The Temple of Ramesses II in Abydos
Welcome to the Temple of Ramesses II
As a first step, we inaugurated an architectural and epigraphic documentation project under the auspices of New York University, Department of Middle Eastern Studies, and later by the New York University - Institute of the Study of the Ancient World (NYU-ISAW). This first stage culminated in the publication of our first volume in two parts in 2015, which presented a complete rendering of all the inscriptions preserved on the temple walls in the form of graphic images and digitalized line drawings, each accompanied by a corresponding color photograph of that scene. The publication would offer the reader an opportunity to provide convenient, updated views of the wall reliefs and architectural details presented together in one volume. We then embarked on Volume II, which is in effect a continuation of the first volume in the same format to present certain remaining temple elements not included in the first volume namely the pillars, chapel niches, fragments, and other miscellaneous items.
The temple site (main gateway coordinates: 26º 11/ 12.11// N, 31º 54/ 59.72// E) and the east–west geographical axial orientation of the Ramesses Temple has an azimuth/offset of 43.9263 degrees from true north. The temple floor in the First Court (Court A) is at an elevation of 67.79 m above sea level.
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It is located local south of the Middle Cemetery, which encompasses quite a large area, including Weni and Idi’s monuments at the top of the hill that overlooks Beni Mansour. Excavations from the early nineteenth century onward have established that the full extent of the cemetery (including tombs of other officials) from the Old Kingdom through the Middle Kingdom was already vast, spreading all the way down east of the hill to what is now Beni Mansour (and probably under it). It spreads also to the south down the hill toward the Ramesses II Temple, and local westward at least as far back as the Pennsylvania–Yale–New York University, Institute of Fine Arts (IFA) dig house by the end of those periods. In other words, it extends from the desert Processional Route to somewhere near the location of the Ramesses II Temple.
We began our work on the project by producing an updated architectural rendering of the temple showing in detail its plan and cross sections.
The plan of the temple (excluding the area between the First and Second Pylons) is a rectangular stone structure with dimensions of 38.62 m x 71.20 m, and the approximate size of its core is 2,590 m in addition to a massive First Pylon that lies 31 m to the east of the Second Pylon.
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The line drawings were produced using varying line weights in order to indicate to the reader the presence of raised versus sunk reliefs (sun and shadow lines), and to allow for more thorough analysis and understanding of the scene. Similarly, weights of painted lines vary and are therefore distinguished from those of the carved lines.
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The photographs provide a great deal of information not easily discernible in the line drawings, such as the stone’s physical condition, painted surfaces, architectural context, and damaged areas. As in the first volume, we attempted to minimize the impact of some of these elements on the clarity of the line drawings by rendering the architectural details in lighter weight or by removing them altogether.
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For ease of identification, the geographical orientations have been approximated by resorting to the device of using notional compass points. The actual northeast–southwest axis of the temple is thus treated as if it had a true east–west orientation.
We cataloged in our second volume photographs of all inscribed fragments in different stone categories of granite, alabaster, limestone, sandstone, which existed within the temple vicinity and registered by the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities. Fragments recovered from our later excavations conducted after 2018 will appear in a future volume.
The proposed hypothetical architectural reconstruction of the complete temple would be quite valuable for better understanding of the various activities within, whether ritual, festival, or accessibility, as well as a guide during the restoration process by properly identifying the location of the myriad fragments strewn in the vicinity of the site. Two careful approaches are employed in synthesizing data that would help in this effort: (1) using the data obtained from the extant temple elements, and (2) comparative configuration gleaned from similar contemporaneous monuments considering location, historical background, and general architectural characters. There are several temples of the New Kingdom and later periods that can also provide valuable data to shed light on the missing parts of the Ramesses II Temple.
