Under the kings of the XIXth dynasty the temple buildings consisted of :-(1) Pylons; (2) an open courtyard; (3) a hypostyle hall; and (4) a shrine, which could be completely cut off from the rest of the temple, and a number of chambers intended to hold statues or emblems of the gods. The first pylon was approached by a broad path, or dromos, on each side of which were arranged, at regular intervals, stone figures of ram-headed or human-headed sphinxes, mounted on pedestals, and having their heads turned towards the axis of the path. The length

of the path varies, but the longest known is that which leads from Luxor to Karnak, and which is more than a mile and a quarter long. It is probable that the sphinxes were intended either to contain or to represent guardian spirits. The temple buildings were enclosed within a wall of unbaked mud bricks, but the avenue of sphinxes was outside this wall. The pylon consists of a large rectangular doorway and two high massive towers, built with sides which slope towards a common centre, and it forms, probably, one of the most prominent characteristics of the Egyptian temple buildings. On festal occasions the towers were ornamented by a number of painted poles, from which flew coloured streamers or flags. At each side of the doorway of the pylon stood a colossal figure of the king in granite, limestone, or sandstone, and a granite obelisk, mounted on a pedestal of suitable dimensions, and colossal statues were sometimes also placed in front of the towers of the pylon. The open court was furnished with a colonnade on three sides, and it is probable that those who sold objects used by the worshippers had their stalls situated in it; both this court and the hypostyle hall beyond it, which was entered through the doorway of another pylon, were thronged on festal occasions, and in one or both the animals intended for slaughter were offered up. All that part of the temple which lay beyond the hypostyle hall was probably reserved for the use of the priests and

the performance of the sacred ceremonies in connection with the worship of the god. In the most holy part of the shrine, and jealously guarded, was the statue, or boat, or emblem of the god, which was only looked upon by the high priest, or by some extremely privileged visitor, about once a year. It was kept inside a sacred ark or tabernacle, made of precious wood or metal, elaborately painted and gilded and worked, and provided with doors and bolts.

In the ground outside the temple-walls, but within the surrounding mud-brick wail, lay the sacred lake or lakes, wherein the devout bathed, and in the waters of which the processions of the sacred boats took place. Speaking generally, the above is a brief description of the principal characteristics of Egyptian temples, and it applies to those that were built or restored between B.C. 1370 and B.C. 200. About the latter date many of the small temples built by the Ptolemies are only modified copies of the small temples of the latter part of the XVIIIth dynasty. An examination of a number of temples will show the visitor to Egypt that in comparatively minor matters each temple possesses characteristics which are peculiar to itself. Thus in the temple at Luxor the open court and the rest of the temple are connected by means of a long, narrow courtyard, which is wanting in many temples; and at Abydos, because there was no room to build all the various parts of the temple in a straight line as usual, the portion which contains the sanctuary has been built to the side of one end of it.

Before passing on to other matters, mention must be made of temples which were hewn out of the rock, and of this class, which is a very small one, those of Bêt el-Wali and Abu Simbel in Nubia are the finest specimens. The other temples in Nubia, and those in the Eastern Sûdân, form a class by themselves, and although of those the sites are very old, the greater number of the buildings belong to the period between B.C. 750 and 200. At Gebel Barkal, parts

of the largest temple there are probably as old as the XVIIIth dynasty, but the general teaching of Egyptian history would lead us not to expect to find any ruins older than the time of Amenophis I. In outlying districts the Egyptian temple served both as a place of worship and a place of refuge, and in many respects the building became half temple, half fortress.

The ornamentation of tombs and temples varied at different periods. The earliest tombs are almost bare in

relief or painted in tempera, began to fill the walls and to cover the sides of the rectangular pillars which supported the roof. Still later, every availablespace in the tomb was filled with scenes most elaborately drawn and painted in vivid colours, and the ceilings were ornamented with geometrical patterns and designs, edged with floral and other bor

ders. As time went on it seemed to be the aim of the funeral artist to make the walls of the tomb to reproduce scenes of all the principal events which had occurred in the life of the deceased, and to describe his wealth and power. But under the rule of the Theban kings of the XVIIIth dynasty, it became the fashion with many to make such painted scenes and the accompanying descriptive texts subordinate to religious inscriptions, and many tombs are almost entirely covered with extracts from the Book of the Dead, or from works of a similar character, and with scenes illustrative of them. The earliest temples were, probably, without ornamentation of any kind, but when it became the fashion to decorate the tombs with bas-reliefs, or painted scenes, the walls and pillars of the temples were treated in the same manner. In the XVIIIth and following dynasties the outsides of the walls of temples were covered with inscriptions and scenes which recorded the victories of the king or kings who built them, and the insides were decorated with figures of the gods and of the king performing religious ceremonies; later, both the insides and outsides of the walls were devoted to representations of colossal figures of the king slaughtering rebels in masses, and to religious scenes.

The Palace and the House. The palace of an Egyptian king was enclosed within a wall like a temple, and was often built of stone; unfortunately, however, the ruins of the royal residences known to us, with but one or two exceptions, do not permit the laying down of any general rule about their construction. It is probable that kings often lived in buildings attached to the temples, and in this case the style of the palace would resemble that of the temple. The entrance into the outside grounds was made through a pylon, and the building which formed the palace. consisted of large numbers of rooms, lighted by means of grating-work windows, grouped round open courts, which were separated from each other by pylons. Some rooms

were set apart for state receptions and ceremonies, others for the sleeping apartments of the male members of the household, and others for the royal ladies. The servants, and others who were not in close attendance on the family, lived and slept outside the palace proper, but within the grounds, in small chambers built against the surrounding wall. In some part of the grounds spice, incense, and fruit trees grew, and one or two ponds, or small lakes, with reedy margins, afforded excellent cover for water fowl. The private house was a rectangular building of two storeys with a flat roof, the whole being made of unbaked mud bricks, with the exception of the lintels of the doors.

A man of means enclosed his house and a piece of ground within a wall, and then he had space enough to build a portico, or colonnade, before his house, where he could find shelter from the sun, and lay out a courtyard. A portion of the enclosed space was laid out as gardens or planted with trees, a lake or fountain of water was made near the house, and the servants or slaves, and others, lived in small buildings, or booths, not very far from the house. In fact, the house and garden of a Theban gentleman or high official must have resembled closely the house and courtyard, and garden, with its fountain of running water and scented trees, of a Muḥammadan gentleman of Damascus, or Cairo, or any other flourishing city in the beginning of the Middle Ages. The courtyard was then, as now, probably tiled, and the outside walls of the house painted in one or two bright colours; the internal decorations of the walls and ceilings consisted of some intricate geometrical design, elaborately painted in several bright colours.

The Egyptian house must always have been a comparatively simple building, for its owner really only needed shelter from the cold by night, and a shady place wherein to sit or sleep in the afternoons. The peasant farmer's house was a small, strong building, with a courtyard large