Worship and Festivals in An Egyptian Temple

WORSHIP AND FESTIVALS IN AN
EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 1
BY R W. FAIRMAN, M.A.
BRUNNER PROFESSOR OF EGYPTOLOGY IN THE UNIVERSITY
OF LIVERPOOL
M OST of the many temples of Pharaonic Egypt now lie

in ruins. Most of them were being built, modified or
added to over so many centuries that they preserve little homo-
geneity and it is difficult for the ordinary visitor to gain any
fair idea of their original nature and condition, still less to
imagine how they could have been used for worship. The
latest temples to be built in Egypt, those of the Ptolemaic
Period (and especially the Temples of Edfu and Denderah),
differ from those of Pharaonic times by their preservation, and
by the nature and extent of the reliefs and inscriptions that
cover their walls.
The texts in these late temples include long descriptions of
the temple room by room, each room, hall, or part of the build-
ing being named and its purpose, decoration and dimensions
recorded. Each room and hall usually contains additional texts
that repeat its name and give further information concerning
its use. Similarly, each door is named and bears texts that
state when and for what purpose it was used. Another long
series of texts records the festivals celebrated in the temple
throughout the year, indicates the date and duration of each,
and sometimes outlines the ceremonies performed. An inde-
pendent series of longer texts describes in greater detail some of
the more important festivals.
This rich treasure of inscriptional material, illustrated as it
often is by well-preserved reliefs, enables us to describe the
1 An expanded version of a lecture given at the John Rylands Library on
Wednesday the 13th of January, 1954.
The abbreviations employed in the notes are those normally used in Egypto-
logical publications, with the following additions : CD = E. Chassinat, Le
temple de Dendara, vols. i-v ; E = E. Chassinat, Le temple d'Edfou, vols.
i-xiv ; MD = A. Mariette, Denderah, vols. i-iv.
165
166 THE JOHN RYLANDS LIBRARY
function of every part of the temple from the smallest chapel
to the largest hall, from the gargoyles and water-spouts * to the
pylons and obelisks. It is possible to reconstruct the furnishing
and equipment of certain rooms, to tell when, how and where
the offerings were prepared, to indicate the precise doors
through which they were introduced into the temple, to trace
the order of the ritual and the route of the great processions,
and even to know what happened to the offerings after the
services and festivals were ended. Moreover, there is evidence
that in general the texts are based on sound ancient tradition,
that in vocabulary and content they often go back to the early
days of Egyptian civilization, and that, if used with due care
and discretion, they provide us with a unique and exceedingly
rich source-book of Egyptian religious practice.
Among all these Ptolemaic temples, that of Edfu occupies a
unique position. It is the only one that was completed; it
was built within a comparatively short space of time and there-
fore appears to us today as a unity; and in the 2,000 years
since its completion it has suffered only comparatively slight
damage. The main temple is intact, its roof is complete, all
its columns are in position, and only the obelisks at the entrance
and some small chapels on the roof have disappeared, while the
sacred lake, the temple storehouses, abbatoirs, and other build-
ings of an administrative nature still lie deeply buried under
the houses of the modern town to the east of the temple.
The temple of Edfu thus affords us our best opportunity of
studying a complete Egyptian temple and the varied religious
activities that took place within it day by day throughout the
year. In this paper I propose to give a very brief account of
daily worship and of some of the great calendar festivals that
were celebrated in the temple. My purpose is merely to describe
in barest outline religious practice, as recorded in the texts and
reliefs of the temple, and lack of space will prevent me from
entering into great detail or even attempting proper justification
of views that may differ from those of other scholars. For the
same reason I have had to abstain from any serious attempt to
1 C. de Wit, " Les inscriptions des lions-gargouilles du temple d'Edfou ",
Chronique d'Egypte, no. 57 (Janvier 1954), 29-45.
EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 167
explain the religious and mythological significance of the
festivals and the individual ceremonies, for in fact each festival
requires a complete book for its proper exposition.
Before, however, we can consider the religious activities in
the temple throughout the year, it is essential to give some
idea of the building and its history. The Temple of Edfu is
dedicated to Horus the Behdetite, a falcon god who is usually
represented as a man with the head of a falcon: the temple
contained statues of the god in this form, and also in purely
bird form. Adjacent to the temple there was also a Temple
of the Sacred Falcon, and here there lived and reigned, for a
year at a time, a living falcon, whose selection and coronation
formed one of the greatest annual festivals (see below pp.
189-92).
There were three main phases in the building of the temple.
The original nucleus, itself a complete temple with a hypo-
style hall, two other halls, sanctuary and numerous side chapels,
was commenced in 237 B.C. and dedicated in 142 B.C. To the
south of this was added between 140 and 124 B.C. the Pronaos
or Outer Hypostyle. Finally, the foundations of the Forecourt,
the stone enclosure wall and the pylons were laid in 116 B.C.;
the dedication ceremony was celebrated in 71 B.C., but the
decoration of the temple does not appear to have been finally
completed, and the great doors of the pylon were not hung,
until 57 B.C. The whole temple thus took 180 years to complete.
This great building lay within a vast enclosure surrounded
by a massive brick wall, the main entrance being to the south,
slightly to the west of the main axis of the temple. The precise
extent of this enclosure is unknown, for the existing brick walls
are to a great extent modern, and all that part of the enclosure
to the east of the temple lies buried under the modern town.
The inscriptions tell us, however, that it was in this buried eastern
section that were situated the sacred lake, the temple abbatoirs,
kitchens, storehouses, and stock-yards for cattle and birds of
various kinds. Here also there must presumably have been a
sacred grove in which the sacred falcons were reared, in addition
to administrative offices, and probably houses for some of the
priests. Immediately outside the temenos, west of the main
entrance and at right angles to the temple, is the Mammisi, or
Birth-Temple, and facing it to the east there must have been
the Temple of the Sacred Falcon, of which all traces have now
disappeared except for the base of what was apparently an altar
or offering table.1 Finally, some distance to the west or south-
west lay what is called the " upper temple " and other edifices
of uncertain nature which played an important part in the
ceremonies connected with the joint festival of the Sacred
Marriage and the Festival of Behdet (see below, pp. 196-200) :
the position of this upper temple is still unknown.
The temple 2 is oriented from south to north. Before each
wing of the Pylon there were originally two masts and an obelisk
which have now disappeared. Over the main door (A) and
between the wings of the Pylon was the Balcony of the Falcon,
reached from the Forecourt (1) by stairs in the eastern wing
of the Pylon.
The Forecourt (1) was a vast open court with a colonnade
of thirty-two columns to south, east and west, and with two
doors in each of its east and west walls. The most important
and biggest of these four doors was the south-eastern one (B),
and through it Hathor entered the temple on her arrival at
Edfu at the beginning of the Festival of the Sacred Marriage
after having entered the temple enclosure through a door in
the now buried east temenos wall.3 The most frequent names
of the Forecourt were Court of Offering* Court of the Pylon?
and Court of Appearance.* There must presumably have been
an altar here, but all traces of this have disappeared. Great
burnt offerings were made in this court at the New Year Festival,
and probably on certain other occasions, and it is sometimes
stated that offerings were made there to Re' thrice daily; pre-
1 E. Chassinat, Le Mammisi d'Edfou, pp. viii-xiii; revised PI. I (printed in
Fasc. 2, Cairo, 1939); PL LVI.
2 See the plan in Fig. 1. The Arabic numerals in parentheses after the
names of parts of the temple refer to the numbered rooms and halls of the
plan ; the capital letters refer to the doors.
3 E. vi. 7, 5-8, 1 ; vii. 18, 10-19, 2. Cf. the texts of welcome on the eastern
jambs of this door, E. v. 370, 11-371, 9; 374, 3-14.
4 E. i. 554, 1 ; iii. 355, 7,- v. 2, 2 ; 305, 3; vii. 5, 3; 18, 6-7; 19, 4.
5 E. vii. 9, 4. 6 £. iii. 355,6; v,5,5.
I .»!• •»• • If
IJHv ••11
I^^^^B ^^^H
• •••• ••••
Li: ddi
V ^B^™^^~^*^^ ^^^^•"^^•^^B
THE TEMPLE OF EDFU

