al-Musawwarat as-sufra

Archaeological sites of Meroe Island
UNESCO world heritage
	Lion temple in al-Musawwarat as-sufra
National territory:	Sudan
Type:	Culture
Criteria :	ii, iii, iv, v
Reference No .:	1336
UNESCO region :	Arabic states
	History of enrollment
Enrollment:	2011 (session 35)

Al-Musawwarat as-sufra ( Arabic المصورات الصفراء al-Musawwarāt as-sufrāʾ , DMG al-Muṣawwarāt aṣ-ṣufrāʾ , also Musawwarat es Sufra ; Meroitic Aborepi ; Ancient Egyptian jbrp, jpbr-ˁnḫ ) is the modern name of a large temple complex in what is now Sudan .

location

The place is in the Butana around 190 kilometers northeast of Khartoum , around 20 kilometers north of Naqa and around 29 kilometers southeast of the Nile .

meaning

There are few remains of settlements and only a few post- Meroitic graves. This indicates that the place had a purely religious function and perhaps served as a pilgrimage center. This thesis is supported by the large number of visitor inscriptions that were found here, including the only Latin inscription from Nubia to date .

As early as 1960 to 1968, the Humboldt University of Berlin carried out excavations under the direction of Fritz Hintze . Between 1969 and 1970 the lion temple was reconstructed under the direction of Fritz Hintze and Karl-Heinz Priese . The archaeological work was resumed in 1995 under the direction of Steffen Wenig . Claudia Näser headed the research project from 2005 to 2015 .

Together with Meroe and Naqa, Musawwarat es Sufra was added to the list of UNESCO World Heritage Sites as Archaeological Sites on Meroe Island in 2011 .

Lion temple

The Lion Temple is a rectangular, 14.21 m long, 9.13 m wide and 4.7 m high temple with a pylon and six columns. Erected by King Arnekhamani and dedicated to Apedemak , the temple contains inscriptions in Egyptian hieroglyphics and depictions of elephants and lions, as well as reliefs of Apedemak, depicted as a three-headed god on the outer walls.

Inside the lion temple
Postage stamp from the Lion Temple: Elephants with prisoners of war
Relief of Apedemak

Great facility

The so-called Great Complex is a tangle of courtyards, the center of which is a temple surrounded by columns. There are also other small temples. The temple 300 was decorated by two colossal figures. Most of the walls were undecorated. There were many sculptures of elephants. The walls of the facility are littered with countless ancient graffiti and visitor inscriptions. The plan of the large complex has so far without parallels in Nubia and Egypt .

The big plant
An entrance to the large facility
Statue of an elephant
Wall graffiti
Graffiti by Hermann von Pückler-Muskau

Great Hafir

The Great Hafir is a reservoir of water to store the rainfall of the short, wet season. It has a diameter of 250 m and was dug 6.3 m deep into the ground.

Individual evidence

↑ Archäologie-Online ( Memento of the original from July 20, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2
^ Gilda Ferrandino and Matteo Lorenzini; 3D Reconstruction of the Lion Temple at Musawwarat es Sufra: 3D model and domain ontologies; in: The Kushite World (2015). Proceedings of the 11th International Conference for Meroitic Studies; Vienna, September 1-4, 2008.
^ Research project graffiti of the large complex
↑ Claudia Näser; The Great Hafir at Musawwarat as-Sufra. Fieldwork of the Archaeological Mission of Humboldt University Berlin in 2005 and 2006. On: Between the Cataracts. Proceedings of the 11th Conference of Nubian Studies. Warsaw University, August 27 - September 2, 2006; In: Polish Center of Mediterranean Aerchaeology University of Warsaw. PAM Supplement Series 2.2./1-2.

literature

Martin Fitzenreiter ao: Musawwarat es-Sufra. Volume 2: The small system. (= Meroitica Vol. 17, 1). Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 1999, ISBN 3-447-04131-5 .
Jochen Hallof: Construction stages I to IV of the large complex of Musawwarat es Sufra. (= Contributions to Egyptology and Sudan archeology, vol. 8). GHP, London 2006, ISBN 0-9550256-7-2 ( PDF; 2.72 MB ).
Fritz Hintze: The inscriptions of the lion temple of Musawwarat es Sufra. (= Treatises of the German Academy of Sciences in Berlin. Class for Languages, Literature and Art. Born 1962, No. 1, ZDB -ID 210007-1 ). Akademie-Verlag, Berlin 1962.

Steffen Wenig (ed.): The temples of Musawwarat es Sufra. (Exhibition catalog, Berlin, Urania, September 16 - October 12, 1996) Institute for Sudan Archeology and Egyptology at the Humboldt University, Berlin 1996.

Web links

Commons : Musawwarat es-Sufra - collection of images, videos and audio files

16.415833333333 33.323611111111Coordinates: 16 ° 24 ′ 57 ″ N , 33 ° 19 ′ 25 ″ E

[1] Archäologie-Online ( Memento of the original from July 20, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2

[2] Gilda Ferrandino and Matteo Lorenzini; 3D Reconstruction of the Lion Temple at Musawwarat es Sufra: 3D model and domain ontologies; in: The Kushite World (2015). Proceedings of the 11th International Conference for Meroitic Studies; Vienna, September 1-4, 2008.

[3] Research project graffiti of the large complex

[4] Claudia Näser; The Great Hafir at Musawwarat as-Sufra. Fieldwork of the Archaeological Mission of Humboldt University Berlin in 2005 and 2006. On: Between the Cataracts. Proceedings of the 11th Conference of Nubian Studies. Warsaw University, August 27 - September 2, 2006; In: Polish Center of Mediterranean Aerchaeology University of Warsaw. PAM Supplement Series 2.2./1-2.