Brief note on the construction genius of the ancient Egyptians
The Temple of Ramesses II at Abu Simbel and the adjoining one, dedicated to his wife Nefertari, personified as the goddess Hathor, were, in the 1960s, cut into blocks and reassembled in an artificial hill, 40 m. higher up. This was necessary, as with the Temple of File in Aswan (which, however, was rebuilt on a different islet from the original), as a result of the creation by the governament of Lake Nasser caused by the Aswan Dam. It is unthinkable that The Temple of Ramesses, first explored by Belzoni in 1817, was built in the middle of Nubia totally isolated. Who knows how many other sites of archaeological interest next to it have been submerged by the lake, which, in addition to resulting quite useless, creates subterranean water seepage that is threatening the good preservation of Luxor's tombs and preventing fertile silt (the Khemi, which gave ancient Egypt its name)-perhaps even crocodiles-from reaching the most cultivated areas of the country.
On the left wall of the hypostyle hall, upon entering the temple, is a bas-relief glorifying Ramesses II at the Battle of Quadesh. Pharaoh is depicted on a running chariot, surrounded by other smaller chariots, as he stretches his bow. The absolute modernity of this bas-relief is that, to give the feeling of movement and speed, the horses have more hooves than the real thing, in different positions, as in today's cartoon technique, according to which, with several successive drawings, movement is created. A graphic idea, for the time, absolutely ingenious, also repeated in the depiction of the tension of Pharaoh's bow.
Another peculiarity that testifies to how advanced the Egyptians's coat of arms technique was is that on February 21, the day when, at that latitude, the sun is at its zenith (we are almost at the Tropic of Cancer), a ray of sunlight penetrates the temple, passes through it in its entire length of about 60 meters, passing through the different halls built 'telescope-like,' until it illuminates the statues of Ammon-Ra, Ptah, Ramesses II (deified) and Horus (in the personification of Ra-Harakhte), placed in the terminal sacellum. Since this "sanctum-sanctorum" had, at the time, its floor covered with electron (an alloy of gold and silver, also used to cover the tops of obelisks), one can imagine what phantasmagorical effect of light could result. The phenomenon was repeated, then, on October 21.
The quite amusing thing is that, in the present temple reconstruction, despite all our modern technology, the phenomenon is repeated yes, but only on the day after the original dates!
