20/9/07 - Architectural History - Ancient Egyptian Architecture 2600-1200 BC

Most ancient Egyptian architecture is centre around the river Nile. This is because Egypt is mostly desert, but the area around the river, including its banks and mouth, flood every year, bringing vegetation and more water. The Egyptians therefore settled here, where the environment was hospitable and could provide everything they needed.

The ancient Egyptians strongly believed in the afterlife. They thought that the afterlife was a world parallel to the land of the living. Egyptian art and sculpture strongly reflects these religious beliefs. The most important thing in the lives of the ancient Egyptians was the sun, as it was seen as a life-giving force and therefore as a kind of deity, named Ra. Pharaohs were seen as the human manifestation of the god Horus, son of Ra (drawn as a falcon), and so they were very important people, worshipped as a divine being.

The rays of Ra (the sun) were depicted by the Egyptians as a wedge-shaped beam shining on the earth. But this symbol was not restricted to representations of the sun. It was used more widely in Egyptian art. The pyramid form, we notice, is clearly related to this symbol, to their strong concern for the effect of the sun on life and the afterlife.

The earliest form of Egyptian architecture came in the third dynasty, around 2630 BC. The first pyramids were stepped, such as the Djoser pyramid of Saqqara, which was built on the river bank and symbolised the life-giving properties of the sun. There exists a statue of its architect, Imhotep, so architects were celebrated in ancient Egypt. The pyramid is based on domestic housing and were called 'mastaba' tombs, or 'eternal homes' of the dead. Pyramids began to be built from the Pharaoh's birth, not after his death. The Djoser represents the birth of life from the sun god Ra (i.e. his rays beaming onto the earth), but more generally, the steps of the pyramid provide a stairway for the deceased Pharaoh to reach heaven. The life of Egyptian Pharaohs, as we see from the symbolism of the pyramid, was all about preparation for death. The pyramids were the mode of transportation from one life to the next, and they had to make the transition as comfortable as possible for the dead Pharaoh.

The Great Pyramid of Cheops, called Khufu, was built with a great degree of accuracy, in order to mirror the perfection of the gods. The inner chamber was thought by archaeologists to be a conduit, but it is now commonly thought that it was a useful tool for the builders of the pyramid to get its dimensions right. The chambers had to be at the precise axial centre of the pyramid and the inner chamber, and from this all the other rooms and passages were arranged proportionally.

The pyramid form as we now know it developed slowly over a period of around two hundred years. This is a very short period of time considering the length of time of the Egyptian rule. The Great Pyramids at Giza were built between 2550-2460 BC. The Great Pyramid of Cheops alone used two million blocks of stone. This is a huge feat of human achievement. Over thirty-five thousand people worked on its construction, and that included both quarrying the materials and laying the stones. The work was also very precise. At the point where the top half of the pyramid weighs exactly the same as the bottom half is the entrance into the King's Burial Chamber, the 'Great Step'. This very fact indicates the great technical ability that went into the planning of the building of the pyramid. This kind of technicality was used in Egyptian art, too.

The pyramids were built on the top of slopes, or causeways, that ran from the foot of the pyramid to the river. This made it easier for the Pharaoh's body and a hoard of valuable objects to be transported down the river and up the ramp, followed by a ceremonious crowd. He would be worshipped and finally interred in the sacred pyramids. The Great Sphinx was built to be the guardian of the pyramids. His features are said to be modelled on Pharaoh Khefre.

It is amazing to think that these massive pyramids were built without the use of wheels or hard metals. These were as yet undiscovered. But the Egyptians were far from primitive in their methods. Thousands of farmers were employed to build the pyramids during the drought season, as during this time of year there was little work for them to do; without water there could be no growth. A system of ramps and pulleys was used to transport the stones up the side of the pyramid. The great accuracy of the construction is astonishing and shows the care and dedication of the workers and reflects the importance of the work that these employees (for they were not slaves) carried out. Management of the work was entrusted to a chief official of the Pharaoh, who was in fact his cousin, Hemon. A statue of him shows the care and sense of duty on his face, a reflection of the importance of his position in ancient Egyptian society, and of his work on the Great Pyramids.

