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Introduction of Ancient Egypt

• Ancient Egyptian architecture is the architecture of ancient Egypt,

one of the most influential civilizations throughout history, which
developed a vast array of diverse structures and great architectural
monuments along the Nile.
• The architecture was based upon perpendicular structures and
inclined planes since there was no structural assistance except the
strength and balance of the structure itself. For this reason, the
square and the plumb-line were very important tools.

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• Ancient Egypt was divided into 2
regions: Upper & Lower Egypt.
• Lower (Northern) Egypt consisted of
the Nile River’s delta made by the river
as it empties into the Mediterranean.
• Upper Egypt was the long, narrow strip
of ancient Egypt located south of the
Delta.

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Famous Architecture in Egypt

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Features

• The ancient Egyptians built their pyramids, tombs, temples and

palaces out of sun-baked mud brick and stone, the most durable of
all building materials.
• From the Old Kingdom onward, stone was generally reserved for
tombs and temples, while bricks were used even for royal palaces,
fortresses, the walls of temple precincts and towns, and for
subsidiary buildings in temple complexes
• Although earthquakes, wars and the forces of nature have taken
their toll, the remains of Egypt’s monumental architectural
achievements are visible across the land.
• These building projects took a high degree of architectural and
engineering skill, and the organization of a large workforce
consisting of highly trained craftsmen and laborers. 10
• Apart from the pyramids, Egyptian buildings were decorated with
paintings, carved stone images, hieroglyphs and three-dimensional
statues.
• The art tells the story of the pharaohs, the gods, the common
people and the natural world of plants, birds and animals.
• The beauty and grandeur of these sites are beyond compare.
• How the ancient Egyptians were able to construct these massive
structures using primitive tools is still a mystery.

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The History

• During the Old Kingdom, Egyptians believed that only the souls of
kings went on to enjoy life with the gods.
• To encourage the soul to return to the body, the body was preserved
and a statuette in the likeness of the deceased was placed in the
tomb.

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Timeline of Ancient Egypt

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Egyptian Society

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Egypt Religion

• Belief that many gods and goddesses ruled

the world and the afterlife.
Amon-Re: sun god
Osiris: god of the underworld and of the
Nile
Isis: goddess of magic
Horus: sky god
• The Pharaoh was believed to be a god as
well as a ruler
• Belief in eternal life after death – relied on
the Book of the Dead
• Practiced mummification to preserve body 15
for use in the next life.
The Book of the Death
• Collection of spells, hymns, prayers intended to secure a safe
passage to the underworld for the deceased.

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• In the early part of the Old Kingdom, the Egyptians built mainly
mastabas, a kind of tomb with a flat roof like a house. Then
throughout most of the Old Kingdom, the Egyptians built the
pyramid tombs which are now so famous. Of course they also built
smaller buildings like houses and butcher shops.
• In the Middle Kingdom, the mastaba tomb came back again,
although in a more elaborate form for the Pharaohs. None of them
built any more pyramids.
• Then in the New Kingdom there was a lot of building that was not
tombs: temples for the gods especially, but also palaces for the
Pharaohs. The columns mainly on the inside of the walls, similar to
buildings from Shang Dynasty China.
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• During the Old Kingdom (about 2650-2150
B.C), Egypt consisted of the Nile Delta
region and the area along the Nile River
south to Elephantine.
• During the Middle Kingdom (about 1975-
1640 B.C.), Egypt extended its control
along the river south to Buhen.
• During the New Kingdom (about 1539-
1075 B.C.), the boundaries of Egypt grew
to include much of the desert area
surrounding the Nile, Nubia to the south,
and the eastern coast of the
Mediterranean Sea.
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Ancient Egypt Architecture

• Architecture was influenced by 2 factors:

i. Belief in life after death tombs
ii. Believe in the pagan gods temples

• 3 types of Tombs -:
i. mastaba
ii. pyramids
iii. rock hewn

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Building Materials

Mud –unbaked mud brick, sun baked mud brick, kiln dried brick
• Loamy Nile mud mixed with straw resulted in surprisingly strong
bricks.
• Used for smaller buildings or in combination with stone for large
buildings.
• Also used for royal palaces, fortresses, walls of temple complexes &
towns & for subsidiary buildings within a temple complex.
• In every location during a building project brick moulds of equal size
were used, which were between about 45 to 30 cm in length and 20
to 15 cm in width.
• As long as groundwater did not dissolve their foundations and floods
did not reach them, well tended mud brick walls could stand for
generations. 21
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mud-brick walls

