Edfu Temple

Travel tips you can trust

Why
Edfu Temple
is special

Edfu Temple is one of the largest, best-preserved, and most-striking ancient temples in Egypt - and has become one of the nation's most popular tourist destinations.

Edfu Temple
tips & insights

How to pronounce

Edfu = ed-foo (as in "too")

Top attractions

37-meter or 121 feet high pylon (twin-towered gateway in photo above).

Inner Sanctuary (features the royal barge).

Hall of Offerings and Court of Offerings.

Hypostyle Hall.

Statue of the falcon-headed Horus (exquisitely sculpted).

The reliefs in general heralded by archaeologists for the historical insights they reveal.

History in brief

Edfu Temple was built over a span of 180 years (237 BC to 57 BC) by six Ptolemaic pharaohs to honor the Egyptian god Horus. The religious site fell into disuse several centuries later when the Roman Empire banned pagan worship. Then, slowly, wind-blown desert sands and Nile River flood silt half buried it. In the 1860s, the French archaeologists Auguste Mariette excavated the ruins.

Architectural anachronism

The Ptolemy pharaohs used the architectural style of the New Kingdom, a period that ended more than 700 years before the Ptolemaic era began.

Site

The temple sits within the town of Edfu, a Nile River town. It lies approximately halfway between Luxor and Aswan. The site, according to Egyptian mythology, is where Horus killed Seth, his father's killer.

Location in Egypt