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Ships were used during the Eighteenth Dynasty of ancient Egypt to transport obelisks from the quarry to their destination. Fifteen centuries later, the Romans used ships to transport obelisks across the Mediterranean to Rome. Today, eight ancient Egyptian obelisks stand in Rome, though not in their original places. The first of the obelisks, the 263-ton Flaminian obelisk, was transported from Heliopolis – modern-day Cairo – in 10 BCE. while the last, the 500-ton Lateran obelisk, was transported from Karnak.
The earliest obelisk ships were built in Ancient Egypt to transport obelisks via the Nile from the quarries to their destination.
During the reign of Thutmose I, Ineni was granted superintendence of the king's building projects, which included the erection of two obelisks. A surviving text fragment documents that the obelisk ship had a length of ~63 metres (207 ft) and a width of ~21 metres (69 ft). [1]
I (Ineni) inspected the erection of two obelisks ... built the august boat of 120 cubits in its length, 40 cubits in its width, in order to transport these obelisks. (They) came in peace, safety and prosperity, and landed at Karnak ... of the city. Its 'track' was laid with every pleasant wood.
A relief depicting Hatshepsut's barge loaded with two obelisks on its way to the great temple of Amun at Karnak was found in the Mortuary Temple of Hatshepsut at Deir el-Bahari. [2]
In the 19th dynasty, Seti I commissioned numerous works, including multiple obelisks, and large barges to transport them. A rock stela at Aswan states:
His Majesty has ordered the commissioning of multitudinous works for the making of very great obelisks and great and wondrous statues in the name of His Majesty. He made great barges for transporting them, and ships crews to match them (for) ferrying them from the quarry while the officials and transport-men hastened and his eldest son was before them doing what is beneficial for His Majesty. [3]
During the Roman Empire ships were constructed to transport obelisks from Egypt across the Mediterranean to Rome and Constantinople (modern Istanbul). Pliny the Elder (23–79 CE) and Ammianus Marcellinus (330–393 CE) give accounts of how obelisks were brought to Rome. [4]
Pliny the Elder described how an obelisk was loaded onto a ship.
For this purpose, a canal was dug from the river Nile to the spot where the obelisk lay; and two broad vessels, laden with blocks of similar stone a foot square, the cargo of each amounting to double the size, and consequently double the weight, of the obelisk, were brought beneath it; the extremities of the obelisk remaining supported by the opposite sides of the canal. The blocks of stone were then removed, and the vessels, being thus gradually lightened, received their burden. [4]
There is little evidence of the great ships that carried the large obelisks across the Mediterranean. One of the two ships that carried the Vatican obelisk was purposely sunk by the emperor Claudius to build the Portus harbor; the other burned down during Caligula’s reign (36–41 CE) while on display at the Puteoli harbor. [4]
Three Roman ships were built to transport one obelisk. The two aft ships were of rectangular shape; they were 37 meters in length and 5 meters in width. The two ships were held together by longitudinal beams, while the obelisk was tied to these longitudinal beams and held stationary underwater. The third ship, a larger trireme, was in the front and was tied to the two larger ships carrying the obelisk. The third ship’s purpose was to help steer the two aft ships and have rowers and sail power the ship across the Mediterranean.
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Until the second half of the 19th century two obelisks were located at the Caesareum of Alexandria, now known as Cleopatra's Needles. The fallen one was taken to London by the cylinder ship Cleopatra in 1877. Four years later, the standing one was loaded onto the SS Dessoug and shipped to New York City. [5]
Hatshepsut was the Great Royal Wife of Pharaoh Thutmose II and the fifth Pharaoh of the Eighteenth Dynasty of Egypt, ruling first as regent, then as queen regnant from c. 1479 BC until c. 1458 BC. She was Egypt's second confirmed queen regnant, the first being Sobekneferu/Nefrusobek in the Twelfth Dynasty.
An obelisk is a tall, four-sided, narrow tapering monument which ends in a pyramid-like shape or pyramidion at the top. Originally constructed by Ancient Egyptians and called tekhenu, the Greeks used the Greek term obeliskos to describe them, and this word passed into Latin and ultimately English. Though William Thomas used the term correctly in his Historie of Italie of 1549, by the late sixteenth century, Shakespeare failed to distinguish between pyramids and obelisks in his plays and sonnets. Ancient obelisks are monolithic and consist of a single stone; most modern obelisks are made of several stones.
The Karnak Temple Complex, commonly known as Karnak, comprises a vast mix of temples, pylons, chapels, and other buildings near Luxor, Egypt. Construction at the complex began during the reign of Senusret I in the Middle Kingdom and continued into the Ptolemaic Kingdom, although most of the extant buildings date from the New Kingdom. The area around Karnak was the ancient Egyptian Ipet-isut and the main place of worship of the 18th Dynastic Theban Triad, with the god Amun as its head. It is part of the monumental city of Thebes, and in 1979 it was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List along with the rest of the city. The Karnak complex gives its name to the nearby, and partly surrounded, modern village of El-Karnak, 2.5 kilometres north of Luxor.
Thutmose I was the third pharaoh of the 18th Dynasty of Egypt. He received the throne after the death of the previous king, Amenhotep I. During his reign, he campaigned deep into the Levant and Nubia, pushing the borders of Egypt farther than ever before in each region. He also built many temples in Egypt, and a tomb for himself in the Valley of the Kings; he is the first king confirmed to have done this.
