The morning had started innocently enough. Wake up call, shower, breakfast with the rest of the group in the hotel dining room, meeting at the dock for the private launch and boarding the bus on the east bank of the river; a routine we've already become familiar with. First a stop at the old (way old) pink granite quarry where the largest obelisk that never was lies still attached to the bedrock, abandoned there unfinished when a fatal flaw was discovered in the stone. The quarry shows evidence of having been in use for millennia, our guide Medhat showing us specifically where known artifacts - famous sarcophagi & such - where extracted. Then a drive to the area between the old British dam and the Aswan High Dam. The vendors on the way to the quay there were particularly insistent. I should have told the cotton shirt vendor that I had already bought a dozen shirts from his cousins in downtown Aswan. But he probably would have told me that his were far better...
Philae is a gem, a late-period (Ptolemaic and Greco-Roman) assemblage of temples, shrines and kiosks erected to the glory of the great goddess Isis and her son Horus. Since by that time in history the attributes of Hathor had been melded with those of Isis, one also finds many references to that great Goddess too, especially on the columns capitals where she is represented in frontal view with cow ears. A Goddess of beauty, no less!
I strayed away from the rest of the group, choosing to conduct my own explorations. Anyway, I would just have made a spectacle of myself, as I could not control the tears running down my face, nor the sobs that clutched my chest. Horus was speaking to me, loud and clear, through the exquisite work of the artists and workmen who carved these stones.
I left the island drained, physically and emotionally, yet longing to remain there. I am sure I will come back.
Later in the afternoon, a visit to the southern tip of Elephantine Island revealed fascinating layers of occupation from the Middle Kingdom onwards, including several restored temples, mudbrick settlements and fortifications, Nilometres (to gauge the rise of the river at flood time, and thus the amount of taxes to be levied on the farmers as crop yields were directly related to flood levels) and countless fragments of beautifully carved stone, many retaining their original colors.
A long and steep climb to the Middle Kingdom tombs of the Elephantine governors was also on the program, which I declined, preferring to climb back to my own 'tomb' at the hotel and get some rest. We are going to turn in early this evening. Tomorrow will be a long day of travel and exploration, as we leave Aswan and Nubia, and head towards Luxor
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