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“ The Montu Precinct at North-Karnak ” in K.A. Bard éd. Encyclopedia of the Archaeology of Ancient Egypt
Luc Gabolde, Vincent Rondot
To cite this version:
Luc Gabolde, Vincent Rondot. “ The Montu Precinct at North-Karnak ” in K.A. Bard éd. Encyclo- pedia of the Archaeology of Ancient Egypt. Encyclopedia of the Archaelogy of Ancient Egypt (K.A.
Bard éd.), 1999. �hal-01895027�
Encyclopedia of the Archaeology of
Ancient Egypt
Encyclopedia of the Archaeology of Ancient Egypt
Compiled and edited by
Kathryn A.Bard
with the editing assistance of
Steven Blake Shubert
London and New York
and feasting show those officials being honored squatting before the façade of the palace, with a head-smiting scene in the background. This can only be the large relief of Akhenaten which decorated the reveals of the gate of Pylon III at Karnak, and lay just south of the royal palace. Whether a large colonnade decorated with figures of Nefertiti once stood on the site of the present Pylon II must remain moot; it remains a possibility that some parts of the Amen temple remained in operation, at least until the celebration of the jubilee. Thereafter, we find the high priest of Amen, Maya, sent to the quarries (year 4), and the writing of the name “Amen” obliterated intentionally throughout Karnak and the whole Theban area. On the eve of Akhenaten’s abandonment of Thebes for Amarna the king changed his name from “Amenhotep” to “Akhenaten,” and had every cartouche modified accordingly. After this hejira, work stopped on his Theban buildings: none of the later changes in nomenclature or art style appears at Thebes.
The phenomenal number of talatat with relief scenes recovered from Karnak and Luxor offers us two unique opportunities: first, to view the astounding revolution in art and religion authored by the monotheist king in its initial experimental stage; and second, to view the oldest festival of ancient Egypt, the royal jubilee, in the fullest and most detailed set of reliefs which ever recorded it.
See also
cult temples of the New Kingdom; cult temples, construction techniques; Gebel el-Silsila;
representational evidence, New Kingdom temples; Tell el-Amarna, cult temples
Further reading Gohary, J. 1992. Akhenaten’s Sed-festival at Karnak. London.
Redford, D.B. 1988. Akhenaten Temple Project 2: Rwd-mnw and the Inscriptions. Toronto.
Roeder, G., and R.Hanke. 1969–1979. Amarna-Reliefs aus Hermopolis. Hildesheim.
Smith, R.W., and D.B.Redford. 1977. The Akhenaten Temple Project 1: The Initial Discoveries.
Warminster.
DONALD B.REDFORD
Karnak, precinct of Montu
The Montu precinct is the most significant architectural complex on the archaeological site north of the temple of Amen-Re at Karnak (25°43′ N, 32°40′ E). It includes other monuments besides the Montu temple. In 1940 the French Archaeological Institute in Cairo (IFAO) began excavations and studies in this area, which are still ongoing. The extant brick girdle wall and its monumental gate were probably built by Ptolemy III, replacing a previous wall tentatively dated to the time of Nectanebo I and II. However, we know for sure that a girdle wall, although with different eastern and western limits,
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existed in the time of Amenhotep III, the founder of the main temple. In its current state, the Montu precinct encloses the following identified structures: (1) the Montu temple; (2) a temple of Ma’at; (3) a temple of Harpre; (4) a sacred lake; (5) a “high temple”; and (6) six chapels dedicated by the Divine Votaresses of Amen. A dromos (7) leading to a quay on a canal (no longer extant), completes the complex.
The so-called “temple of Montu,” largely destroyed today, was founded by Amenhotep III. Like other temples of this king at Luxor and Soleb, it is built on a podium. Its masonry included blocks belonging to various dismantled monuments bearing the names of Amenhotep I (a copy of the “White Chapel” of Senusret I), Hatshepsut-Tuthmose III, Amenhotep II (a peristyle chapel for the sacred bark of Amen) and Tuthmose IV. The plan was modified twice during the building process. At first, the project consisted of a square building with two rows of columns in the façade and an
Figure 51 Karnak, plan of the Montu precinct
entry ramp facing north. However, before the surface of the walls was completely smoothed the temple was extended to the south, where the rear wall was opened and a range of supplementary rooms were added. The façade was modified with the addition of a peristyle court that incorporated the previous ramp into the new extended foundation. A new ramp flanked by obelisks led to the portal opening onto the peristyle court.
