrangement and decoration of the chambers. After passing through the hypostyle or great forecourt, of which the roof is supported by eighteen columns, we come to a * prosekos ' with twelve columns, which is called the great banqueting-hall. Thence we proceed through the hall of sacrifice and the central hall of the * repose of the gods,' and reach the sanctuary and grand throne, which consists of a huge block of porphyry brought to Edfu during the Persian dominion by the native Egyptian king, Nectanebos I., who ruled in opposition to the Persian invaders. " The inscriptions in the laboratory and the little library are of the greatest scientific interest. The library was full of papyrus and leather roljs, and it adjoined the front wall of the hypostyle lying to the right of it. As at Denderah the roof was reached by a straight stair, and by a spiral flight of steps, and here • "Tebu," me.ining "piercing," is the Coptic " Atbo," whence the Arabic " Edfu."