Controversy arose in Egypt after installing a wooden roof over the famous ancient columns of the Karnak Temple in Luxor, in the south of the country.
Some considered that this was a “distortion and change” of an archaeological landmark among the most prominent in the world, but a government official revealed to “Sky News Arabia” that the wooden ceiling “returned the temple to its origin, which was established by the ancient Egyptians.”
Social media platforms circulated pictures showing the columns of the Karnak Temple covered with a wooden ceiling, with comments criticizing this measure.
The roof serves to protect the inscriptions on the walls of the temple
The roof serves to protect the inscriptions on the walls of the temple
official response
However, the director of the Karnak Temple, Al-Tayyib Gharib, told “Sky News Arabia” that “what happened was the placement of a wooden ceiling on the southeastern quarter of the Great Hall of Columns in the Karnak Temple, which is an important idea to protect the original colors that adorn these columns.”
And he continued, “This procedure is nothing but returning the thing to its original, because all the archaeologists agreed that the column hall in the Karnak Temple was roofed.”
He explained that “the only disagreement between archaeologists and historians was about the material from which this ceiling was made, wood or stone,” noting that “some archaeologists said that it was a stone ceiling, and others said that the ceiling was wooden, and each side has its evidence.”
Gharib stressed that “despite the disagreement about the material from which the ceiling was made, all modern and ancient archaeologists agreed that the Great Column Hall in the middle of the Karnak temples had a roof that protected the colors, as well as the nature of the religious rituals that required shade inside the hall.”
The roof wood did not interfere with the effect, according to the director of the temple
The roof wood did not interfere with the effect, according to the director of the temple
The official stressed that “no small or large change occurred in the nature of the antiquity in the Karnak Temple by placing this ceiling, because the wooden panels were placed above the pillars of the hall, and this is not considered a change because the wood did not interfere with the antiquity itself, and it was placed without inscriptions, drawings or decorations.” .
Regarding the importance of this roof, the director of the Karnak Temple said that “to protect the colors inside the temple from rain as well as from intense sunlight in the summer, so a specific type of wood called Azizi was chosen, which is very expensive wood and is a good insulator for heat and rain and resists fungus.”
He concluded, “The reason for resorting to this procedure at this time is that during the past two years, a beautiful and bright group of colors was revealed on the walls of the columns of the Karnak Temple, and these colors must be preserved with the same splendor, because they dazzled the world and became an attraction for tourists, and they are original colors belonging to more than from 3600 years ago.
2023-08-30 23:56:37
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