(Adapted from Chassinat, Le temple d'Edfou, IX, PI. I)
EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 169
sumably these offerings were made on special festivals, for the
three services of the ordinary daily ritual were celebrated in
the Sanctuary.
To the north of the Forecourt lay the Pronaos or Outer
Hypostyle (2), the Fore-Hall or Great Court as it was most
usually called. It was both higher and wider than the rest of
the temple to the north of it and contained twelve great columns.
Its south wall was composed of a screen wall, to about half
the height of the hall, with three engaged columns on either
side of the entrance, thus, in contrast with the rest of the temple,
ensuring that it was reasonably well lighted. There was a
service door in the east wall. Two small chapels were built
against the south wall: to the west of the main door, the House
of the Morning (3) for the purification of the King before per
forming the ritual, and to the east the House of Books (4), the
temple library, containing a selection of the books required for
the services; a lector priest was on duty here throughout the day.
Beyond the Pronaos lies the original nucleus of the temple.
First, a hypostyle hall (5) called the Great Court,1 or Great
Pillared Hall, 2 or, less frequently, the Court of Festival9 At
the north-west corner of this hall was the Laboratory (6) in
which incense and unguents were prepared, and to the south
of it the Room of the Nile (7) which had in its west wall an ante
chamber and door (C) leading to the ambulatory ; it was through
this door that the libations were introduced daily into the
temple. On the east side of the hall was an entrance to the
winding stairway (D) leading to the roof, a passage (E) through
the east wall by which the daily offerings were introduced, and,
south of the passage, the temple Treasury (8) in which the more
valuable equipment and cultus vessels were kept.
Beyond the Inner Hypostyle lay the Hall of Offerings 4 (9),
having to its west the antechamber to the western stairway (10),
and to its east the chief entrance to the winding, eastern stair
way (F). To the north lay the Central Hall 5 or Place where
the Gods Repose,6 or Hall of the Ennead 1 (11), where the
l E.vu. 17,3. 2 £.iv.6,4. 3 E.ii. 11, 13.
4 E. iv. 6, 3; vii. 16, 5. 5 E. iv. 5, 12; vii. 15, 7.
6 E.iv.5, 12; vii. 15,8. 7 E.iv. 13,13.
portable shrines of the co-templar divinities were kept, and to
its west the Chapel of Mm 1 (12). On the east of the
Central Hall a door leads to two rooms that play an important
part in the temple year: the southernmost is called Food"
altar 2 (13) and is open to the sky, its north wall being the
facade of a special room, at a slightly higher level, called the
Pure Place* (14); it was in these two rooms that some of
the preliminary rites of the Festival of Raiment and the New
Year Festival were celebrated.
The north wall of the Central Hall was occupied by the
facade of the Sanctuary and the doors of the corridor that
surround it. The Sanctuary or Holy of Holies (15), the Great
Seat* as it is usually called, is in fact a small and complete
rectangular chapel, with its own roof and no external lighting,
set within the larger framework of the temple. Its principal
contents were a great black granite naos, still to be seen there,
containing the cultus images, and the portable boat-shrines of
Horus and Hathor that were used in certain processions. In
the Sanctuary was celebrated the daily liturgy.
Surrounding the Sanctuary, and separated from it by a
corridor, is a series of small chapels. The first and most im
portant of these (16), called Mesen,5 or the Mansion of Valour*
or Pleasant-to-live-in? is situated on the axis of the temple
immediately behind the Sanctuary. This room contained a
naos of black granite that housed two shrines containing statues
of Horus in falcon form and of Hathor. Close to the naos was
a statue of another form of Horus, the Falcon of Gold. Also
kept in this room were the two sacred lances of Horus. 8
To the west of the Mesen-room lies the room called the
Crypt 9 (17), with its annexe (18) or Mansion of the Prince
These two rooms, together with the first room on the west
side of the corridor, the Privy Chamber of the Crypt u (19), were
1 E. iv. 6, 2 ; vii. 15, 9. 2 E. iv. 6, 2 ; vii. 16, 1.
3 £.iv.6,2; vii. 16, 1. 4 £.iv.5,9-11; 13,12; vii. 15,3-7.
5 £.iv. 13,7; vii. 13,1. 6 £.iv. 5, 1; 13,7.
7 £.iv. 13,7.
8 M. Alliot, Le culte d'Horus a Edfott au temps des Ptolemees, i. 314-25 ; quoted
henceforth as Alliot, Culte. ' E. iv. 5, 4 ; 13, 11 ; vii. 13, 3.
]0 £.vii. 13,3. n £.iv.5,5; vii. 13,4.
EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 171
specially connected with the cult and mysteries of Osiris.1 To
the south lay the Throne of the Gods 2 (20), and the Mansion of
Raiment 3 (21) which contained the provincial inventory and
supplies of coloured cloths and unguent required for the temple
services.
To the east of the Mesen-room are the Mansion of the Leg 4
(22), devoted to Khonsu, and its annexe, the Chapel of Hathor 5
(23). South of them are the Throne of Re • (24) in which Re'
was supposed to rest and in which the evening service was
celebrated, and the Throne Room 7 (25).
The roof of the temple was reached by two stairways. At
certain of the annual festivals the procession made its way up
the winding eastern stairway (F) and proceeded along the east
side of the roof to a small kiosk, called the Place of the First
Feast,8 that originally stood in the north-eastern corner of the
roof. This building is now lost, but it must have been similar
to the kiosk of the same name that still exists on the roof of the
Temple of Denderah.9 The kiosk had two doors, a main one
on the south, and a smaller one on the west by which the
procession made its way to the descending stairway that began
at the north-west corner of the roof. The roof, and above all
the Place of the First Feast, was the site of the final and most
important rites of the New Year Festival.
The temple was surrounded by a massive stone wall which
separated it from the rest of the sacred enclosure. Starting
from the Pylon, the wall first formed the east and west walls of
the Forecourt, but from the facade of the Pronaos northwards
it formed the outer wall of the Pure Ambulatory 10 which en
circled the temple. This ambulatory was one of the more sacred
parts of the temple enclosure; it was the route of processions,
particularly at the Festival of Sokaris, and doors to east and
west prevented the uninitiated from entering it. In the east
^.vii. 13,4-14, 1. 2 E.iv.5,6; vii. 14, 1-2.
3 £.iv. 5,6; vii. 14,2. 4 E.iv. 5, 7; 13, 11 ; vii. 14, 3.
5 E. iv. 5, 7-8; vii. 14,3. 6 E.iv. 5,8.
7 £.iv. 5,8; vii. 14,5. 8 £.vii. 14,4.
9 CD. i. Pis. 40-42 ; L. Borchardt, Aegyptische Tempel mil Umgang, pp.
14-17; Pis. 7 and 8.
10 £.vi. 12,5; 348,11-12.
wall of the ambulatory were two doors : the northernmost (G)
led to a passage dug under the foundations of the wall itself
and leading to the sacred well from which pure water for the
temple service was drawn; the second door (H) to the south
of this gave access to those parts of the temple enclosure that
are now buried, and through it were brought all the food and
offerings for the temple service, through it entered the temple
staff in general, after having purified themselves in the sacred lake,
in order to perform their duties in the temple, and finally through
it the offerings were taken out of the temple after the service had
ended and after the reversion of the offerings to the priests.1
Apart from the Food-altar (13) and the openings in the
facade of the Pronaos, the temple was without any external
illumination 2 except what light filtered through the door be
tween the inner and outer hypostyle, when it was open. The
innermost parts of the temple were thus in complete darkness,
and the light of the torches used during the services playing on
brilliantly coloured reliefs, on the gilded surfaces of doors and
shrines, and on the cultus vessels must have increased the sense
of awe and majesty and grandeur. This feeling of mystery
was heightened by the fact that as one progressed from hall to
hall the floor level was raised slightly and the roof level was
at the same time lowered.
Such was the setting for the many ceremonies that were
celebrated in the temple. It is obvious that the foundation of
such a temple must have been accompanied by elaborate cere
monies. Several detailed series of foundation ceremonies have
been preserved in the temple, but I do not propose to dwell
on them here since they can hardly be included among the
normal year to year activities. When all had been completed,
however, the temple was dedicated, handed over to its lord* It
is fortunate that an abbreviated version of the Edfu ritual for
the dedication of a temple has survived.4 The ceremony was
^.vi.S, 1-3; 348,13-14; vii. 18, 3-6.
2 There were, however, small windows in the eastern stairway.
3 See JEA. 32, p. 81, n. 32.
4 A. M. Blackman and H. W. Fairman, " The Consecration of an Egyptian
Temple According to the Use of Edfu ", JEA. 32, 75-91.
EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 173
a combination of the Rite of the Opening of the Mouth and the
daily temple ritual, which in essentials were practically identical
rites. It is probable that the statues of Horus and the co-
templar divinities were assembled in one of the halls of the
temple, possibly the Outer Hypostyle (but see further, p. 187
below). The ceremonies that followed may be conveniently
summarized under five heads. First, the statues were purified
by libation and censing and by the presentation of pellets of
natron and incense for purifying their mouths. Then the
mouths and eyes of the statues were *' opened " by manipulations
with a variety of instruments. There followed an elaborate
toilet: the statues were anointed and arrayed with the head-
cloth, the four prescribed coloured cloths and the appropriate
insignia. After the toilet, a repast was laid before the statues.
In the Opening of the Mouth and the Daily Ritual this meal
ends the ceremonies, but in the dedication ceremony at Edfu
it is followed by a second opening of the mouth. It appears
that at this point the priests visited each hall and chapel in the
temple, censed and asperged it, and " opened the mouths " of
the reliefs. The result of this final act was that not only the
statues, but the entire temple, its reliefs and its furnishing
became alive and active. " The divinities could now become
immanent at will in their figures appearing in the reliefs, while
the inanimate objects depicted therein became the actual
equivalents of what they represented—food, vessels, floral
offerings, and the like.'* l The ceremony was now ended, the
statues were returned in state to their resting places, and a special
meal was given to the priests and to the craftsmen who had
taken part in the building and decoration of the temple. The
dedication ceremony was repeated annually, so that year by year
the temple was re-consecrated and its life renewed. At Edfu
the date of this annual rededication is never explicitly men
tioned, but the evidence of earlier times suggests that very
probably it took place on New Year's Day 2 (see p. 187 below).
1 JEA. 32, 90 ; see also ibid. pp. 84, 85.