But he must consider what the Great Pyramids would have looked like at the time. Cashmere-like vermeer is still seen in remnants on the surface of the pyramids, and would have positively gleamed in the sun. The appearance of the pyramids would have been much more pristine and clear-cut and fresh than they are now. Cases found inside the pyramids were stuffed with furniture, ornaments, trinkets, and even boats, to be interred alongside the Pharaoh with the purpose of giving him the most comfortable afterlife possible.

Civil war racked and changed the society of the Egyptians. These wars were expensive and so grand buildings such as the pyramids could not be built, for they were extremely costly. The status of pharaohs in the new Middle Kingdom became reduced significantly compared to their predecessors. Their burial places look more like temples than pyramids, but they are a combination of the two.

The terraces of the temples originate from step pyramids, but they do not contain the body of the pharaoh. The body was kept in a very small chamber at the back of the building. This type of burial was not monumental, and neither was the architecture, but it did set the model for the future.

Queen Hatshepsut had the mortuary temple of Deir el-Bahari built in preparation of her death. But she was not buried in the temple itself; she was buried on the other side of the cliff, along with her belongings. This shows that the temple was built mainly for monumentality rather than for the specific purpose of holding the body of the queen.

The Great Hypostyle Hall at the Temple of Amenophis III, built c. 1350 BC, was the template that the Greeks later used for there buildings such as the Parthenon.

The temple complex at Karnak was built for Amun, but also to house the new priesthood whose job it was to dedicate itself to the sun god. The complex is therefore a type of ancient Egyptian monastery. The columns here are in the closed-papyriform style, but those in another temple, the Great Hypostyle Hall of Ramesses II, use the open-papyriform. There are two rows of columns in the Great Hypostyle Hall that are taller than the rest. These allow for a clerestory window space which let light shine into the interior of the temple. Other column types included fluted, palmiform (palm fronds lashed to a pole) and lotiform (closed buds of the lotus flower). The temple and columns would have been decorated and painted in a garishly colourful way. The colours have faded with time, and now are completely gone. David Roberts repainted the Temple of Philae between 1846-50, to give an idea of what the temple, and other ancient Egyptian architecture, may have looked like when they were first built.

Egyptian architecture drew on nature for inspiration. The column types are one example of this. Another is the gateway to the Temple of Amun, which consists of two great pylons, mirroring the twin mountains of Bakhu and Manu to the east. These were considered important mountains because the sun rises between them every day.

King Ramesses II (the Great) was a very important ruler for Egypt. He had a Great Temple built at Abu Simbel between c. 1285 and 1255 BC. He was famous for building a number of great temple complexes, which is true; siring hundreds of children, which is perhaps untrue; and winning a great war, which is known to be untrue. The reason why these stories have circulated about him is that he edited his own life story in the Great Temple so that it showed him to be a great man. The temple itself is very impressive. It has a pillared hall with sculptured figures appearing to hold up the ceiling, a relief sculpture of Amun-Ra on its front facade and a statue of Horus as a falcon on its exterior.

We can see that the Greeks were highly influenced by ancient Egyptian architecture because they borrowed many details from it for their own much more renowned architecture. For example, the colonnades of the mortuary temple of Queen Hatshepsut look like they may have been the origins of the Greek Doric order.

Bibliography
Alfred, C., The Egyptians (London 1987)
Lehner, M., The Complete Pyramids (London 1997)
Romer, J., The Great Pyramid: Ancient Egypt Revisited (Cambridge 2007)
Shafer, B. E. (ed.), Temples of Ancient Egypt (London 1998)
Stevenson Smith, W., The Art and Architecture of Ancient Egypt (New Haven 1998)
Wilkinson, R. H., The Complete Temples of Ancient Egypt (London 2000)