Saturday, September 5, 2009

Vestibule and Central Tomb Chamber

Vestibule and Central Tomb Chamber

These are the main chambers. They are lit by a single electric light bulb that throws the chamber into green, a perfect staging for that composite art. In the center of the facade, the familiar solar disk is carved below frieze of serpents. Left and right are two serpents wearing the crowns of upper and lower Egypt. These are not the lithe cobras of Saqqara or Thebes. They seemed to be designed as modern book comics. In the Tomb Chamber, the dead lies on a lion-shaped bier attended by Horus, Thoth, Anubis, and other familiar funerary deities and funerary equipment : Canopic jars, the priest in his panther skin, and the king making an offering to the deceased in the form of Osiris. These figures are rendered in Greco-Roman style. To the traditional scenes are added bunches of grapes, Medusa heads, and a variety of Greek and Roman decorative devices.

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