2 See JEA. 32, p. 81, n. 32, and the authorities there quoted, to whom
should now be added JNES. 8, 340-1.
The temple was now built, it had been consecrated and
filled with life. What were the activities that were carried on
within it? What were the services and festivals that were
celebrated throughout the year in the house of the god ?
The ceremonies performed in the temple were essentially of
two kinds. On the one hand was the Daily Ritual with three
main services in the interior of the temple; on the other hand
were the calendar festivals, great feasts of varying duration
observed at various dates throughout the year. The former were
always celebrated within the temple by a limited number of
priests, and the laity and general public had no access to them.
The latter were always processional and involved stately pro
cessions of the divine statues, sometimes only in the temple
itself, when the public were excluded, sometimes within the
temple enclosure when perhaps the public, to a limited extent,
may have been present, and sometimes to other temples outside
the temple enclosure when of course the general public could
have witnessed and accompanied the procession, though not the
more intimate and sacred rites.
In his great study of the festivals of Horus at Edfu, Alliot
has given a very fully documented reconstruction of the daily
services in the temple.1 The main outlines of this reconstruc
tion are, I believe, quite correct, but in certain important details
I do not think his views are supported by the texts. Alliot
speaks of " regular " services and festivals. By " regular " he
refers to all services in the Sanctuary, the ordinary daily ritual,
and a more elaborate form which he calls " service solennel au
sanctuaire ". He considers that the latter type of service is
concerned with the five great festivals of the lunar month and
those of the three decades of the solar month, the difference
between these and the normal daily liturgy being that at the
" service solennel" the morning service was celebrated more
elaborately and with greater pomp and ceremony, the midday
1 M. Alliot, Culte, i. 1-179. Only the first volume of this valuable collection
of material concerning the worship of Horus at Edfu has as yet been published.
This first volume is concerned with the Daily Ritual, the Calendars, and the
New Year Festival. Professor Alliot has published a summary of his complete
study under the same title in Revue de I'Histoire des Religions, 137, 59-104.
EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 175
and evening services being the same for both types of '* regular "
liturgy. He claims that all texts in the temple that do not lie
on the path of the officiants in the ordinary service, which in
his view is only from the middle of the Inner Hypostyle (5)
northwards, belong to the solemn service, and that many texts
on the actual route of the ordinary service equally concern the
solemn service : he admits, in fact, that it is difficult to dis
entangle the two. Alliot's solution is to attribute all elaborate
and rich ceremonies to the solemn service. Alliot further claims
that only the two side doors (C and E) of the Inner Hypostyle
were open for the daily liturgy, and that through them entered
the libation water, the offerings, and the officiating priest.
Since all other doors in the temple were, he claims, closed, the
king or his deputy could not have entered through the main
door of the Pronaos (2) and therefore the normal robing and
purification in the House of the Morning (3) could not have
been celebrated at the ordinary daily service but the officiating
priest was purified at the sacred lake to the east of the temple,
and, be it noted, outside the really sacred area.
Although it is certain that there were ceremonies much
more elaborate than those of the ordinary daily service, there
is nothing to indicate when they were celebrated. It is a
reasonable assumption that there were special ceremonies at
the festivals of the lunar and solar month, but the Edfu texts
are conspicuously silent about them; there is no text that
would lead one to suppose that they were a special and more
elaborate form of the daily ritual. In the great calendar in the
temple of Ramesses III at Medinet Habu the lists distinguish
very carefully between the ordinary daily ritual, the " festivals
of the sky", and the " festivals of the times " or calendar
festivals. It is important to note that at Medinet Habu the
feasts of the lunar month are included among the " festivals
of the sky 'V At Edfu I only know of one possible reference
1 Medinet Habu (ed. Chicago), iii. PI. 148, 318. 367. 391 ; PI. 150, 440. 452.
Similarly, in the Edfu Nome List the only festivals listed under the Nome of
Heliopolis are the " festivals of the sky ", all those listed being days of the lunar
month (E. i. 333, 13). Cf. also JEA. 38, 21 ; Pap. Harris 166, 13 ; 346, 6 =
Bibliotheca Aegyptiaca, v. 20, 10 ; 40, 2.
to a feast of the lunar month, and then only in a copy whose
complete accuracy is unfortunately suspect. The passage in
question, I believe, reads : The sacred image of Him-who-is-on-
his-great-throne is engraved upon its wall together with (those of)
the gods who appear with him on every occasion of his feast of
the (last) quarter.1 The verb " appear " is that normally used
in the technical sense " to appear in procession ". If my inter
pretation of this passage is correct, it would appear to indicate
that the lunar and solar festivals were processional like the
calendar feasts and that they were distinct from the daily
liturgy. It would be safer in the present state of our knowledge
to postulate only one type of daily service.
The contention that only the side doors of the Pronaos
were open at the time of the daily services is contradicted by
several passages. There is an explicit statement that the doors
of the pylon are opened in the morning when the Disk r^es and
are closed in the evening.2 Another text referring to the temple
as a whole tells us its doors are opened at dawn when his rays
illumine the earth,3 and elsewhere it is said of the Pronaos : Its
door-leaves are opened to the Court of Offerings (1) that Re'
may be adored thrice daily. It is entered by the temple staff who
perform their duties within it thrice daily*
The claim that the officiating priest in the daily service
entered by the side doors is partly due to this misunderstanding
about the opening of the temple, and partly to faulty inter
pretation of the texts on the side doors. Alliot considers that
the priest who censed the libation water as it was brought into
the temple was the officiant in the Sanctuary because he must
have been the senior priest since he followed the priest who
carried the water. Not only do the texts give no hint that any
of the priests who entered by the side doors actually celebrated
the service in the Sanctuary, but it is explicitly stated that the
priest with the incense preceded the libation water,5 and hence
no question of seniority arises. In theory it was the king who
performed the service. In practice it is obvious that this was
1 E. I 368, 11 -12. Alliot, Culte, i. 431 translates rather differently.
2 E. viii. 58, 14-15. s E. i. 20, 1 -3 (text on the left).
4 E. iii. 355, 7-8; cf. v. 2,2-3. 6 £. ii. 139, 8.
EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 177
impossible, but the texts give very little definite evidence on
the question of the identity of his deputy. In a text concerned
with the New Year Festival it is stated that it is the king himself
in his capacity of the Great Prince (a special title of the High
Priest of Edfu) who enters the chapel, mounts the stairs of
the naos and unveils the face of the god.1 Elsewhere, in obvious
references to the daily ritual, we read : / am a prophet, the son
of a prophet. It is the King who commanded me to see the god ; 2
or It is His Majesty who commanded (?) the prophet to [adore]
the god.3 In other passages the king says : I am he who gazes
upon thy mysterious form. It is I who send the prophet to [see
the god] ; 4 or / am he who arrays Thy Majesty in raiment;
the prophet acts according to my command..5 Since the high
priest was a prophet, the senior overseer of prophets in the
temple, the texts just quoted may well refer to him. Neither
the high priest nor any prophet is ever mentioned as entering
by any side door expressly to officiate in the Sanctuary.
I feel equally doubtful about the omission of the rites of the
House of the Morning 6 from the preliminaries to the daily
service. The libation water was drawn from the well dug
under the east wall of the temple, obviously to ensure extreme
purity, and it naturally follows that the waters of the sacred
lake, which lay outside the temple wall, were not sufficiently
pure for this purpose. It seems hardly likely that the officiating
priest who entered the Holy of Holies to unveil, gaze upon, and
touch the god should only be cleansed at the sacred lake, and
that he should then have to cross a part of the temple enclosure
that was less ritually pure than the temple proper. It is incredible
that the chief officiant should have been in a state of less ritual
purity than the libation. Since I hope I have demonstrated that
all the temple doors were open at dawn, there seems no reason
to deny that the officiant entered by the main door of the Pronaos
^.i. 554, 3-4. 2 £.iii.83,10.
8 E. ii. 144, 8 ; interpreted quite differently by Alliot, Culte, i. 15, with n. 2.
For this and E. iii. 83, 10, see the parallels in the Rituals of Amun and Mut,
P. Berlin 3055, 4, 6-7 = P. Berlin 3014, 3, 10-4, 1 = A. Moret, Le rituel du
culte divin joumalier en Egypte, p. 55.
4 E. i. 420, 13 = xii. PI. 344. 5 E. i. 429, 15-16 = xii. PI. 346.
• Cf. A. M. Blackman, The House of the Morning (]EA. 5, 148-65).
12
and was punned in the House of the Morning. The priests
who are mentioned as entering the temple after purification at
the Sacred Lake were all junior priests who never penetrated
the Sanctuary.
Let us now consider what happened in the Daily Service. 1
One of the most important points that emerges from Alliot's
study is that every day there were three main services in the
temple, at dawn, at midday and at evening, the morning service
being by far the most important, and the midday service the
least important. Alliot was the first to establish this very
important point, which has been overlooked in all standard
works on the cult and worship.
Before dawn an immense amount of preparatory work was
necessary. It was the duty of two priests to fill the libation
vessel from the sacred well (G), and then, one carrying the
vase, and the other walking in front and censing it, they marched
round the ambulatory in anticlockwise direction and entered
the temple by the door on the west (C) leading to the Chamber
of the Nile (7) and thence to the Inner Hypostyle (5). In the
ante chamber of the door and in the Chamber of the Nile the
water was blessed and dedicated, and it was then the duty of
the two priests to replenish all libation vessels. In the mean
time, the offering was introduced by the door to the east of
the Inner Hypostyle (E). In the abbatoirs and kitchens to the
east of the temple men had been busy long before dawn
slaughtering an ox and preparing the varied offerings that were
to be laid before the gods. At the appointed moment the offer
ings were carried through the door (H) in the enclosure wall
and thence into the temple by the east door (E) of the Inner
Hypostyle. The offerings were escorted and censed by priests,
and it would appear that at the same time other priests who
had duties to perform in the temple entered by the same door,
having first purified themselves at the sacred lake. After the
offerings had been purified and censed, they were taken into the
1 For studies of earlier versions of the daily ritual see A. Moret, Le rituel du
culte divinjoumalier en Egyftte ; A. M. Blackman, " The Sequence of the Episodes
in the Egyptian Daily Temple Ritual", Journal of the Manchester Egyptian
and Oriental Society (1918-19), pp. 27-53.
EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 179
Hall of Offerings (9), and eventually some of the libations and
offerings must have been brought into the Hall of the Ennead
(11) where were kept the portable shrines of the co-templar
divinities.
Meanwhile the officiating priest had entered with due
solemnity by the main door of the Pronaos. In the thickness
of each jamb of this door is an abbreviated Declaration of
Innocence which he presumably recited while entering. He
then turned to the left and was taken to the House of the
Morning (3), and there he was ceremonially purified, dressed
and invested, and given a light meal. When all had been com
pleted, and while hymns were sung, he marched in solemn
procession towards the Sanctuary, whose doors were still
closed and sealed.
It is evident that there was not room on the walls of the
temple for the full series of ceremonies recorded in the Ritual
of Amun. At Edfu only nineteen scenes from the daily liturgy
are inscribed in the Sanctuary, and these must be interpreted
as a selection of the more important ceremonies and not neces
sarily as a complete but abbreviated version special to Edfu.
It is this same lack of space that is the most probable explanation
of the complete absence of any mention of the preliminary
rites, such as the twisting and lighting of the torch, the taking
of the censer and incense, and the placing of incense on the
flame, all of which were essential preliminaries to the service.
It was at this moment, or as the doors of the Sanctuary were
opened, that the Morning Hymn was sung. This great hymn
is inscribed on the facade of the Sanctuary 1 and in it Horus,
the co-templar divinities, the members and insignia of Horus,
and the individual parts of the temple are addressed and bidden
to rouse themselves from slumber. It seems a very long hymn
to have been sung every day, but there must have been a
Morning Hymn, either this or an abbreviated version.
The priest then entered the Sanctuary and advanced towards
the naos. The ensuing service consisted of seven phases.
1 A. M. Blackman and H. W. Fairman, " A Group of Texts Inscribed on
the Facade of the Sanctuary in the Temple of Horus at Edfu ", Miscellanea
Gregoriana, pp. 397-428.
First, the priest mounted the steps to the naos, broke the seals
on the door, drew the bolts and opened the doors, thus revealing
the statue of the god. Then followed the uncovering of the
face of the god and the ceremony of seeing the god, when the
priest recited : / have seen the god, the Power sees me. The
god rejoices at seeing me. I have gazed upon the statue of the
Divine Winged Beetle, the sacred image of the Falcon of Gold.1
This was undoubtedly one of the most important moments in
the whole service, the god had once more entered his statue
and taken up residence in his house. The third phase consisted
of the adoration of the god and was followed by the presentation
of myrrh. The last-mentioned ceremony apparently symbolized
the presentation of a meal (see below, p. 191), and takes the
place of the Offering of Truth that occurs at this point in the
Ritual of Amun. The three final phases were all connected
with the toilet of the god. The statue was touched with unguent
and the four coloured cloths prescribed by the ritual were
presented. Then the statue was purified with water from the
ritual green and red vases. Finally, the service concluded with
a long series of censings and fumigations, the priest withdrew,
and the shrine and the Sanctuary were once more closed. Here,
again, Edfu diverges from the Ritual of Amun, in which the
purification precedes the dressing of the statue, but in general
the two liturgies are closely similar.
While these ceremonies were being performed in the Sanct
uary, other priests visited the chapels that open off the corridor,
and probably all other parts of the temple as well, and performed
an abbreviated version of the rites that were being simultaneously
celebrated in the Sanctuary itself. Thus the whole temple and
its gods were awakened, washed, dressed, fed, and made ready
for another day.
It was probably immediately after this service that the
rites called the Reversion of the Divine Offerings were per
formed. 2 Naturally only a small proportion of the offerings
brought into the temple was symbolically placed upon the
1 E. i. 26, 4-6 ; cf. the close parallel at Denderah, MD. iii. 614. For a much
different translation see Alliot, Culte, i. 79.
2 Cf.;£A35,85.
EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 181
altars of the gods. After the service had ended and the god was
satisfied with his offerings, they reverted to the priests, were
taken out of the temple through the eastern doors (E and H),
and were then divided among the priests in due proportion
according to rank.
Details of the midday service 1 are exceedingly meagre. It
was certainly shorter and much less important than the morning
service. Alliot considers that it consisted essentially of the
offering of libations and the replenishing of vessels throughout
the temple, no offerings were brought in and the Sanctuary
remained closed. While this may be so, it is necessary to
point out that there are at least four texts that clearly mention
the bringing of offerings, as distinct from libations, into the
temple thrice daily, and that these offerings include various
kinds of bread, flowers, geese, and grain.2
The evening service 3 took place just before sunset. It was
in the main a repetition of the morning service, but on a less
elaborate scale. The most important difference was that it
seems to have been celebrated in the room called the Throne
of Re (24) and not in the Sanctuary. It was here that the soul
of Re was supposed to retire to rest at night and it was from
here that he rose to the sky at dawn.
Such were the three main services that were duly celebrated
every day throughout the year. Were they the only activities
within the temple on ordinary days ? This is a question to
which no final answer can yet be given, but three curious facts
ought to be mentioned. A text in the east door of the Pronaos
speaks of the spells for lustrating the great, sacred images of the
majesty of Re in the twelve hours of the day; 4 another in the
Library states that the Chief Lector-priest did his duty in it in
the twelve hours of the day; 5 lastly, a text on one of the jambs
of the door of the room called Throne of Re tells us the prophets
pass along its path to the Palace of the Behdetite to uncover the
face of Him~of-pleasant~life (an epithet of Horus the Behdetite)
from eventide without cease through the twelve (?) hours of the
1 Alliot, Culte, i. 107-20.
2 E. vi. 105,2-3; vii. 83, 16-84, 2 .- 207, 7-10; 239, 2-4.
3 AllJot, Culte, i. 121-32. *E. iii. 356, 1. 5 £. iii. 339, 9-10.
night, provisions being in their hands in order to be laid upon its
altar . . . is satisfied with the offerings, and the gods and goddesses
who are in his train, they eat with him.1 It is difficult to escape
the conclusion that certain rites were celebrated in the temple
each hour of the day and night, but of the nature of these
ceremonies we know nothing.
In the temple are two calendars of festivals, 2 as distinct
from the ordinary daily services, that were celebrated at Edfu
during the year. Although the record is unfortunately in
complete in parts, the calendars themselves and scattered crumbs
of information from other texts show that over forty 3 special
festivals were celebrated in the temple in the course of a single
year, festivals that varied in length from one to fifteen days.
Most of these festivals are little more than names and we know
nothing about their nature and development. It is probable,
moreover, that some festivals have been omitted from the list.
During a great part of the fourth month of the year, the Fourth
Month of Inundation, special festivals of Osiris were celebrated in
all temples of Egypt. At Edfu three rooms were specially con
nected with the cult of Osiris (Rooms 17, 18, and 19 on the
plan), and contain a portion of the text of the Osiris Mysteries,
the Leg of Osiris was supposed to be kept in the temple, and
there is even a boastful claim that Osiris was mummified at
Edfu : 4 it is certain that there must have been festivals of
Osiris, but the calendars almost completely ignore them, except
for references to the Festival of Sokaris on the 26th of the month.6
If some of the rooms on the roof had survived, we might have
been in a better position to speak of what happened at Edfu,
but at Edfu alone there is not sufficient material to enable us
^.i. 282,12-15.
2 E. i. 359, 15-18= xii. PI. 324; v. 397, 5-401, 5; 394, 10-395, 7 = xiii.
Pis. 490, 491, 489. The most recent published translations are those of Alliot,
Culte, i. 206-15. A third calendar at Edfu (E. v. 348, 4-353, 6 ; 354, 2-360, 2 =
xiii. Pis. 485, 486) is, as Alliot has pointed out, in reality a calendar of the festivals
of Hathor at Denderah (Alliot, op. cit. i. 251-62 ; translation, op. cit. i. 219-39).
3 The calendar of Tuthmosis III at Karnak mentions no less than fifty-four
calendar festivals (JEA. 38, PI. IX, frag, gg ; pp. 20-1).
4 E.v. 164,6-7; cf. 163, 17-164, 1.
6 E. v. 399, 1-6; 6, 7-8 ; vi. 9, 7-8. For scenes connected with this festival
seeE. v. 163, 16-165,2; vi. 136, 11-142,6: 281, 12-282, 13.
EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 183
to draw a complete picture and an adequate account of the Osiris
Mysteries will have to await the accurate and complete publica
tion of the abundant materials from Denderah and Philae.
Only four of the great annual festivals can be reconstructed in
any detail or accuracy. These festivals are the New Year
Festival, the Coronation of the Sacred Falcon, the Festival of
Victory, and the Sacred Marriage, and it is to these that we
must now turn our attention.
New Year's Day in Egypt coincided, at least when the
calendar and the year were in step, with the traditional day of
the rising of the Nile. The ceremonies on this day, the herald
of the life-giving inundation, are therefore naturally primarily
concerned with renewal, the renewal of life and fertility, for
the gods, for Egypt, and her people, and above all for Pharaoh
on whom the welfare of Egypt depended, and this renewal is
symbolized by the union of the sun's rays with the statue of the
god: the rooms called Food-Altar (13) and Pure Place (14),
the stairways to and from the roof, and the Kiosk, the Place of
the First Feast, on the roof are specially designed to facilitate
this all-important union.
The first complete study of the New Year Festival is that
of Alliot.1 The following account of the ceremonies follows
Alliot in its broad lines, but it is only fair to Alliot to point
out that it differs from him in three respects. In the first place,
it is not absolutely certain that at Edfu the Festival lasted eleven
days. The ceremonies began on the thirtieth day of the Fourth
Month of Summer (the last day of the old year), continued on
the five epagomenal days, and according to Alliot ended on the
fifth day of the First Month of Inundation. The difficulty here
is that the calendar entries for the fourth and fifth days of that
month contain no reference to the New Year Festival but are
called respectively The Festival of the Behdetite, and The Festival
of Horus the Behdetite. 2 Moreover, the calendar of Kom
Ombo 3 clearly states that the festival ended on the fourth day
of the month. A final solution of this problem cannot yet be
1 Alliot, Culte, i. 303-433. 2 E. v. 397, 6.

