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Mortuary Temple of Seti I, Luxor

The Mortuary Temple of Seti I is the memorial temple (or mortuary temple) of the New Kingdom Pharaoh Seti I. It is located in the Theban Necropolis in Upper Egypt, across the River Nile from the modern city of Luxor (Thebes). The edifice is situated near the town of Qurna.

The temple seems to have been constructed toward the end of the reign of Seti, and may have been completed by his son Ramesses the Great after his death. One of the chambers contains a shrine dedicated to Seti's father Ramesses I. The ruler reigned a little under two years, and did not construct a mortuary temple for himself.

The entire court and any pylons associated with the site are now in ruins, and much of the eastern part of the complex is buried under the modern town of Qurna.

Entrance to the Mortuary Temple of Seti I
The Mortuary Temple of Seti I is located 1.1 km (0.7 mi) south of the House of Carter, towards the Nile River.


Mortuary Temple of Seti I Plan
Plan Legend:

  1. First pylon
  2. Visitor access
  3. First courtyard
  4. Second pylon
  5. Second courtyard
  6. Central door
  7. Right door (northeast)
  8. Left door (southwest)
  9. Hypostyle hall
  10. Vestibule
  11. Chapel-rest of the barque of Amun
  12. Sanctuary of Osiris
  13. Sanctuary of Khonsu
  14. Sanctuary of Mut
  15. Sanctuary of Ptah
  16. Hall with four columns
  17. Courtyard of the solar cult
  18. Temple dedicated to Ramesses I
  19. Royal funeral cult
  20. Slaughter rooms

Funerary Temple of Seti I seen from the visitors' access (Plan No. 2)
Access to the Funeral Temple of Seti I is from the northeast.

  • In the center we can see the Portico.

First pylon (Plan No. 1) seen from the inside.
The First pylon had a dromos bordered by sphinxes.


First courtyard (Plan No. 3)
The Mortuary Temple of Seti I is here seen from the First pylon (Plan No. 1).


Second pylon (Plan No. 4)
The second pylon, like the first pylon, is quite destroyed.


Second courtyard (Plan No. 5)
Currently, a beautiful group of palm trees grows in the second courtyard.


Portico (Plan No. 6-8)
The portico is 50 m (164 ft) wide and is supported by nine columns (originally it had ten) with fasciculated shafts and papyriform capitals.

  • The four sides of the capital die bear the name of Seti I.
  • The low reliefs that decorate the interior of the portico represent Seti I and Ramesses II paying homage to the Theban triad and several other deities.
  • The basement is decorated with a double procession of Nile gods, alternatively male and female, bearing to Ramesses II the products of the northern and southern nomes they represent: the southern nomes are on the left side, and the northern ones on the right.

Central door (Plan No. 6)
Three doors (Plan No. 6-8), at the rear of the portico, give access to the interior of the temple, and thus reveal the tripartite division of the temple in the east-west direction.

  • The central part is dedicated to Amun and the king.
  • The southern part (left) is dedicated to Amun and Ramesses I (the king's father).
  • The northern part (right) is dedicated to the Sun god.

Hypostyle hall (Plan No. 9)
The central door opens onto the hypostyle hall whose ceiling is decorated with vultures and rests on six columns with papyriform capitals.

  • The decoration of this hall consists exclusively of customary offering scenes where King Seti and his son Ramesses are alternatively in the presence of Amun and the Aeneid gods revered in Thebes.
  • In the panels in front of the last two columns of the hypostyle, on the left side, Ramesses II, in the symbolic form of a standing child, embraces Mut, who gives him her breast; on the right side, a similar painting represents Seti suckled by Hathor.
  • On one side and the other there are six small chambers, three on the right side, and three on the left side, they are decorated with scenes of worship, offerings or purification whose officiating king is sometimes Seti I, sometimes Ramesses II.
  • A door, at the rear of each of the first small side chambers of the hypostyle hall puts the central compartment of the temple in communication with the two side compartments, which are also accessed through the two side doors 7 and 8 that open to the external portico.

Chapel-rest of the barque of Amun (Plan No. 11)
After a wide Vestibule (Plan No. 10) opens the Sanctuary (Plan No. 11) whose roof rested on four columns that left no marks.

  • On the left and right side we can see representations of Amun's barque that was placed in this sanctuary.

Hall with four columns (Plan No. 16)
All this part of the temple, as well as the hall with four columns, flanked by several chambers, is very ruined.


Courtyard of the solar cult (Plan No. 17)
The right part of the temple includes a very deep courtyard, measuring 23 m (75 ft) by 14 m (46 ft), with two porticoes of five columns each that have disappeared.

  • In the middle is the solar altar, as seen in Deir el-Bahari.
  • On the walls of the courtyard there are pictures of worship with captions of Ramesses II.

Leaving the temple

Basin
To the south of the temple, a small dug basin encloses a paved space which represents, as at the Osireion of Abydos, the primordial mound.

  • In the creation myth of the Heliopolitan form of ancient Egyptian religion, Benben was the mound that arose from the primordial waters Nu upon which the creator deity Atum settled.
  • See more at Benben - Wikipedia.

See also

Source

Location

Location: Naga Al Taref Inside Rd, Al Qarnah, Luxor, Luxor Governorate, Egypt