Medinet Habou - Plain and square Palace Window

View from ruins across a plain and towards the Memnonium in the background. On the right-hand side is a well-preserved window of the temple complex of Medinet Habu. The temple complex of Medinet Habu, built over structures dating from the Middle Kingdom, dates from the New Kingdom to the Late period (c.1550-332 BC) and consists mostly of the mortuary temple of Rameses III (1184-1153 BC). The king modelled his mortuary temple to that of one of his predecessors, Rameses II (1279-1213 BC), which the photographer interestingly included in the image. The Ramesseum was in fact still also known in the nineteenth century as the Memnonium, due to the wrong association, firstly occurred in classical times, of the two nearby colossal statues of Amenhotep III (1390-1352 BC) with Memnon, the Homeric character.

Object Details

Medinet Habou – Plain and square Palace Window

Francis Frith

1857

Luxor

Albumen print

15.9 x 20.9 cm

Acquired by King Edward VII when Prince of Wales

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