About three-quarters of a mile from the Memnon colossi lies the
southernmost group of the long line of mortuary temples which extends along the
whole eastern face of the Theban necropolis .
It goes by the general name of Medinet Habu ; but there is a whole group
of buildings comprehended under that title, and these have to be distinguished
from one another . The earliest building at Medinet Habu dates from the dawn of
the 18th Dynasty . This is the smaller temple within the enclosure,
which, in spite of Ptolemaic and Roman additions, belonged originally to the
reign of Amenhotep I, whose mortuary temple it may conceivably have been .
It was usurped, according to the amiable Pharaonic custom, by Tuthmosis
I, and considerably added to by Hatshepsut and Tuthmosis III, so that the main
part of the rear of the existing building is of mid 18th Dynasty
date . Ramses II and Ramses III also did work upon the temple, and the outside
reliefs are the work of the latter Pharaoh .
A court from a Saite period ( 664-525 B.C. ), and a court of Nectanebis, with a gate of
Taharqa of the 25th Dynasty carry on the complicated history of the
building, and the last work is of Ptolemaic and Roman date, and includes the
whole of the present beautiful façade . In short, the smaller temple of Medinet
Habu is almost as much an epitome of Egyptian history as is its greater
neighbour across the Nile at Karnak .
Besides this temple, there are at Medinet Habu three
other more or less important buildings, all of them of a mortuary nature .
These are : the pavilion of Ramses III, the small mortuary temple of
Amenartais, and the great temple of Ramses III .
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