3 De Morgan, Ombos, i. 314, no. 426.
offered, but I am reluctant to make as positive a declaration
as Alliot regarding the duration of the festival.
Secondly, Alliot has attempted to prove that the Place of
the First Feast was the name of the Kiosk on the roof and also
of the room called Food-altar (13) and hence divides the
ceremonies into two phases : (a) the days before New Year's
Day when the ceremonies took place in and between the Mesen-
room (16) and Food-altar and Pure Place (14), and (b) New
Year's Day and the following days when the ceremonies extended
to the roof and the kiosk. No text at either Edfu or Denderah
applies the term Place of the First Feast to any part of the
temple other than the Kiosk on the roof. Alliot's view is based
on the fact that at Denderah the room equivalent to the Food-
altar at Edfu is sometimes called the Court of the Place of the
First Feast. 1 If this means anything, it surely means that the
room cannot be the Place of the First Feast; otherwise, one
might also call it the Pure Place since an infrequent name of the
same room is Court of the Pure Place.2 Since the Edfu calendar
explicitly states that on the last day of the year and on the
epagomenal days the god went to the Place of the First Feast,
I assume, contrary to Alliot, that both before and after New
Year's Day the ceremonies included a procession to the roof.
Lastly, Alliot denies that any of the toilet episodes took
place on the roof. This is also impossible to sustain, not only
because an epitome of the ceremonies at Denderah clearly
refers to detailed toilet episodes after Hathor had entered the
Kiosk,3 but both at Edfu and Denderah the toilet requirements
are carried up to the roof and at Edfu there is a particularly
clear statement that the toilet was performed there.4 In my
view there were toilet episodes in both the Pure Place and the
Kiosk.
The New Year ceremonies did not affect the Sanctuary and
the statues that were kept in it, but started in the Mesen-room
1 CD.iv. 185, 14; 186,5.
2 J. Diimichen, Baugeschichte des Denderatempels, xiv, 10.
3 CD. v. 117, 1-4 = MD. iii. 37 i: the most recent study is by Daumas
in Ann. Serv. 51, 384-8. Cf. also MD. iv. 11 = J. Diimichen, AltSgyptischen
Kalendarinschriften, 92-3. 4 E. i. 555, 11-14.
EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 185
(16). The king or his deputy, accompanied by the senior
priests of the temple, entered the room, and performed the
opening rites of the daily service: he mounted the steps of
the naos, opened it, and revealed the face of the god. After
a brief adoration, the shrines of Horus and Hathor were removed
and placed on separate, rectangular, gilded supports, each
surmounted by a canopy on four columns, and each having a
metal ring at the four corners. Nine priests, usually called
the Companions, were assigned to each shrine and its support
and were responsible for carrying it in all the processions of the
day; they supported the shrines on their hands and by means
of cords passed round their necks and then through the rings
attached to the support. These priests impersonated the four
sons of Horus, the four sons of Mekhentienirty, and Mekhen-
tienirty himself, who does not seem to have acted as porter, but
brought up the rear of each group of porters rather like an over
seer. 1 The procession then formed up, and in double file, with
the Sacred Lance of Horus before Horus and the Lance of
Khonsu before Hathor, made its way along the corridor that
surrounded the Sanctuary and so eventually reached the Food-
altar (13) and the Pure Place (14). In the meantime, particularly
rich offerings, including burnt offerings, had been placed on all
altars throughout the temple and above all in the Forecourt,
the Court of Offering (I).2 The shrines of Horus, Hathor,
and all the co-templar divinities were now grouped in the Pure
Place (14), facing south, offerings were made to them, the
statues were unveiled, and then the toilet episodes of the daily
ritual were repeated in very rich and elaborate form to the
accompaniment of special hymns.
It was now time for the procession to reform and make its
way to the roof. The route was from the Food-altar (13),
into the Central Hall (11), thence to the Hall of Offerings (9)
1 Presumably owing to lack of space the reliefs of the eastern stairway depict
either two or four priests, cf. E. ix. PL XXXVIII e and o (two priests), PL
XXVII b and e (four priests). That there were in reality nine is assured by
the repeated mention of the sons of Horus and Mekhentienirty and Mekhen
tienirty himself, and by references to the nine "Companions" or "Porters"
(£. i. 414, 9; 549, 15; 554, 8; 560, 1-2 ; 571, 7-8). At Denderah the nine are
clearly depicted and named (MD. iv. 9). 2 £. i. 553, 15-554, 1.
where it turned to the left and, passing through the door (F),
made its way up the winding stairway on to the roof and eventually
to the Kiosk. We possess a particularly detailed description
of the procession. Since each file was essentially the same, I
describe only that of Horus. The first section of the procession
was composed of priests, probably fifteen, carrying the sacred
standards : their function was to prepare the way, to open it,
and to remove all evil and danger from the path of the god.
Behind them came more priests, some of them masked, im
personating divinities who were carrying food, drink, clothing,
and other offerings. Now came the immediate escort of the
god composed of the senior priests, the High Priest in the rear,
nearest to the shrine : a lector priest marched at the head, and
the other priests carried clothing, semi-precious stones, incense
and libations. Immediately behind these priests marched a
man dressed in the royal costume and carrying the Sacred Lance
of Horus, and behind him came the queen and the king, bare
footed and looking over their shoulders at the shrine of the
god immediately behind them : the queen rattled sistra as
she walked, the king burned incense. Then came the portable
shrine of Horus, carried by the nine Companions. After the
god followed other priests, each carrying one of the co-templar
divinities in his or her portable shrine, and finally each file
was closed by a fan bearer.
The statues of the gods were introduced into the Kiosk
and, all facing south, were grouped to either side and behind
Horus. While further offerings were made, the ritual was once
more performed. The statue was unveiled, the old clothing
removed, the statue was anointed, dressed and a meal was
offered. The supreme moment of the ceremony must un
doubtedly have been the unveiling of the face of the god, and
this presumably happened at midday. At that moment the
rays descended on the statue, and that mystic union of the
sun and the god that was the whole purpose of the ceremony
was effected. After these ceremonies, the procession reformed,
passed through the west door of the Kiosk and eventually
regained the temple and the respective resting places of the gods
by descending the western stairway.
EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 187
Two further points which, as far as I know, have not previously
been mentioned in discussion of this festival, should now be
discussed. In the calendar of Kom Ombo 1 reference is made
to an " opening of the mouth " at the First Feast. Although
this ceremony is not mentioned in any of the texts of the New
Year Festival at Edfu or Denderah, it is very significant, I think,
that the Edfu calendar tells us that on the 19th day of the First
Month of Summer (the ninth month of the year) there took
place the following ceremonies : Procession of this august god,
Khonsu of Behdet, to the roof of the temple ; uncovering the face ;
clothing in raiment; offering unguent; singing praises; per-
forming the opening [of the mouth]. . . .2 The importance of
this passage is that it undoubtedly refers to ceremonies on the
roof similar to those of the New Year Festival, and it confirms
the testimony of Kom Ombo that the opening of the mouth
was part of the ceremonial. If I am correct in assuming an
opening of the mouth on New Year's Day, we have a new and
very important fact. The traditional time for the dedication
of a temple was either on the eve of New Year's Day,3 or on
New Year's Day.4 I suggest, therefore, that the ceremonies
on the temple roof on New Year's Day included the annual
rededication of the temple and its gods: the union with the
sun not only brought renewal of fertility and welfare to Egypt,
it renewed for another year the life and powers of Edfu, Horus
and the gods who lived with him in the temple.
All the ceremonies just described, though they directly
affected the well-being of the people, were hidden from the
outside world, the doors of the temple were shut while they
were being celebrated, and no member of the general public
witnessed them. Hitherto it has been assumed that the day
ended with the return of the procession to the secondary
sanctuary. In a calendar at Denderah, however, we read:
Now after the ceremonies of the divine service have been completed,
when the 8th hour of the day comes, performance of all the cere-
monies of bringing out in procession this goddess, Hathor the great,
1 De Morgan, Ombos, ii. 52, no. 596. 2 E. v. 400, 8-401, 2.
3 F. L. Griffith, The Inscriptions of Siut and D&r Rlfeh, PI. 7, 298.
4 Griffith, op. cit. Pis. 6, 277-8 ; 7, 297.
Lady of Denderah, Eye of Re, in her Uplifter-of-Beauty, 1 together
with her Ennead, to the Great Court of the Sky- 2 Uniting with
her father ; seeing her beauty by the sun-folk- Entering her house
in slow march. Resting in this her place.5 These words can surely
only mean that in the afternoon, after the New Year ceremonies,
Hathor and the co-templar divinities were brought out and
displayed to certain privileged people, but not to the public
in general, in the Outer Hypostyle Hall of the temple; the
mention of the processional barque proves that this could not
have been a procession to the roof, for the stairway was too narrow
to admit the barque and its carriers. Although this is not
mentioned at Edfu, the ceremonies at Edfu and Denderah are
so similar that it would seem that there was a reasonable possi
bility that at Edfu also Horus was brought out and displayed,
probably in the Forecourt, one of whose names is the Great
(court of) the Sky*
It is reasonable to enquire whether there was any difference
between the ceremonies before and after New Year's Day, for
it seems inherently improbable that precisely the same rites
were performed throughout the festival, without any special
difference on the important New Year Day. Unfortunately,
the texts and reliefs give us no help on this point, and one is
compelled to rely on speculation. I feel that it is probable
that the processions and the ceremonies in the temple and on
the roof on the six days before New Year Day were merely
preliminary and conducted on a modest scale. The real union
with the sun obviously was consummated on the first day of
the year, which was further marked by being the day of the
annual rededication of the temple. I feel also that New Year's
Day and the following days were distinguished from those
that preceded by special ceremonies connected with the cult
1 The portable boat-shrine kept in the Sanctuary.
2 Wb. ii. 214 (16) strangely identifies this with the roof of the temple of
Denderah. The fact that it contained columns (MD. ii. 13c), and that the boat-
shrine could be taken there makes this identification impossible. That it was
the Pronaos of Denderah was correctly recognized many years ago by Diimichen,
Baugeschichte, p. 4, and unnumbered plan of Denderah.
3 MD. i. 62 f = Brugsch, Thesaurus, 365.
4 £. v. 6, 10; cf. vii. 18,8-9.
EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 189
of the reigning king and his ancestors, which, as Alliot rightly
emphasizes,1 played such a prominent part in the ceremonies
of the New Year Festival.
The second great Festival we have to consider is the Corona
tion of the Sacred Falcon, which was celebrated on the first
five days of the First Month of Winter (the fifth month of the
year). Once again, Alliot is the first scholar to have made a
study of the festival and to have suggested the correct order
in which the reliefs are to be studied.2 The details are relatively
easy to reconstruct thanks to a magnificent set of eight great
scenes, accompanied by very long texts, on the first two registers
of the inner face of the north wall of the enclosure, supplemented
by numerous but scattered texts in other parts of the temple.
The falcon-headed statue of Horus, crowned with the Double
Crown, was taken from the naos in the Sanctuary (15) and placed
on a light, portable litter, open at the sides but surmounted by
a light canopy. The litter was carried by masked priests, those
in front wearing falcon masks, and those behind jackal masks ;
they represented the ancestors, the kings of the archaic kingdoms
of Hierakonpolis in Upper Egypt and of Buto in the Delta.
The procession was probably very similar in organization to
the procession of the New Year Festival. In front came the
priests carrying the standards, then the chief members of the
priesthood, the god in his litter, and finally priests bearing the
statues of the gods in their shrines. A feature of the procession
was that it proceeded in silence, no man speaking to his fellow.3
1 Alliot, Culte, i. 358-60. Cf. the Decrees of Canopus and Memphis : hiero
glyphic text, Urk. ii. 137, 10-138, 4; 195, 6-8; 211, 12-212, 13; translation
of the Greek text, E. Bevan, A History of Egypt wider the Ptolemaic Dynasty, 210.
2 Alliot's detailed study will appear in his second volume. He has published
a preliminary account, " La fete egyptienne du couronnement du roi au temple
d'Edfou sous les rois PtoUmees ", CRAIBL (1948), pp. 208-19, and a short
summary in Revue de I'Histoire des Religions, 137, 88-95. The main texts, in
Alliot's order, are : E. vi. 93, 2-99, 16; 262, 11-269, 12 ; 100, 2-104, 7; 269,
14-274, 7; 143, 12-152, 12; 298, 2-304, 12; 152, 14-157, 2; 305, 2-309, 7.
A hieroglyphic summary of the whole ceremony is given in E. vi. 102, 3-103, 6.
I have also used my own photographs of the first four scenes, and the complete
set of photographs of the Berlin Academy, nos. E. 18-28, 93-106. See also
H. Junker, " Der Bericht Strabos iiber den heiligen Falken von Philae im Lichte
der agyptischen Quellen ", WZKM. 26 (1912), 42-62. * E. vi. 102, 5.
The procession passed through the temple, through the great
doors of the pylon, and having passed the gate m the south
wall of the temenos, turned to the left and marched to the
Temple of the Sacred Falcon. Here the litter turned and
faced the shrines of the gods who, with their porters, were
assembled before it. The moment for the selection of the new
king had now arrived, and the method was obviously oracular.
One by one the name of each divinity was called so that Horus
might indicate the one on whom his choice had fallen. None
of the gods thus called was chosen, presumably the litter of
Horus either remained still, or made a movement of recoil as
each name was called. Then the procession enters the court,
either the Forecourt or the Hypostyle, of the Temple of the
Sacred Falcon, and while the litter of Horus is stationed in the
doorway, the falconers bring in a number of the sacred falcons
who had been bred in the sacred grove, and eventually one of
these was chosen, and recognized as the heir of the god and the
new king.
The second part of the ceremony now began. The pro
cession, now including the Sacred Falcon, reformed and retraced
its way to the Forecourt (1) for the Ceremony of Recognition.
Having entered the Forecourt, the gods and their attendants
entered the door in the east wing of the pylon and emerged
upon the roof of the main door, between the two wings of
the pylon : this was the Balcony of the Falcon,1 or Window of
Appearance.2 It is obvious that this was in order that Horus
might display his heir, the newly chosen Sacred Falcon, to the
people: there is no indication who these people were, but
presumably there was an assembly of priests and other privileged
people in the Forecourt and before the pylons. It was probably
at this point that two litanies were sung: first, the Litany of
the Happy Year, and the then Litany of Sakhmet, the purpose
of which was to ensure the protection of the Sacred Falcon
from all kinds of harm and danger.
The procession then descended from the balcony and
entered the temple for the third part of the proceedings, the
*E.vi.93, 11. 2 £.vi. 102,9.

EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 191
Coronation. For the first part of the coronation service the
falcon was placed under a light canopy on a rectangular block
elaborately carved in imitation of the primitive palace facade,
the serekfi 1 and was then anointed, invested with a ceremonial
collar, and presented with the Symbol of Eternity and the four
posies of Horus the Behdetite, Re, Hathor, and Atum. The
second part of the ceremony was concerned with the investiture
and protection of the new ruler. The falcon and Horus were
placed side by side on seats,2 each being on the back of a figure
of a lion. The god was presented with the royal insignia and
with numerous amulets, his lips were touched with milk and
long hymns were sung for the protection of the god and his
house, the ground on which he stood, the bed on which he
slept and the air he breathed, and the spells for the protection
of the divine body were recited.
When all these ceremonies had been completed, it was time
for the final phase, the Banquet. For this purpose the pro
cession formed again and returned to the Temple of the Sacred
Falcon. There an elaborate Grace before Meat was sung s
while the king presented choice meats to the falcon, the cut-up
pieces of flesh symbolizing the destruction of the enemies of
the god and the king.4 The actual banquet is represented by
a scene entitled Burning myrrh. Bringing the god to his meat.5
As in the daily service (see above, p. 180), the offering of
myrrh symbolized an actual meal, the accompanying formula
telling us that The scent of myrrh is for thy nose, it fills thy nostrilst
thy heart receives the meat-portions on its scent.9
The Banquet concluded the official ceremonies. While the
Sacred Falcon remained in his temple, Horus was carried back
to his shrine in the Sanctuary of the main temple, and the
populace gave themselves up to merriment and feasting.
The striking parallelism between these rites and our modern
coronation ceremony needs no elaboration. One further point,
1 E. xiv. PI. 553.
2 The reliefs actually depict the Sacred Falcon in front of Horus, but it is
perhaps better to imagine them seated side by side.
3 A. M. Blackman, "The King of Egypt's Grace Before Meat", JEA. 31,
57-73.
« JEA. 31, 72. 5 £. vi. 305, 2. • E. vi. 305, 3-4.
however, requires brief comment. It must be stressed that
throughout these ceremonies there is complete identity between
the Sacred Falcon, Horus the Behdetite and the Pharaoh.
The festival was very much more than just the selection and
coronation of a Sacred Falcon, it was also the annual renewal
of the coronation of the reigning king. The first day of the
First Month of Winter, the first day of the festival, is named in
the calendar as the day of the New Year Feast of Horus the
Behdetite.1 The significance of this is, as Gardiner demon
strated in his review of Frazer's Adonis, Attis, Osiris* that
this day follows immediately after the great Osirian festivals
of the fourth month of the year. On the last day of that month
there took place both the resurrection of Osiris, as " a dead
king recalled in the tomb to a semblance of his former life ",
and his interment. On the following day, the first day of the
fifth month, his son Horus assumed the kingship. Hence this
is the date that was apparently considered fitting for the
accession of any Pharaoh, and that was also the conventional
date for the Serf-festival. It is these facts that explain the
significance of the date and nature of the Coronation of the
Sacred Falcon.
The third great annual festival which we have to describe
was the Festival of Victory, celebrated on five successive days
beginning with the twenty-first day of the Second Month of
Winter (the sixth month of the year). Unlike the other festivals
we are describing, no detailed account of the various ceremonies
has come down to us. The long texts specially connected
with the festival are of a special type and could not have included
all the rites, and it is a matter for speculation what other
ceremonies were performed.
The main texts concerned with the festival are preserved
on the first and second registers of the inner surface of the
western enclosure wall. They are clearly defined and separated
from all other scenes on that wall by being given in reverse
order.3 In the first register is the text of what may conveniently
1 E. v. 399, 7. * JEA. 2, 121-6, especially pp. 122-4.

