HSTAR - Egyptian Architecture

kemi

the black land

Egyptian Geography

all ancient Egyptian cities are located along the Nile River flooding zones

Soft Stones

• limestone

• sandstone

• alabaster

Hard Stone

• granite

• basalt

• quartite

• pophyry

Climate

• warm

• continuous sunshine conduced to simplicity of design

Geology

• stone was the material chiefly employed not only in construction but for decoration

• poor in metal

Quarrying

• Extracting stones from nearby sites and shipping them to the construction site

Transportation

Using ramps, pulleys, and levers to move blocks weighing up to 2.5 tons

Acacia

Boats

Sycamore

Mummy Cases

Indigenous Date Palm

sometimes used in roofing

Interior

• sufficient light reaches the interiror through doors and roof slits

• no need for windowsthus unbroken massive walls

  • protected the inside from heat

  • uninterrupted surface for hieroglyphics

Hieroglyphics

pictorial representation of religious ritual, historical incidents and daily pursuits

Life

Water

Absence of Rain

• rain drainage was not considered

• flat roofs of stone slabs

• temples: roofs served as religious processions

• Ancient Egyptian families often slept on their roofs

Desert

death

Ancient Egypt

• obsessed with cult of the dead

• world view was a perpetual cycle of life and death and therefore renewal

• life was a brief transient passage, and the other side of death was the external extension of the joys of his worldly experience

• death was seen as a passage to another life made possible only if the body remained intact

Mummification

permanent habitation for the soul through mutilation made the dead harmless

Ka’ba’

human body with a bird head

Afterlife

depends on the delicate balance between good moral conduct and on careful provisions for the physical remains

Pyramids

were built for the preservation of bodies

Religion

dominant element for structures

Theban Triad

• Ammon - Sun God

• Mut - Wife of Ammon

• Khons - Moon God

Memphis Triad

• Ptah - Creator

• Sekhmet - Goddess of War

• Nepertem - Son

Osiris

• God of the Dead

• Isis - wife

Other Gods

• Horus - Sky God

• Hathor - goddess of love

• Set - god of evil

• Serapis - Bull G

Papyra and Tablets

• written records of history and literature

• made from papyrus plant

Pharaohs

• kings

• the great house

Menes

• 1st dynastic king

• founded memphis in lower Egypt, remained as the new capital until the “new empire”

• United Upper and Lower Egypt

Mastaba

• first egyptian tomb

• known as Tomb Houses

Old Kingdom (4400 - 2466 BC)

• King Seneferu’s Pyramid at Medum

• King Seneferu’s Pyramid at Dahsur

• The Great Pyramid of Cheops/Khufu

• The Pyramid of Chephren/Khafre

Middle Kingdom (2466 - 1600 BC)

• Pharaohs began to care for their public

• Hierarchy in Egyptian Society

• construction of canals, dams, and draining of swamp lands

  • Erection of the 1st Obelisk Heliopolis by Semusret I

  • Great Temple at Karnak by Amenemhat I

New Kingdom (1600 - 332 BC)

• Egypt became the most powerful empire in ancient world

• Valley of the Kings

  • Tomb of Tutankhamun

  • Temple of De’r-el Bahari by Queen Hatshepsut

  • Temply at Luxor by Amenophis III

Rameses I

• most brilliant epoch of Egyptian Art

• began the Great Hypostyle at Karnak

Rameses II

• finished the Great Hypostyle at Karnak

• constructed rock-cut Temple at Abu Simbel

Ptolemaic Period (332 - 30 BC)

Ptolemy II - Pharos/Lighthouse at Alexandria