No. 9

Philae

On land Egypt & Africa

The central sanctuary is the Temple of Isis. — Holger Uwe Schmitt, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

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Where: Egypt
Built by: Ptolemaic Egypt
Era: 380 BCE onward
Known for: The last place hieroglyphs were carved, in 394 CE.
How it ended: The temple closed around 537 CE and was moved to a new island in the 1970s.

A panoramic view at the Philae temple in Egypt. Picture taken by me, Benjamin Franck, on Nov 2005. — PtitBen at English Wikipedia, Public domain

Slightly edited sketch of a relief showing pilgrimgs and priests from the so-called "Ethiopian" chamber of the temple of Philae, Lower Nubia. Dated to late Antiquity. — Francis L. Griffith, Public domain

Copt altar, Isis Temple, Philae Island, Egypt — Rémih, CC BY-SA 3.0

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Background

The Philae temple complex (; Ancient Greek: Φιλαί or Φιλή and Πιλάχ, Arabic: فيلة Egyptian Arabic: [fiːlæ], Egyptian: p3-jw-rķ' or 'pA-jw-rq; Coptic: ⲡⲓⲗⲁⲕ, ⲡⲓⲗⲁⲕϩ, Coptic pronunciation: [ˈpilɑk, ˈpilɑkh]) is an island-based temple complex in the reservoir of the Aswan Low Dam, downstream of the Aswan Dam and Lake Nasser, Egypt in Africa.

Originally, the temple complex was located on Philae Island, near the expansive First Cataract of the Nile in Upper Egypt. These rapids and the surrounding area have been variously flooded since the initial construction of the Aswan Low Dam in 1902. With the construction of the modern dam in Aswan (1960–1970) a few kilometers upstream, this temple was going to face total flooding and was initially omitted from the International Campaign to Save the Monuments of Nubia project to rescue all temples in the area and avoid what had previously happened with the Aswan Low Dam and the Temple of Philae. However, the importance of the monumental complex, formerly known as the Pearl of the Nile, remembered for the description by Pierre Loti in his literary work, La Mort de Philae (1909), led to further commitment from UNESCO member countries, which launched an international competition to save the monuments of Philae.

The solution proposed by a consortium of Egyptian designers prevailed, which involved dismantling the ninety-five monumental structures on the island and reconstructing them at a higher site, 12.40 meters above the original location, by leveling the nearby islet of Agilkia. The contract for the execution of the works was awarded by UNESCO in 1974, through the Egyptian Ministry of Culture, to two Italian companies: Condotte Acque from Rome and Mazzi Estero from Verona, later joined as Condotte-Mazzi Estero S.p.A. The two companies were tasked with documenting, dismantling, and restoring the Philae monumental complex, as well as transferring and reconstructing it at the new site on Agilkia Island. A third Egyptian company, the High Dam Company, which had previously built the Aswan High Dam, was assigned the task of draining the original monumental site and preparing the reinforced concrete foundations and landscaping of Agilkia. The Italian architect Giovanni Joppolo was entrusted with the supervision and responsibility for all operations under the Italian consortium's jurisdiction. The whole operation lasted from 1977 t

Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.