Dome of the Chapel of the Exodus

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STONE – granite, sandstone and limestone.
• Used for building temples & tombs.
• Most stone used was limestone which is relatively soft when freshly
quarried and can easily be shaped.
• Building with stone was without the use of mortar, so the stones
were carefully cut to fit precisely.
• Stone was used as short columns and lintels (beams).

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The most skilled artisans were the stone carvers

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Large blocks of limestone masonry at
the pyramids of Giza

Ancient Stone Carved Egyptian Hieroglyphics

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MORTAR
• Used a mixture of gypsum and quartz
with small amounts of lime when
working with stone.
• The mortar used for mud bricks was
basically the same material as that
from which the bricks themselves were
made, but generally no organic matter
was added.
• It was mixed shortly before being used
and was only applied between the
horizontal layers, and not to stick the
bricks together along their vertical
joints. 28
WOOD
• Doors and shutters were made of it and upper storey floors.
• The longest beams that could be cut from local wood were only
three to four metres long.
• If the ceiling was wider than that, it had to be supported with
wooden pillars.
• The only native trees easily available and with stems straight and
long enough to be used for this purpose were palm trees, whose
wood is not very strong.
• When a building was abandoned, all wooden and stone parts such
as doors, lintels etc. were removed to be reused somewhere else.
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Tools

• The foremen used measuring rods, strings, plumb-lines and set-

squares. The water-level was unknown, though its principle was
understood.
• Workmen had buckets and baskets to carry the mud, hoes for mixing
it with straw or chaff and standard sized wooden moulds.
Wheelbarrows were unknown and the dried bricks had to be
carried, for which a yoke was often used.
• Builders smoothed walls with floats of various sizes. There were big
floats for the rough first coat of plaster. They had a bevelled end for
working in corners. The facing coat was laid on with smaller and
smoother floats.

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Architecture Elements

Arches and Vaults

• Known at least since the 3rd dynasty, true arches were rarely used in
early Ancient Egypt. Only when the building material was mud bricks
and building corbelled vaults was impractical, were true arches
erected.

• In the 12th dynasty pyramid at Hawara a

brick arch almost a metre thick was
erected above the rock burial chamber and
passages, separating and supporting the
upper part of the pyramid consisting of
bricks laid in sand and a limestone
covering, which has completely
disappeared. 32
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Architraves
• Architraves (from Latin trabs, beam) are the main beams resting
across the tops of the columns.
• In ancient Egypt no attempts were made to cover pillared halls with
arches.
• In the temple symbolism the architraves were part of the heavens.

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Architraves

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Corbels
• Corbels were widely used in stone buildings.
• Corbelled arches continued to be constructed a long time after the
true arch had been invented.
• They can be found in pyramids and occasionally in temples.
• The use of corbelled instead of true arches limited the width that
could be spanned, but required less dressing of stones.

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• Corbels are overlapping arrangements
of bricks or stones in which each course
projects farther out than the course
below. By corbeling towards the center
from opposite sides of a planned space,
a meeting of the corbels can be
achieved, or they can be bridged by a
horizontal element, creating an
overhead enclosure of that space. The
resulting appearance resembles an arch,
but technically it is quite different.
Corbels are self-supporting during
construction and afterwards, while
arches require support (centering) 38
during construction.
• Post and lintel describes basic vertical and
horizontal construction elements. Two
vertical members supporting a horizontal
one - this is the simplest. The vertical is
also known as a column, the horizontal as
a beam.

