Fajum
Many people call the oasis Fayoum (Fayyum, Faiyum, dim. fajum) "The garden of Egypt”. This is one of the biggest (1800 km2 ; 1,3 million inhabitants) and the most famous oases in Egypt and North Africa. Oasis, surrounded by hills, it is located in a tectonic sinkhole 80 m p.p.m. Separated from the Nile by a narrow part of the desert, it is a fertile area around a brackish lake, today called Birkat Karun (Birkat Qarun, Birket Qarun). The ancient Greeks called them Moeris. Too strong evaporation made, that the salt contained in the water of the Nile had deposited in the lake, whose salinity increases from year to year.
Lake Karun arose in times, when the Sahara was full of water. Archaeologists have found traces of people from before that on its shores 40 thousand. years. As the climate got drier and drier, the lake began to shrink. During the Old Kingdom, when the lake was called Sha-resi (southern lake), and then Mer-ver (great lake), many settlements and towns flourished here. As a result of the incredible drought, the oasis was almost completely depopulated. Only the works initiated by the pharaohs of the XII Dynasty (ok. 1991-1792 p.n.e.) made her flourish again. The irrigated southern shores of the lake, fertile and agricultural, it was called Tashe (lake-land). Here was the capital of the oasis – the city of Szedet (Crocodile polis). The water was supplied by the natural branch of the Nile, considered to be a channel made by the human hand, which was attributed to the biblical Joseph (Bahr Yussef) or to Pharaoh Amenemhat III. It flows through a natural gate in a chain of hills near el-Lahun, and hence the water is distributed over the entire basin through a network of channels. In antiquity, Lake Karun was supposed to resemble a crocodile, that is why the crocodile god Sobek was worshiped here, later called Suthos or Skonopaios. The collapse of the Middle Kingdom and the transfer of the capital to the south resulted in, that the desert sands covered most of the farmland. It was only during the first Ptolemy that enormous irrigation works were carried out, old canals cleaned, and the lands were settled by Greek military settlers. The king dedicated the oasis to the good spirit of his kingdom – wife and sister at the same time – Queen Arsinoe.
The most important monuments of Fayum are: w Medinet Fayoum – ruins of the temple of the god Sobek, Asil Bey Mosque (XV w.); in Biahmu – remnants of the colossi of Amenemhat III; in Dimei – ruins of Ptolemaic temples; w Kasr Karun (Qasr Qarun, Qa§r Qarun) – ruins of Ptolemaic temples and the city of Dionysias; w Madinat Madi – the temple of Amenemhat III and his son, and the ruins of Ptolemaic temples; w Hawara – piramidę Amenemhata III i Labirynt; w Al-Lahun (Al-Lahun, El-Lahun) – pyramid of Senusereta II.
A small sandstone temple in Madinat Madi (Medinet Madi, Madinat Ma T)dedicated to Sobek, Horus and the serpent goddess of the harvest Renenutet from the time of Amenemhat III and IV (XII dynastia), it is one of the few houses of the cult of the Middle Kingdom. Although in the nineteenth dynasty, and then, in the Ptolemaic times, the sanctuary was rebuilt, its shape from the period of the Middle Kingdom has been preserved. The avenue of lion sphinxes, partially hidden under the sands, leads to the temple gate. The walls were built of regular stone blocks, and the walls are covered with well-preserved bas-reliefs. The portico supported by two papyrus columns leads to a transverse room with columns (7 me and 2,17 m), from where are the entrances to the three chapels with statues of the deity (the widest) and two kings. The reliefs show the two Amenemhat offering sacrifices to the goddess Renenutet. Greek inscriptions date from Ptolemaic times (part at the museum in Alexandria) and statues of lions.
Hawara Pyramid (codz. 8.00-16.00; 30 EGP) it was erected second on the orders of Amenemhat III of the 12th Dynasty (the first was at Dahshur). As described by Herodotus, adjoined the Labyrinth and had 73 m in height. It was decorated with carved figures. The pyramid of Amenemhat III actually rose in height 58 m, the side of the base was counting 102 m, and the inclination angle of the walls is 48 ° 52. The core is made of mud brick and clad in polished white limestone. There was a mortuary temple next to the pyramid, from which there was a secret and very twisted entrance to the pyramid. However, this did not protect the mummy of the Pharaoh from desecration.
South of the pyramid, almost right at her feet, there is an area covered with ruins, which already became legends in antiquity. This rubble of stone fragments is to be the Labyrinth, which is so suggestive (but probably not true) described by Herodotus. What was the Labyrinth? Is the mortuary temple of Amenemhat III, his daughter graduated, Queen Sobek-Neferu, the last ruler of the XII Dynasty? Or maybe it was different, unidentified building, whose destiny has faded in the darkness of history, already unknown to Herodotus? The building must have been approx 305 m in length and 244 m wide. It has served as a quarry since Roman times, so only the foundations remained, a heap of white limestone and machined granite. Herodotus, who supposedly saw the building in all its glory, describes it as a string 12 peristyle courtyards: 6 from the north and 6 since noon. It was supposed to be here 3000 komnat – 1500 in the basement and 1500 on the surface. In the underground halls there were probably the tombs of the sacred crocodiles and the king, who erected the building.
About 19 km od Medinet El-Fayoum, a 10 km od Hawara, at the mouth of a wide desert gorge stands the pyramid of Senuseret II (XII dynastia) w Al-Lahun (codz. 8.00- 16.00; 30 EGP). The name comes from ancient Le-hone (“Mouth of the lake”). It is surrounded by the mud-brick houses of the ancient city of Kahun, where the priests and officials who looked after the pyramid may have lived.