Athena Review Image Archive ™
Philae: Temple of Isis, First Pylon (French Exped. 1799)
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(Top:) Temple of Isis, west elevation. (Bot:) First Pylon, viewed from the south (Descrip. de l'Egypte 1809).
Philae was a major temple site located on an island near Aswan, just above the first Nile cataract. The focus of the site was its remarkable Temple of Isis, first built in the Ptolemaic era (3rd century BC), and rebuilt during the Roman period. Isis was the mother of Osiris, a major Egyptian god during the earlier Dynastic era. In the Roman period the cult of Isis became widespread across the empire.
This drawing by an artist from the French expedition in 1799 shows an elevation of the temple at top, and a rendering of the relief-covered First Pylon or gateway at bottom. The pylon reliefs, here as at Edfu, show Ptolemy XII defeating his enemies, and presenting them to the deities Isis, Horus, and Hathor.
Philae remained an active center of traditional Egyptian worship into at least the 4th century AD, when a Coptic missionary reported seeing a ceremony of the falcon god Horus, still being worshipped there. The last examples of Egyptian hieroglyphic inscriptions were found at Philae, dating from 394 AD. The latest demotic grafitti or informal inscriptions found on Philae date from AD 452.
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