The great variety of form in the column and capital is not shared by the entablature. This consists, as seen at the tombs of Beni-hassan, of two members. The lower stretches from pier to pier, or from column to column, as a connecting epistyle. The upper, representing the horizontal ceiling, reposes thereupon, and is crowned by the universal cornice-moulding—a boldly projecting Egyptian scotia. Between these two members there is a continuous roundlet, often characterized, by its ornament of an encircling ribbon, as a bundle of reeds. The cornice is sometimes marked by rows of reed-leaves bent forward at the top, the epistyle covered with hieroglyphics. In later times, the decoration of the entablature became more florid, repetitions of the uræos serpent appearing as a cornice ornament.
The columns of the new kingdom had, meanwhile, been given up in the rock-cut tombs, where they first occurred. Yet the cavern sepulchres themselves remained so much in vogue that they even served the kings of the Theban dynasties in place of pyramids. Their tendency was rather to burrow deeply into the cliff than to create large sepulchral chambers, where the support of columns would have been necessary. The principal intention of the excavators—to make the royal burial-place as inaccessible as possible—was adverse to any monumental development of the interior. The decoration was restricted to paintings upon the long and repeatedly closed corridors, and sufficed only to rank these above the bare channels of the pyramids. The formation of the earth on the border of the desert offered no ground for the exterior architectural treatment of these graves, and a simple portal is generally all that designates the entrance to the shafts which were the sepulchres of the Theban dynasties. The plan of that at Biban-el-Moluc is given in Fig. 17.
The temples of the new kingdom with their numerous halls and courts offered, on the other hand, most ample scope for the application of columnar architecture. These extended series of strangely enclosed rooms and courts, though richly decorated with paintings, would have seemed bare within and without if the column had not entered into their composition, and if the building had not been expanded and ornamented by its help. With the floral orders, the temple interior became an architectural organism truly deserving of study and admiration.
With exception of that portion of the structure which stood before the chief portal, and cannot be considered as an integral part of the building, every Egyptian temple was divided into three principal parts, contained within an oblong enclosure: namely, the court, the hall of columns, and the holy of holies—a series of cellas. (Fig. 18.) Long rows of sphinxes generally stand facing the avenue which leads to the entrance of the temple, and prepare for the sacred silence within. The doorway is flanked by two enormous towers, so-called pylons, formed like steep truncated pyramids. The walls of these masses of masonry, ornamented with coilanaglyphic paintings, show slots upon the front for the reception of the high flag-poles which are represented upon contemporary wall-decorations. The towers are crowned with the scotia cornice, the roundlet of which is continued down the angles. Within they are pierced by stairways and small chambers, scantily lighted by narrow slits in the wall. It is probable that the summits of these pylons, without doubt the highest standpoints in the valley of the Nile, served as observatories for the Egyptian astronomers and astrologers; a practical use was thus added to the original purpose of monumental decorative gate-ways. Two or four colossal sitting figures were generally placed before the pylons, and sometimes also two obelisks, bearing the dedicatory inscriptions of the temple.