No significant modification is known up to the reign of Taharka, except restorations after the Amarna period (including the erection of a copy of the “Restoration Stela” of Tutankhamen), a stela of Seti I, inscriptions of Ramesses II, Merenptah, Amenmesses, Pinedjem and Nimrod. We know that the eastern part of the temple collapsed at the end
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of the New Kingdom, and it is most probable that reconstruction of the temple was undertaken by Taharka, who is also responsible for a great portico on the main façade (very similar to those of East Karnak and the Khonsu temple). The portico was dismantled and rebuilt by the first Ptolemies, who also rebuilt the gate of the temple proper and that of the enclosure wall.
Among the numerous finds, the statuary is of particular interest, including statues of Amenhotep II and Amenhotep III in the heb-sed (jubilee) garment; two quartzite statues of Amenhotep III holding the sacred pole of Amen (found shattered to pieces and buried in two adjoining heaps beneath a chapel in the middle of the dromos), and two human- handed sphinxes of the same king presenting an offering table. Very little of the decoration on the walls remains. It should be mentioned that the Ptolemies recarved the walls of the hypostyle hall, the bark sanctuary and architraves in the name of Amenhotep III.
The temple of Ma’at, the only one extant dedicated to this deity, leans on the rear side of the Montu temple. Largely destroyed today, it still preserves inscriptions of some of the viziers of Ramesses III and XI. Scattered reliefs and stelae belonging to the reign of Amenhotep III indicate that a previous Ma’at temple existed at that time in the same area.
The door in the wall of the precinct opening to this temple was rebuilt by the Nectanebos, reusing a previous Kushite door. The trials of the perpetrators of the great tomb robberies at the end of the Ramesside period took place in the temple of Ma’at.
The temple of Harpre is built along the east side of the Montu temple. The oldest part (i.e. the sanctuary on the south side) may date back to the 21st Dynasty. Nepherites and Hakor (29th Dynasty) built a hypostyle hall with Hathor capitals. A geographical procession formed part of the decoration of the hypostyle hall. An open court and a pylon were added to the north façade during the 30th Dynasty. The question of the identification of this temple as a mammisi or birthhouse has been proposed and rejected by various scholars. A subsidiary building, in front of the pylon, is known as the “eastern secondary temple” and may be related to the cult of the bull of Montu.
The sacred lake, on the west side of the Montu temple, may have been dug by Amenhotep III and restored by Montuemhat, as can be inferred from his biographical inscription in Mut temple. A “high temple,” built on a massive brick structure, was erected by Nectanebo II as a “pure storehouse” for the offerings.
Six doors in the south wall of the Montu precinct lead to six chapels dedicated by Divine Votaresses of Amen to different forms of Osiris. From west to east they are: (a) chapel of Nitocris (Psamtik I); (b) Amenirdis (Shabako or Shabataka); (c) and (d) unattributed; (e) Karomama (Takelot II); (f) reign of Taharka. These chapels may not have been included in the precinct until the girdle wall was built under Nectanebo I and II, as there are other chapels of the same type outside of the precinct.
The dromos is a stone-paved road leading from the gate of the precinct to a quay on a canal which lay north of the site. The quay may be dated to the reign of Psamtik I, as his name is found on the masonry. The temple dromos is flanked by sphinxes, now badly damaged. It was probably part of the original temple plan of Amenhotep III, as indicated by the discovery of two quartzite statues of the king carrying the sacred pole of Amen found broken and buried under a chapel in the middle of its length. They probably once stood in a chapel on the same site.
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Outside of the temple precinct, a number of buildings have been located in the vicinity. A limestone gate of Hatshepsut and Tuthmose III (formerly attributed to Tuthmose I), usurped by Amenhotep II and completed by Seti I, is on the west side of the west wall of the precinct. It probably led to a palace complex of Hatshepsut situated farther north, only known from textual sources. Only two brick walls remain of the chapel dedicated to Osiris by Shepenwepet II (Taharka), the site where Auguste Mariette discovered the splendid statue of goddess Taweret (CG 39145). Farther west, a door of Ptolemy IV marks the entrance to a small temple of Thoth, now in ruins. In the northwest of the area, a columned building consecrated to the Theban triad by Nitocris has suffered greatly since the time of its discovery. To the east of the Montu precinct, the remains of a building of Tuthmose I have been excavated. Known by quarry marks as a “Treasury,” it consisted of a bark station of Amen, storerooms and workshops.
The oldest remains on the site of North Karnak date back to the end of the Middle Kingdom (13th Dynasty) and belong to urban settlements identified at different parts of the site, consisting of mudbrick houses, granaries and workshops. The chronology of monumental constructions on the site is as follows: the oldest building known today is the Treasury of Tuthmose I, which is most probably a modification of a sanctuary of Ahmose; then, reused blocks of Amenhotep I, Hatshepsut and Amenhotep II in the Montu temple (although there is no evidence that they belong to buildings once erected on the spot), and the limestone door of Hatshepsut and Tuthmose III; then, the temple of Amenhotep III itself.
