40 SEN MUT-—-AN EGYPTIAN CRIOHTON 
DEIR EL BAHARI. 
This exquisite funerary temple was designed and built by Sen 
Mut at the joint desire of Thothmes 2nd and Hatshepsut, and it is held 
to be the most beautiful building in Egypt. 
High up on the Libyan hills, closed in on two sides by vertical 
rocks, the ground sloping from west to east was levelled into three 
great terraces; the approach was through long curving lines of 
Sphinxes terminated by two obelisks. Upwards through the centre 
of the terraces climbed a wide stairway, the front of each terrace 
was fringed with a magnificent colonnade of white limestone; on the 
highest terrace the entrance was through a triumphal gateway of 
rose granite. 
In the cliffs are niches and a sanctuary ; cut deep in the rock in 
the centre is a splendid temple, its square window frames and door- 
ways, its pillars sixteen-sided and without capitals, and above which 
are painted Ureas, are claimed as the precursors of what afterwards 
developed into the Italian style. North and south are many courts, 
churches, and chapels; in one of the latter is a white marble altar, 
the only one left standing in the whole land. 
The principal central building was called the temple of “ Myriads 
of years,” the outer doors were of black copper inlaid with eleetrum, 
the inner of red cedar wrought with bronze, leading into the “ House 
of Amen,” containing a great shrine of Nubian ebony, the steps of 
which were of pure white alabaster inlaid with gold and silver. 
The sculptures and inscriptions on the walls record the leading 
events of Hatshepsut’s reign, and though inferior to Greek Art the 
work is of a very high order; the details of the smallest objects are 
so exquisitely done that when the surface outline has been destroyed, 
sufficient of the incuse remains to insure the identification of a face 
or a hieroglyphic. ‘The simple inscriptions form the most splendid 
ornamentation, in which vivid colours are blended harmoniously. 
Soil and water ahd been carried to the highest level, and each 
terrace formed a splendid garden; dwarf trees, sweet smelling 
shrubs, and gorgeous flowers were laid out in orderly beds, between 
which ran rills of water, which fell on tiny glittering cascades to the 
lower terraces. I think the Babylonians must have found here 
the idea for their hanging gardens. 