• Arches can be round (Classical or

Moorish), or pointed (Gothic) as they leap
upward into space, and descend down to
the opposite side. Arches are composed of
wedge-shaped or tapered masonry units
with their narrow ends down and the
wider ends on top of the curve. Each unit
is known as a voussoir. The central or
lynchpin of the assembly is called the
keystone. It locks all the other members in
place. 39
Obelisk
• Monolithic square stone pillars ending in
a point.
• Obelisks were erected in honour of the
sun god Re, the oldest on a natural hill
north of Heliopolis.
• During the 5th Dynasty the obelisk
became the centre of the sun temple,
later they are to be found standing in
pairs by temple entrances.

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Pillars
• Pillars evolved into stone plants.
• Pillars were either free-standing or engaged, sometimes they were
purely ornamental, never more so than in the case of pillar reliefs
carved into walls.
• Pillars had also a symbolic role denoting stability and duration.
• New Kingdom papyriform pillars with closed or open flower
capitals were symbols for the sky crossed by the path of the sun: in
the early morning the flowers are still closed but then open with the
progress of the sun across the sky. They can be seen in the temples
at Luxor.
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Workmen polishing a monolithic column

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Engaged column
Saqqara
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Papyriform column
Hypostyle at Karnak
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Pylons
• Introduced at least as early as the Middle Kingdom, pylons were
towerlike structures flanking temple entrances reminiscent of the
mountains on the horizon between which the sun rose every
morning.
• They were often solid structures with their interiors filled with
rubble, but many enclosed rooms and stairways.
• The tops of the pylon ended often in cavetto cornices.
• Pylons were often decorated with painted reliefs depicting the
destruction of enemies of Egypt, reminding the temple visitors of
the power of the king.
• The number of pylons differed from temple to temple, many having
just one but the Amen temple at Karnak as many as ten. 45
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The Pylons at the entrance to the temples was of a
massive scale
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Fortresses
• The walls were, if not very strong at least of massive thickness and
higher than the portable ladders that could be built.
• The gates were specially protected.
• Wall tops have decayed completely, but according to drawings there
were cornices all around behind which the defenders could take
cover.
• The main rampart was surrounded by an outer wall of lesser height.

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Types of Architecture Buildings

• Ancient Egyptian city-dwellers lived surrounded by ramparts, and

even villages were at times walled in.

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Private Dwellings
• In the countryside houses had just one storey; and people
surrounded them and their courtyards with mud brick walls, in the
hope of preventing robbers from breaking in and stealing their
belongings.
• In towns, a large part of the houses had walled-in courtyards.
• Door jambs were let into stone lintels and thresholds, making
breaking down the doors more difficult.
• Windows were small and placed high up close to the ceiling, which
also improved ventilation.
• Walls were thick and often crenelated even if this was just for show.
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Crenelated wall

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Palace
• It was surrounded by walls, the main gates protected by massive
gate-houses.
• Along the outer walls there were storage rooms.
• The living quarters were at the centre of the whole complex, with
the doors opening into the inner courtyard which had to be reached
through another pair of pylons.
• Brick walls were at times plastered with gypsum.
• The view of a big structure shining brilliantly white in the Egyptian
sun light must have been impressive to the populace advertising the
grandeur of its inhabitants.
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Temples
• The temple complexes which frequently had extensive storage space
filled with the produce of the temple estates and the gifts of the
kings were well protected.
• The thickness of the brick wall lined with limestone around
Senusret's temple at Hotep Senusret (Kahun) for instance was about
12 metres. Its height must have been correspondingly great.
• When walls were built completely of stone, their thickness could be
reduced, but they were still quite massive.
• Most impressive were the huge pylons 'guarding' the main gates,
which became popular in the New Kingdom.
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Temple of Ramesses II
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Old Egyptian temple
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Village and Town
• City walls were rarely built to
withstand the onslaught of a great,
well organised and properly
equipped army; but they could
prevent the penetration of
marauding nomads and stave off
attacks by an unruly neighbour.
• The walls were straight without
towers or other fortifications. They
were built of sun-baked mud bricks
laid in horizontal layers, between 11
and 12 metres thick and 9 metres
tall. Sometimes the walls were
probably covered with white plaster. 61
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Hotep Senusret in the Fayum was a planned town.
Medieval cities and towns. Old Siwa, Egypt 63
Ancient Egypt Town 64