Valley Temple

The granite interior. Originally roofed over with an upper courtyard, the brilliant sun light probably shone through those thin slots at the top on the south wall. Granite and basalt wall blocks, alabastar floor. Austere and unadorned, this temple has no incised inscriptions or reliefs. There are no pictorial or linguistic clues to its builder's origins.

Imagine - What may it have been like? Silent? Statues? Incense? Candles? Prayers?

This diorite sculpture was found upside down, buried and broken in a shaft (#16) in this temple. It is believed to represent the pharaoh Khafre. The divine falcon Horus, son of Osiris and Isis, guardian deity of the pharaohs, is seated behind the figure's head.

Hymn to Osiris
I have come home. I have entered humanhood, bound to rocks and plants, men and women, rivers and sky. I shall be with you in this and other worlds. When the cat arches in the doorway, think of me. I have sometimes been like that. When two men greet each other in the street, I am there speaking to you. When you look up, know I am there - sun and moon pouring my love around you. All these things I am, portents, images, signs. Though apart, I am a part of you. One of the million things in the universe, I am the universe, too. You think I disguise myself as rivers and trees simply to confuse you? Whatever I am, woman, cat or lotus, the same god breathes in every body. You and I together are a single creation. Neither death nor spite nor fear nor ignorance stops my love for you...

What you see in these two photographs are holes made by a tube drill in red granite. They can be seen in the overhead door lintels of the granite lined Valley Temple near the Sphinx.

Almost all the doorways in this temple show evidence of tubedrilling in granite. It seems that the holes were used to hold in place long vertical rotating shafts on which the doors were hung, like hinges.

Archaeological research has not found actual examples of ancient egyptian tube drills, ancient paintings of them or hieroglyphic descriptions of who used such tools or when.

The circles on this photo show some of the places where visitors to the temple can look.

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