The half-brother of Alexander the Great, Philip Arrhidaeus ruled Egypt from 323 to 317 BC. Like many non-Egyptians who assumed control of the country, Philip adopted Egyptian costume, titles, and religious beliefs. Philip was chosen to lead Egypt by Greek military officers who considered him the least threatening of a bad lot of candidates. He was dim-witted, epileptic, and the illegitimate son of Philip II of Macedonia and a dancing girl.

Until the army had him murdered after six years of rule, military officers or his wife, his first cousin, Eurydice, made most of the government’s decisions.Among those was the decision to build in the Karnak complex. The choice of location for Philip’s shrine was no accident: it was set in the very heart of the Temple of Amen, precisely on its main axis, adjacent to the earliest part of the temple, the Middle Kingdom court. Few sites were more central to temple ceremonies. The shrine of Thutmes III that stood here was torn down and replaced with Philip’s shrine. The earlier shrine may have been damaged by Assyrian or Persian invaders three centuries earlier, and Philip claimed that he found it “fallen into ruin.” His shrine, of identical plan to the shrine it replaced, was made of pink granite with carved figures painted yellow. It was 18 meters (58 feet) long, 6 meters (20 feet) wide, and divided into two rooms, the first for offerings, the second for the sacred bark. Some of the most interesting and bestpreserved scenes were carved on the outer face of the right (south) wall: there are four registers, the uppermost of which documents Philip’s ritual purification, coronation, and enthronement before Amen.

It is worth walking counterclockwise around the shrine of Philip Arrhidaeus to its northwest corner. North of the shrine, a large relief scene shows Thutmes III dedicating offerings to Amen.Immediately in front of the king, two obelisks that he erected at Karnak are shown standing in front of the Seventh Pylon. Below the scene, sixty-seven columns of text describe in detail the king’s military campaigns in western Asia. A doorway through the western end of this north wall leads to a chamber decorated with beautifully painted reliefs of Hatshepsut, Thoth, and Horus. The figures of the god Amen and the wellpainted hieroglyphs are masterfully sculpted, but the figures of the queen were erased by Thutmes III, who replaced them with figures of himself.

From" The Illustrated Guide to Luxor" by kent R.Weeks ,published by the American University in Cairo Press. Copyright © 2005 White Star S.p.a