Читать книгу The dawn of astronomy. A study of the temple-worship and mythology of the ancient Egyptians онлайн

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TEMPLE AND TEMENOS WALLS OF TANIS.

(From Lepsius.)

TEMPLE AND TEMENOS WALLS OF SAÏS (SĀ-EL-LAGER).

(From Lepsius.)

Further, the temples at Gîzeh, instead of being oriented to the north-west, and to the south-east, are just as truly oriented to the east and west as the Pyramids themselves. We have either Temples of Osiris pointing to the sunset at the equinox, or temples of Isis pointing to the sunrise at the equinox, but in either case built in relation to the Pyramids. As an indication of the importance of the considerations with which we are now dealing, I may mention that it is suggested by them that the building near the Sphinx is really a crypt of a temple of Isis or Osiris. This is a view which may change the ideas generally held with regard to its age to the extent of something like a thousand years. It has been imagined that it was at least one thousand years older than the second Pyramid; but if it be ultimately proved that this is really a temple of Isis or Osiris, then since it was built in just as strict relation to the side of the Pyramid as the temple near the Pyramid was to its centre, both temples were most probably built at the same time as the Pyramid itself. However this may be, the important thing is that when we pass from Thebes, and possibly Abydos, to the Pyramids at Memphis, to Saïs and Tanis, we find a solstitial orientation changed to an equinoctial one. There is a fundamental change of astronomical thought.