DOI Artikel:
Naville, Edouard: Excavations at Henassieh (Hanes)
DOI Seite / Zitierlink:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.12667#0024
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Ahnas and Beni Hasan.
Unfortunately, in the night which followed its discovery it was
broken to pieces by the inhabitants, who build all their walls
and houses with Roman bricks found on the Tell.
In two other places were several shafts of red granite
columns lying on the ground. Researches made all around,
and even underneath, did not lead to any result; except the
discovery of a fragment of mosaic. These columns belonged to
Coptic churches ; the Coptic cross being engraved on several
of them.
We dug also near two huge granite bases, which looked like
Roman work. The excavations showed that they had
supported two large columns at the entrance of a Coptic
church, now entirely destroyed, but of which nearly all the
materials were left. They consisted of columns in grey
- marble with Corinthian capitals, some of which had, instead
of astragalus, a Coptic cross, also architraves and friezes
well sculptured with flowers, arabesques, and animals, and
even with mythological subjects. I should not wonder if
a sculptured stone, bearing a coarse representation of Leda
and her swan, which was in a fellah's house, had come from
here.
In digging in a great depression in the western part of the
mounds, at a depth of about four yards, we at last hit upon
a granite monolithic column complete, with a palm-leaf
capital. We concentrated all our researches around it, and we
found that we had reached a vestibule which must have been
one of the side entrances of the temple of Heracleopolis.
The remains of it consist of six columns 17 ft. high, one
of which only is perfect, with sculptures representing Ra-
meses II. making offerings to various divinities, and in the
intervals the name of Menephthah, the son of Rameses. The
architraves which were supported by those columns are cut in
a building with the cartouches of Usertesen II. of the Xllth
Dynasty. The six columns were in one line. The length of
the vestibule is 61 ft., and it was open on the water side. The
Ahnas and Beni Hasan.
Unfortunately, in the night which followed its discovery it was
broken to pieces by the inhabitants, who build all their walls
and houses with Roman bricks found on the Tell.
In two other places were several shafts of red granite
columns lying on the ground. Researches made all around,
and even underneath, did not lead to any result; except the
discovery of a fragment of mosaic. These columns belonged to
Coptic churches ; the Coptic cross being engraved on several
of them.
We dug also near two huge granite bases, which looked like
Roman work. The excavations showed that they had
supported two large columns at the entrance of a Coptic
church, now entirely destroyed, but of which nearly all the
materials were left. They consisted of columns in grey
- marble with Corinthian capitals, some of which had, instead
of astragalus, a Coptic cross, also architraves and friezes
well sculptured with flowers, arabesques, and animals, and
even with mythological subjects. I should not wonder if
a sculptured stone, bearing a coarse representation of Leda
and her swan, which was in a fellah's house, had come from
here.
In digging in a great depression in the western part of the
mounds, at a depth of about four yards, we at last hit upon
a granite monolithic column complete, with a palm-leaf
capital. We concentrated all our researches around it, and we
found that we had reached a vestibule which must have been
one of the side entrances of the temple of Heracleopolis.
The remains of it consist of six columns 17 ft. high, one
of which only is perfect, with sculptures representing Ra-
meses II. making offerings to various divinities, and in the
intervals the name of Menephthah, the son of Rameses. The
architraves which were supported by those columns are cut in
a building with the cartouches of Usertesen II. of the Xllth
Dynasty. The six columns were in one line. The length of
the vestibule is 61 ft., and it was open on the water side. The