3 See Chassinat's observations, E. vi. 55-6, 104.
EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 193
be called a Sacred Drama. 1 In the second register is the text
generally known as the Legend of the Winged Disk,2 followed
by a shorter text whose title refers to the presentation of a
beverage composed of grapes and water. 3
The exact nature of the texts in the first register is a matter
of dispute. In our original study Professor Blackman and I
presented it as a drama consisting of a Prologue, three acts and
an Epilogue.4 This, however, has been disputed by Drioton,5
who denies that the texts are really dramatic, and claims that
in reality they embody two versions of an ancient drama con
cerned with the victory of Horus, which, with some additional
material, have been amalgamated to form a series of hymns
for liturgical use. Alliot,8 on the other hand, disputes both
these views, claiming that the text is no mystery or drama but
that it embodies a series of ritual actions. These divergent
opinions cannot be discussed here in detail. Since Alliot's
final study has not yet appeared, detailed criticism of his views
would be premature and unfair, but his case does not appear
to be proved, it does not seem to consider all the evidence,
and he can hardly be correct in including ceremonies from the
Festival of Sokaris. Drioton's study is one of the most in
genious and brilliant that has appeared for many a day, but the
picture it presents is, I believe, purely fictitious. That the
text contains earlier material is obvious, but the philological
grounds for the isolation of the two postulated earlier dramas
(two words that occur nine times in some 350 lines of printed
text) are not only quite inadequate for their purpose but
demonstrably incorrect. Other grave objections could also be
raised to Drioton's view. In the following account, therefore,
I adhere to the view that the text in the first register is, in the
1 £. vi. 60, 6-90; xiil. Pis. 494-514.

