Customer Reviews

Karnak: Evolution of a Temple

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This is a superb work of scholarship, and a must-read for everyone with a serious interest in Egyptian history or archaeology. The operative word, however, is "serious," because this is no accessible coffee-table book; it's densely packed with archaeological information, and although it's well written, it makes no concessions to the casual reader. You will need to hold the book in one hand, your computer mouse in the other, and keep Google Images or Flickr.com on the computer screen in front of you, because you won't find many illustrations in the book. Those few that you will find are skimpy black-and-white images. This is certainly not the author's fault; the publishers probably limited the number of illustrations that could be printed in order to keep the cost of the volume under control. A book fully illustrated with good color photos would probably cost -- shudder, don't ask. Still, reading it is worth the effort, even if you do have to Google the images yourself.

As Blyth states in her final sentence, the temple of Karnak encompasses all of Egyptian history within its boundaries, and that is not an exaggeration. In many respects, it was the cult of Amun-Ra at Karnak, established by Senusret I in the Middle Kingdom, that created Egypt as a nation-state in our sense of the word, with a unified national religion. Practically every king from then onward who lived long enough needed to put his mark on the sacred place, at least with valuable gifts, often by adding to the existing buildings with new halls, pylons, chapels, etc. etc. When we see the magnificent ruins of this structure nowadays, we can still forget that at one time it was vividly colorful. The columns were not only painted but often gilded and inlaid with precious stones, pennants flew from enormous masts over every pylon, and the whole complex was surrounded by gardens that supplied incense and food offerings for the cult. The illustrations may be skimpy, but the temple as Blyth recreates it is a feast for the mind's eye.