Deir el-Bahri

Deir el-Bahri (Arabic دير البحري dayr al-baḥrī, literally meaning, “The Northern Monastery”) is a complex of mortuary temples and tombs located on the west bank of the Nile, opposite the city of Luxor, Egypt. The first monument built at the site was the mortuary temple of Mentuhotep II of the Eleventh dynasty. During the Eighteenth dynasty, Amenhotep I and Hatshepsut also built extensively at the site. On November 17, 1997 62 people were massacred by Al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya at the site.

Mortuary Temple of Mentuhotep II (Akh Sut Nebhepetra)

The first king of the Middle Kingdom, Nebhepetre Mentuhotep (known as Mentuhotep I or II in the lists of kings) built a combined mortuary temple and tomb complex in the cliffs at Deir el-Bahri.

The temple is called Akh Sut Nebhepetra, "Splendid are the places of Nebhepetre" and was discovered in the 1860s. The temple was divided into two parts, the front (nearest the causeway to the Valley temple) being dedicated to Montu-Ra, and the rear serving as the cult center for the Pharaoh. It is made of limestone and sandstone, and consists of a colonnaded ramp, leading up to a flattened terrace, which originally had a small 'structure' on it (probably a pyramid or mound). This structure was surrounded by a pillared hall (see image).

Behind this structure was an open court, then a hypo-style hall, and then the sanctuary and tomb of the Pharaoh himself. The shaft and subsequent tunnel descend for 150 meters and end in a burial chamber 45 meters below the court. The chamber held a shrine, which once held the wooden coffin of Nebhepetre Mentuhotep. A great tree-lined court was reached by means of the processional causeway, leading up from the valley temple. Beneath the court, a deep shaft was cut which led to unfinished rooms believed to have originally been intended as the king’s tomb. A wrapped image of the pharaoh was discovered in this area by Howard Carter. The temple complex also held six mortuary chapels and shaft tombs built for the pharaoh's wives and family.

Mortuary Temple of Hatshepsut (Djeser-Djeseru)

The focal point of this complex is the Djeser-Djeseru meaning "the Sublime of Sublimes", a colonnaded structure, which was designed and implemented by Senemut, royal stewart and architect of Hatshepsut (and commonly believed to be her consort), to serve for her posthumous worship and to honor the glory of Amun and the other gods. Djeser-Djeseru sits atop a series of colonnaded terraces, reached by long ramps, that once were graced with gardens and is built into a cliff face that rises sharply above it. It is 97 feet tall.

Mortuary Temple of Thutmoses III

Thutmose III built a temple complex here, dedicated to Amun. Discovered in 1961, it is believed to have been used during the Feast of the Valley. Not much is known about the complex, as it was abandoned after sustaining severe damage during a land-slide in the latter 20th Dynasty. After that time it was used a source of building materials and in Christian times became the site of a Coptic cemetery.

Deir el-Bahri Cache

An 11th Dynasty shaft tomb located at the southern end of the complex contained a cache of forty royal mummies, moved there from the Valley of the Kings. The bodies had been placed there by 21st Dynasty priests most likely to prevent further desecration and looting. In the cache were found the mummies of Ahmose I, along with the 18th and 19th dynasty leaders Amenhotep I, Thutmose I, Thutmose II, Thutmose III, Ramesses I, Seti I, Ramesses II, and Ramesses IX. In a separate room were found 21st dynasty pharaohs Pinedjum I, Pinedjum II, and Siamun. Later on, a cache of 153 reburied mummies of the priests themselves were also found in a tomb at the site.

Private Tombs

Private tombs dating from the Middle Kingdom through the Ptolemaic period can be found here. The two most notable private tombs at Deir el-Bahri are those of Meketra, which contain many painted wooden funerary models from the Middle Kingdom, and even the first recorded human-headed canopic jar, and the tomb of Senmut. Senmut's tomb was vandalized in antiquity, but some of the relief artwork is still intact. It was meant to be a very large tomb and the corridors are over 100 yards long; however, it was never finished and Senmut was not interred there. He has another tomb, not far from Deir el-Bahri, where his body may have been placed, but it, too, was vandalized and robbed.

External links

Egypt Index at Bluffton University
The Cache at Deir el-Bahri – Archaeology at About.com
The Temple Djeser djeseru
The Temple of Deir el Bahri
Deir el-Bahri by Marie Parsons

References

Mertz, Barbara (1964). "Temples, Tombs and Hieroglyphs". New York: Coward-McCann. ISBN 0872262235

Theban Necropolis

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