Temple of Kom Ombu

Like Japan, Egypt does not lack in temples. Everywhere you look there is a temple to explore, built to one god or another by a pharaoh working to outdo his predecessor. You had to make sure you did more to appease the various gods.

These two temples were built to honor the Egyptian Gods Horus, the Falcon God, and Sobek, the God of fertility, represented by the crocodile. The columns are carved with intricate pictures and hieroglyphics. The columns in the temple are intricately carved with scenes to honor the two gods and at one time, were undoubtedly brightly painted (you can see bits of it here and there.Obviously Sobek has granted favors upon the young female behind him. 

The hypostyle hall (large hall area with lots of huge pillars) has both lotus shapes and palm trees – one style on each side. Everything was duplicated exactly – the rooms, sanctuaries, alters and chambers are identical for each of the two gods. The inner sanctuary in the back was probably reserved just for the high priest and probably the pharaoh but other areas would be open to others.

There are walls full of descriptions of daily life as well as a hieroglyphic calendare including the days and months with phases of the sun and moon. There are also walls with some pretty advanced medical instruments including clamps, scissors scalpels, bone cutters and forceps – pretty remarkable considering it was probably built right about 2 BC.