It should be pointed out that all the above mentioned monuments (or parts of monuments), including the temple of Amenhotep III, are dedicated to Amen-Re of Thebes, even if rare mentions of Montu have been found on the site (mainly epithets describing various kings as “beloved of Montu”). The dedicatory inscription of the main temple attributes the sanctuary to “Amen-Re, Lord of the Thrones of the Two Lands, Pre- eminent in Ipet-Sut,” an attribution which is confirmed by the text of the “Petrie Stela,”
and various minor monuments such as the obelisks, the two quartzite statues of Amenhotep III and other pieces of statuary. The first dedicatory inscription to Montu known to us appears on the stela erected by Seti I in the court of the temple. It is from the reign of Taharka, however, that we have a comprehensive documentation in the decoration of the portico, stating that Montu is the main god of the temple. The scenes on the Ptolemaic gate of the precinct confirm this rank for Montu, paralleled however by the expected presence of Amen-Re. In this matter, the dedicatory inscription carved under the Ptolemies in the central bark station of the Montu temple is eloquent: while attributing to Amenhotep III the foundation of the monument, the text clearly dedicates the temple to
“Montu, Lord of Thebes.”
Thus, the area of North Karnak appears to have been originally a dependency of the temple of Amen-Re and was only progressively and partially devoted to Montu. The cult of this divinity of the Theban nome, which predates that of Amen, was developed during the Late period in the framework of the theology of the “four Theban Montu,” at Medamud, Armant, Tod and North Karnak. In Graeco-Roman times, Montu was identified with Apollo and the temple was designated as an Apolloneion. The Demotic documentation reveals that this area was called “the House of the Cow” while Greek papyri call it Chrysopolis.
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See also
Armant; cult temples, construction techniques; cult temples of the New Kingdom; cult temples, Medamud; New Kingdom, overview; Tod
Further reading
Gabolde, L., and V.Rondot. 1993. Une catastrophe antique dans le temple de Montou a Karnak- Nord. BIFAO 93:245–64.
——. 1996. Le temple de Montou n’était pas un temple a Montou. BSFE 136:27–42.
——. 1996. BIFAO 96:177–215.
Jacquet, J. 1970. BIFAO 69:267–81.
Jacquet, J and Jacquet-Gordon, H. 1983, 1988, 1994 Le trésor de Thoutmosis I. La decoration, Karnak-Nord 6: Cairo. (FIFAO 32).
Robichon, Cl. and Christophe, L.A. 1951. Karnak-Nord III, FIFAO XXIII. Cairo.
Robichon, Cl., Barguet, P. and Leclant, J. 1954. Karnak-Nord IV, FIFAO XXV. Cairo.
Siclen, C.C.van, III. 1986. Amenhotep II’s barque chapel for Amun at North Karnak. BIFAO 86:353–9.
Sourouzian, H. 1997. BIFAD 97:239–45.
Varile, A. 1943 Karnak I, FIFAO XIX, Cairo.
VINCENT RONDOT LUC GABOLDE
Karnak, precinct of Mut
The precinct of Mut at Karnak, the goddess’s main cult center, lies on the east bank of the Nile about 325m south of the precinct of Amen (25°43′ N, 32°40′ E). During the New Kingdom, Mut, Amen and their son Khonsu became the pre-eminent divine family triad of Thebes. The Mut Temple proper is oriented toward the Amen precinct and is surrounded on three sides by a sacred lake called “Isheru.”
Recent excavations indicate that much—and possibly all—of the present precinct was settlement until some time in the Second Intermediate Period. The earliest reference to
“Mut, Mistress of Isheru,” a common epithet, occurs on a statue of the 17th Dynasty in the British Museum (EA 69536), suggesting that by then the site was dedicated to her.
Inscriptional evidence also links the site to Mut in the early 18th Dynasty reign of Amenhotep I. The earliest, securely dated in situ Mut Temple remains are no later than the reigns of Tuthmose III and Hatshepsut.
While the Mut precinct was noted by the Napoleonic expedition, the Royal Prussian Expedition and individual early explorers, the first major excavations took place in 1895–
7, led by Margaret Benson and Janet Gourlay, who concentrated on the interior of the Mut Temple. In the 1920s Maurice Pillet directed the Egyptian Antiquities Organization’s excavation and partial restoration of two other temples: Temple A in the northeast corner, and Temple C (built by Ramesses III of the 20th Dynasty) west of the
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