2 E. vi. 108,15-132, 5; xiii. Pis. 518-33.
3 £. vi. 132, 7-136,9; xiii. Pis. 534,535.
4 A. M. Blackman and H. W. Fairman, The Myth of Horus at Edfu, II: " The
Triumph of Horus over his Enemies : A Sacred Drama ", JEA. 28, 32-8 ; 29,
2-36; 30,5-22.
6 E. Drioton, " Le texte dramatique d'Edfou ", Cahiers des Annales de
Service des Antiquites de VEgypte, no. 11, Cairo, 1948.
8 Revue de I'Histoire des Religions, 137, 95-103.
13
form that has survived on the wall of the temple, that of a
sacred drama.
Since the Sacred Drama is found in the first register, it
would seem certain that it must have been enacted earlier in
the day than the scenes of the second register. What preceded
it we do not know, but undoubtedly the statue of Horus must
have been brought from the Sanctuary to the Sacred Lake, on
the edge of which there must almost certainly have been a
small kiosk. The action of the play took place partly beside
the lake and partly on its waters, in the presence of priests and
a large concourse of the faithful who acted as chorus. The
chief participants were the king, a Lector, priests who imper
sonated the gods, and a chorus. There was little action or
real acting, the important point being the ranting or declaiming
of set speeches with the minimum of formal, stilted gestures;
there is little " drama" in our sense of the word, and no
characterization. To us it appears as rather dull stuff, enlivened
by a few passages of genuine literary merit, but then it was not
written for us or for people with our ideas. But to the Egyptian
beholders the words and setting, and above all the underlying
religious and political ideas, made it real, dramatic, exciting,
and intensely significant.
The Prologue sets the tone of the drama with its praise of
the king and its statement: Here begins the bringing to pass
of the triumph of Horus over his enemies. 1 Act One, divided
into five scenes, is the Ritual of the Sacred Harpoon: ten
harpoons, accompanied by appropriate words and gestures, are
in turn implanted in a figure of a hippopotamus. The two
scenes of Act Two are concerned with rejoicing over the
victory : in the first scene Horus, seated in his galley, and the
young harpooners are invoked; in the second scene the people
rejoice over Horus crowned and invested with the insignia
of kingship. Act Three, the celebration of the victory, con
sists of two versions of the dismemberment of Seth, separated
by an Interlude. Finally, the Epilogue declares that Horus
is triumphant and that the enemies of the gods and the king
are overthrown.
l E.vi.6],2.
EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 195
It is significant that the play begins and ends with the king.
The dramatic enactment of the victory of Horns, the formal
statement of the triumph of Horus and the king, made certain
that the enemies of Pharaoh were overthrown and destroyed
and thus ensured that for another year Pharaoh, his people,
and the whole land of Egypt had victory and peace.
The main text of the second register, the Legend of the
Winged Disk,1 is no ordinary liturgical or ritual text, still less
is it dramatic. It takes the form of a long account of the
fighting between Horus and Seth, interspersed with numerous
and tedious puns on the various actions and on the places
mentioned. Its climax is the statement that the Winged Disk
is placed in every temple throughout Egypt, and the text goes
on to explain that the Winged Disk is Horus the Behdetite,
who is pre-eminent in Upper and Lower Egypt, who over
throws the enemy, and in whose name the living and dead are
inscribed. The text ends with a piece of pure magic : a winged
beetle in writing is to be placed on the breast of the king on
the day of trouble, the appropriate spell is to be recited, and
as a result the king will not be afraid and his enemies will be
destroyed immediately. It is clear that the text as a whole is
designed to assert and prove the claim of Horus the Behdetite
to the overlordship of Egypt, and to emphasize that he can
and does protect the king. It is significant that the whole legend
takes the form of a historical document and commences with
a mythological date : In the year 363 of the King of Upper and
Lower Egypt Re-Harakhte. This looks remarkably like one of
those appeals to historical precedent, real or fictitious, of which
the Egyptians were so fond, and I would suggest that this
section of the festival was conceived as a supplement to the
Sacred Drama, that it consisted of the recitation of the history
of the victories of Horus, which were thus presented in the
guise of a historical document to prove his claim to supremacy.
The final section of the text is ostensibly connected with
an offering of drink, and of oryx, ibex, and long-horned and
short-horned cattle which, as we know, symbolize the enemies
*H. W. Fairman, "The Myth of Horus at Edfu, I: The Legend of the
Winged Disk "JEA. 21, 26-36.
of the king and the gods. It directly continues the concluding
passages of the Legend of the Winged Disk by elaborating the
spell which is to be recited over the winged beetle placed round
the neck of the king, whose enemies are immediately brought
to nought, in conformity with one of the fundamental principles
of Egyptian magic, by the bare assertion that they are afraid
and powerless. This is followed by the statement that the
defeated enemies are despatched to the four points of the
compass, there to form the different races of mankind, apart,
of course, from the Egyptians, and by a further recital, with
the inevitable puns, of further incidents in the wars of Horus.
The whole text appears to be an appendix to the Legend of
the Winged Disk, and its basic purpose seems to be that of a
final, magical, and protective rite at the end of the ceremony.
The Sacred Marriage,1 the last of the great festivals that
we have to discuss, is in many ways the most interesting. It
was essentially a popular festival, to a far greater extent than
any of those already described; a very large proportion of the
ceremonies took place outside the temple area and, in varying
degree, affected and interested the whole of Upper Egypt
from Denderah to Elephantine.
The festival was celebrated at Edfu from the day of the
New Moon in the Third Month of Summer (the eleventh
month of the year) and ended on the day of the Full Moon,
a total of fifteen days. The preliminaries actually commenced,
however, fourteen days earlier 2 at Denderah when Hathor
boarded her great river-going processional barge and was towed
up-stream towards Edfu in the midst of a great fleet of boats
bearing priests and the faithful. The procession stopped on
the way at Thebes, where Hathor visited Mut of Asheru, Komir,
between Esneh and Hierakonpolis, and Hierakonpolis, opposite
the modern El Kab. It is possible, though not stated, that
there may have been stops at other places, and it is easy to
imagine that, as the glittering procession made its slow progress,
excited crowds danced and rejoiced on the river banks. The
period of the festival was a time of peace and gladness: The
1 E. v. 29, 9-33, 16; 124, &-129, 11; 130, 17-136, 4; 34,2-35, 3.
2 E.vii.26,9-12.
EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 197
inhabitants of Edfu are in jubilation, shouting for joy to the height
of heaven. . . . The great water-flood, it has stilled its raging,
the Nile rejoices [pacifying?] them that are in the water, while
the crocodiles are all quieted and none are able to dart up.1
The procession arrived at the quay to the north of Edfu
at the eighth hour of the day on the day of the New Moon
and was there met by Horus of Behdet and his following and a
deputation from Elephantine. Hathor disembarked and pro
ceeded with Horus to an adjacent temple and there various
ceremonies were performed, the most important being the
Opening of the Mouth, an offering of the first fruits of the
field, the presentation of the field, the driving of the calves,
the offering of Truth and numerous food-offerings. The gods
then boarded their ships, and accompanied by the Mayors of
Komir, Hierakonpolis and Elephantine and a host of pilgrims,
set sail for Edfu, presumably by a canal joining the river at
Etbo to a place in the immediate neighbourhood of the temple.
On the way the procession stopped at a place called the Mound
of Geb where further ceremonies took place, including another
Opening of the Mouth, the celebration of the ritual and rich
offerings and burnt offerings, and then pursued its way. Eventu
ally the boats arrived at Edfu, and Horus and his bride entered
the enclosure by the eastern door in the brick enclosure wall
and so across the enclosure and into the Forecourt (1) by the
door in its south-eastern corner (B). This concluded the cere
monies of the day, this was the marriage proper, and Horus
and Hathor spent their marriage night in the Sanctuary.
The next morning, the second day of the lunar month,
there was a subtle change: the emphasis is no longer on the
marriage, which is not mentioned, but instead we read of a
fourteen-day Festival of Behdet which commenced on this
day. The procession formed up, at its head the five sacred
lances, all the visiting deputations, priests and doubtless most
of the townsfolk followed, and all made their way from the
temple, across the desert to the Burial-ground of Behdet, some
distance to the west or south-west. There they stopped at
^.v. 30,3-6.
the Upper Temple, and in addition to offerings of bread, beer,
bulls, birds, and every good thing, many burnt sacrifices, and the
singing of hymns, there were performed the making oblation to
the Divine Souls, and the ceremony of treading the grave.
After this, everybody gave themselves up to merrymaking for
a time. The procession then departed from the Upper Temple
and proceeded to the Hall of the House of Life, a building
whose position is not known but which was probably a de
pendency of the main temple. Here a series of exceedingly
complicated rites was performed, the chief items being the
slaughter of a red goat and a red ox,1 profuse offerings of every
description, the despatching of four geese to the compass
points, each bearing to the gods of the appropriate quarter
the message: The King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Horus the
Behdetite, great god, lord of the sky, has possessed himself of the
White Crown and has assumed the Red Crown, and then a priest
called " His-beloved-son " took a bow and shot to south, north,
west, and east. The nature of the subsequent rites changed
and became more prophylactic. A hippopotamus of red wax
inscribed with the names of enemies was brought, the enemies
of the king were entered on a clean sheet of papyrus, a
hippopotamus of sand was made and every harmful thing was
done to them,2 and afterwards there were performed the cere
monies of trampling on the fishes, the treading down and tramp
ling on the foe by the king, and the smiting with the sword.
These were then followed by an interpretation, which clearly
explains that all these were the symbols of the king's enemies
who were thus destroyed. By this time it was evening; after
drinking in the divine presence, the gods retired, and the people
gave themselves up to a night of merriment around the temple.
The ceremonies of the second to fourth day of the Festival
of Behdet were approximately similar to those of the first day,
except that on each the main ceremonies at the Upper Temple
took place at a different " mound ". For the fifth to thirteenth
day of the festival the details are meagre in the extreme, but as
far as can be gathered the celebrations were on a vastly reduced
1 Red is the evil, unlucky colour, the colour of Seth. 2 £. v. 134, 2.

EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 199
scale, there does not appear to have been any procession to
the necropolis, and the ceremonies all appear to have been per
formed within the temple. Finally, on the day of the Full
Moon, the fourteenth day of the Festival of Behdet, it was
time for Hathor to return to Denderah. In the same state
as at her arrival she was escorted to the temple or chapel at
Etbo and there elaborate farewell ceremonies took place. The
Opening of the Mouth was performed, offerings were made,
the crew of the ship of Horus marched past, the ceremony of
treading the grave was performed yet again, the adoration of
the sacred harpoon was recited, and finally Hathor boarded her
barge and slowly sailed away northward to Denderah.
The above description is the merest outline of the extremely
complicated rites which the texts give us in no little detail.
There emerge, however, a number of points of the greatest
interest and significance. It is clear that the festival was not
a unity. The obvious division is into two main parts : the
Sacred Marriage on the first day, or more precisely the after
noon and evening of the first day, and the subsequent Festival
of Behdet, itself divided into two sections of four and ten days.
But there is more to it than this. The striking feature of
the ceremonies is the emphasis throughout on ceremonies, all
of which, as is now well known, were essentially rites of the
harvest festival: the offering of the first fruits, the offering of
the field, the driving of the calves,1 the treading of the grave,
and the despatching of the geese to the compass points are all
well-known features of the harvest festival. Even the trampling
of the enemy under-foot is clearly to be equated with the
scattering of grain and trampling it under-foot at the harvest
festival. But here a curious point emerges. We are accustomed
to regard the harvest festival as a ceremony immediately pre
ceding the reaping of the crops and its traditional date is in the
First Month of Summer.2 Even when the year and calendar
were in order, the third month of summer would have covered
1 A. M. Blackman and H. W. Fairman, " The Significance of the Ceremony
' Hwt Bbsw ' in the Temple of Horus at Edfu ", JEA. 35, 98-112 ; 36, 63-81.
2 H. Gauthier, Les fftes du dieu Min ; see also H. Frankfort, Kingship and
the Gods, pp. 188-90.
our May to June, long after harvest which in Upper Egypt is
in April, but at the time that our texts of the festival were
engraved, the Third Month of Summer would have been even
later in the year, probably in July to August, months after
harvesting and threshing, when the Nile was already rising.
In my mind there can be no possible doubt that the Sacred
Marriage at Edfu was essentially a harvest festival, in reality
that of the First Month of Summer, but a harvest festival per
formed out of due season.
But there is even more. It is well known that these Egyptian
harvest festivals were speedily Osirianized and that they became
funerary festivals. This also is markedly obvious at Edfu. The
visit to the Upper Temple was to a sacred necropolis, where
were buried the Divine Souls to whom offerings were made
during the festival. These Divine Souls were presumably the
ancestral gods of Edfu. A big series of texts l deals almost
exclusively with these gods and their connection with this
particular festival; they tell us that they were nine in number,
and name them, and they tell us that the annual visit of Horus
and Hathor brought these dead gods life and light.
It is thus evident that the Sacred Marriage is a very complex
festival. The marriage itself is an intimate part of the harvest,
for it ensured fertility and an abundant crop. At Edfu it is
combined unmistakably with harvest rites and with the cult
of the ancestors. It is the perfect Egyptian example of the
anthropologist's ideal pattern of sacred marriage, linked with
harvest rites and the cult of the ancestors.
We have now hastily surveyed a year's activity in the temple
of Edfu. It is natural to ask ourselves what was the attitude
of the priesthood to these manifold activities. In what spirit
did they approach their duties ? Egyptian temple inscriptions
are never personal, they never inform us in set terms of the
feelings and reactions of the priests, but some of the doors of
the temple bear remarkable addresses to the priests entering
the temple that throw light on the question. All these have
*£. i. 173, 3-174, 7; 382, 4-15; ii. 51, 3-52, 8; iv. 102, 17-103, 13; 239,
13-241,14; v. 61,17-63,16; 160,12-162,6; vii. 118,4-119,8; 279,16-281,2;
Hi. 323, 5-12.
EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 201
been collected and translated by Alliot,1 and two extracts will
have to suffice. On one door, for instance, we read: Everyone
who enters by this door, beware of entering in impurity, for God
loves purity more than millions of possessions, more than hundreds
of thousands of fine gold. His food is Truth, he is satisfied with
it. His heart is pleased with great purity.2 Or again: Turn
your faces to this temple in which His Majesty has placed you.
He sails in the heavens while seeing what is done therein, and he
is pleased therewith according to its exactitude. Do not come in
in sin, do not enter in impurity, do not utter falsehood in his house,
do not covet things, do not slander, do not accept bribes, do not
be partial as between a poor man and a great, do not add to the
weight and measure, but (rather) reduce them; do not tamper
with the corn-measure; do not harm the requirements of the
Eye~of-Re (i.e. the divine offerings); do not reveal what you
have seen in the mysteries of the temples; do not stretch forth
the arm to the things of his house, do not venture to seize his property.
Beware, moreover, of saying " Fool! " in the heart, for one lives
on the bounty of the gods, and " bounty " one calls what comes
forth from the altar after the reversion of the divine offerings
upon them. Behold, whether he sails in the heavens, or whether
he traverses the Netherworld, his eyes are firmly fixed upon his
possessions in their (proper) places.3 The cynic may comment
that if such exhortations were necessary, the priests must have
fallen very far short of the ideal. It can be admitted that there
must have been bad priests, but far more important than such
considerations is the ideal. These texts set before the priests
a goal and a high ideal. We shall not go far wrong if we assume
that there were many priests who in sincerity and humility
attempted to follow this path.
For the people in general there is little to be said. It is
clear that for the majority of the people there was no direct
contact with either daily service or with many festivals, and no
participation in any intimate or sacred rites. On certain
occasions, such as the Coronation of the Sacred Falcon and the
1 Alliot, Culte, i. 181-95. Similar texts exist at Denderah and Kom Ombo,
MD. i. 15 c ; 16 a ; De Morgan, Ombos, ii. 245, no. 878.
2 E.vi.349,4-6. 3 E.iii.360,361,5.
Festival of Victory, it is reasonable to assume that some of the
provincial notables and probably also the members of the lay
fraternities of the temple were admitted to the enclosure and
perhaps even to the Forecourt, but no one other than a priest
ever penetrated more deeply into the temple. The ordinary
man in the street had to content himself with the knowledge
that these secret rites were for his ultimate benefit. He could,
above all, join in the more public festivals and processions, and
he could always avail himself of the free meals and rejoicings
that always accompanied such festivals. That he did so with
zest and gusto is recorded for us at more than one point on the
temple walls. The following extract from a description of
popular rejoicing at a festival is typical: He stands opposite
his city, he sees his temple enriched with all its provisions, his
city in festivity, its heart rejoicing, all its lanes in gladness. . . .
Its provisions are more numerous than the sand of the shore: all
kinds of bread are in it as numerous as grains of sand, long-homed
and short-horned oxen are more numerous than grasshoppers :
A bird pool for birds is in it. Gazelle and oryx and ibex and their
like, the smoke of them, it reaches heaven ; the Green Horus-eye
(wine) runs in its quarters like the inundation flowing forth from
the Two Caverns; myrrh is on the brazier together with incense,
it is smelled a mile away. It (the city) is bestrewn with faience,
gleaming with natron, garlanded with flowers and fresh herbs.
The prophets and the fathers-of-the-god are clad in fine linen,
the king's suite are arrayed in their regalia, its youths are drunk,
its citizens are glad, its young maidens are beautiful to see, re-
joicing is round about it, festivity is in all its quarters, there is
no sleep in it until dawn.1
We must not, however, take away the impression that the
common man's only contact with his god and his temple was
one of orgy and self-indulgence. Though not admitted to the
temple, to many the temple, its services and its god were real,
and were needed. A series of texts on the south gate of the
temenos shows us that this belief in the god did exist, and that
provision was made for the needs of the people to pray and
l E.iv.3,\-&.
EGYPTIAN TEMPLE 203
make their offerings. There we read that it is the standing-
place of those who have and those who have not in order to pray
for life from the Lord of Life; l or The place for hearing the
petitions of all petitioners in order to judge Truth from Falsehood.
It is the great place for championing the poor in order to rescue
them from the strong ; 2 or again The place outside which offerings
are made at all times consisting of all the produce of the servants.3
The texts just quoted demonstrate that immediately outside
the south gate of the temenos the ordinary people were able
at all times to come to pray, to offer petitions, to appeal for
justice, and to lay their own humble offerings before the god.
The temple was a living entity, the varied activities that took
place within it were for the common good, and the man in
the street was not blind to his god but in his humble way saw
in him a help and a support.
*£. viii. 162,16-17. 2 £. viii. 163,1-2. 3 £. viii. 164,11.

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WORSHIP AND FESTIVALS IN AN

M OST of the many temples of Pharaonic Egypt now lie

THE TEMPLE OF EDFU

1 JEA. 32, 90 ; see also ibid. pp. 84, 85.

1 Alliot, Culte, i. 303-433. 2 E. v. 397, 6.

*E.vi.93, 11. 2 £.vi. 102,9.

1 E. v. 399, 7. * JEA. 2, 121-6, especially pp. 122-4.

1 £. vi. 60, 6-90; xiil. Pis. 494-514.

1 Red is the evil, unlucky colour, the colour of Seth. 2 £. v. 134, 2.

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