The Obelisk Temple in Byblos and its predecessors
The Obelisk Temple in Byblos and its predecessors

Author(s): Manfred Bietak
Subject(s): Archaeology, Ancient World
Published by: Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego
Keywords: Byblos; Obelisk Temple; Temple en L; Herischef; Reschef; sun cult; processional courtyard; temple ritual
Summary/Abstract: This article treats architecture and archaeological contexts as signsthat help us reach the meaning and function of building assemblages.It therefore falls into the framework of the semiotics of space andarchitecture (of the abundant literature on the subject, see amongothers, Eco 1997; Hammad 1984; Lukken 1993). The studyconcentrates on the Obelisk Temple in Byblos and its predecessors,searching for the connection between these sacred buildings from theEarly and Middle Bronze Ages. A hieroglyphic inscription on one ofthe obelisks of the so-called Obelisk Temple in Byblos may help toconclude that the numerous upright stones in the sacred precinct werein accord with the widespread custom of erecting standing stones in theLevant and Asia Minor. They are thought to have been memorial stones(massebot, betyls) for specific individuals, set up all around this temple.It is also understood in scholarship, based on an obelisk inscription,that this temple was devoted to the Egyptian god Herishef-Re‘ as aninterpretatio aegyptiaca of the Canaanite god Reshef. The syncretismwith the Egyptian sun-god Re‘ and the form of the stones as obelisksshows that this temple also served a solar religion. The architecturalhistory of the predecessors of the Obelisk Temple seems to confirmthis. The central of the tripartite shrines of the Temple en L of the EarlyBronze Age forms an east–west axis opening toward the east. A largeobelisk, an Ancient Egyptian symbol of the sun’s resting place on itsdaily course from east to west across the sky, once stood at the easternend of this axis. This idea seems to have been taken over by the Byblites.

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