The new sky above Esna. The astronomical ceiling of the Temple of Khnum

In 2018, the University of Tübingen, in collaboration with the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities (MoA) – now the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities (MoTA) – launched a project in conjunction with the Ministry’s Documentation Centre to carry out a complete restoration of the pronaos, whose walls were almost entirely covered in soot.

Eight years later, the entire astronomical ceiling and most of the columns have been cleaned and now appear in vibrant colours. During this cleaning process, nearly 200 inscriptions painted in ink were discovered, which had previously gone unnoticed by Sauneron, the editor of the Esna Temple.

The lecture presents all six sections, or travées, of the astronomical ceiling and provides an overview of their decoration. These include the paths of the Sun and the Moon, the decans (stars used to measure the hours of the night), several well-known Egyptian constellations and many more lesser-known constellations, as well as the twelve signs of the zodiac.

Speaker: Christan Leitz (Tübingen)

• Free admission.
• No registration required.
• Venue: Auditorium of the James-Simon-Galerie