Thutmose II was the fourth Pharaoh of the Eighteenth Dynasty of Egypt, and his reign is generally dated from 1493 to 1479 BC. Little is known about him and he is overshadowed by his father Thutmose I, half-sister and wife Hatshepsut, and son Thutmose III. He died around the age of 30 and his body was found in the Deir el-Bahri Cache above the Mortuary Temple of Hatshepsut.
The Red Chapel of Hatshepsut or the Chapelle rouge was a religious shrine in Ancient Egypt.
The unfinished obelisk is the largest known ancient obelisk and is located in the northern region of the stone quarries of ancient Egypt in Aswan, Egypt. It was studied in detail by Reginald Engelbach in 1922.
Caligula's "Giant Ship", also known as the "Round Ship", was a very large barge, the ruins of which were found during the construction of Rome's Leonardo da Vinci International Airport in Fiumicino, Italy, in the 1950s. This was previously a Roman port a few kilometres north of Ostia at the mouth of the Tiber River. The ship was dated to c. 37 AD using dendrochronological dating methods.
Ancient Egyptian technology describes devices and technologies invented or used in Ancient Egypt. The Egyptians invented and used many simple machines, such as the ramp and the lever, to aid construction processes. They used rope trusses to stiffen the beam of ships. Egyptian paper, made from papyrus, and pottery were mass-produced and exported throughout the Mediterranean Basin. The wheel was used for a number of purposes, but chariots only came into use after the Second Intermediate Period. The Egyptians also played an important role in developing Mediterranean maritime technology including ships and lighthouses.
The Lateran Obelisk or Tekhen Waty in ancient Egyptian is the largest standing ancient Egyptian obelisk in the world, and it is also the tallest obelisk in Italy. It originally weighed 413 tonnes, but after collapsing and being re-erected 4 metres (13 ft) shorter, now weighs around 300 tonnes. It is located in Rome, in the square across from the Archbasilica of St. John Lateran and the San Giovanni Addolorata Hospital.
The mortuary temple of Hatshepsut is a mortuary temple built during the reign of Pharaoh Hatshepsut of the Eighteenth Dynasty of Egypt. Located opposite the city of Luxor, it is considered to be a masterpiece of ancient architecture. Its three massive terraces rise above the desert floor and into the cliffs of Deir el-Bahari. Her tomb, KV20, lies inside the same massif capped by El Qurn, a pyramid for her mortuary complex. At the edge of the desert, 1 km (0.62 mi) east, connected to the complex by a causeway lies the accompanying valley temple. Across the river Nile, the whole structure points towards the monumental Eighth Pylon, Hatshepsut's most recognizable addition to the Temple of Karnak and the site from which the procession of the Beautiful Festival of the Valley departed. The temple's twin functions are identified by its axes: its main east-west axis served to receive the barque of Amun-Re at the climax of the festival, while its north-south axis represented the life cycle of the pharaoh from coronation to rebirth.
The Luxor Obelisks are a pair of ancient Egyptian obelisks, over 3,000 years old, carved to stand either side of the portal of the Luxor Temple in the reign of Ramesses II. The right-hand (western) stone, 23 metres (75 ft) high, was moved in the 1830s to the Place de la Concorde in Paris, France, while the left-hand (eastern) obelisk remains in its location in Egypt.
Bas-relief carvings in the ancient Egyptian temple of Deir el-Bahari depict events in the life of the pharaoh or monarch Hatshepsut of the Eighteenth Dynasty. They show the Egyptian gods, in particular Amun, presiding over her creation, and describe the ceremonies of her coronation. Their purpose was to confirm the legitimacy of her status as a woman pharaoh. Later rulers attempted to erase the inscriptions.
The Flaminio Obelisk is one of the thirteen ancient obelisks in Rome, Italy. It is located in the Flaminio quarter on Piazza del Popolo.
Amenhotep was an ancient Egyptian high steward in office during the reign of Queen Hatshepsut. He is mainly known from his tomb and from a series of rock-cut inscriptions in the Aswan region.
Minmose was an Ancient Egyptian official under the ruling queen Hatshepsut. He was the overseer of the double granary. He is shown in the queen's mortuary temple at Deir el Bahari in a scene depicting the transport of two obelisks. and was therefore evidently involved in the erection of these monuments. He also appears on objects found in the burial KV60 of the nurse Sitre In who was buried in the Valley of the Kings. Minmose might have been buried close the temple of Hatshepsut at Deir el Bahari. There was found a burial in shaft tomb with the remains of a coffin belonging to a person called Minmose. The burial was already heavily looted in ancient times and reused in the 21st Dynasty.
Ancient Rome had a variety of ships that played crucial roles in its military, trade, and transportation activities. Rome was preceded in the use of the sea by other ancient, seafaring civilizations of the Mediterranean. The galley was a long, narrow, highly maneuverable ship powered by oarsmen, sometimes stacked in multiple levels such as biremes or triremes, and many of which also had sails. Initial efforts of the Romans to construct a war fleet were based on copies of Carthaginian warships. In the Punic wars in the mid-third century BCE, the Romans were at first outclassed by Carthage at sea, but by 256 BCE had drawn even and fought the wars to a stalemate. In 55 BCE Julius Caesar used warships and transport ships to invade Britain. Numerous types of transport ships were used to carry foodstuffs or other trade goods around the Mediterranean, many of which did double duty and were pressed into service as warships or troop transports in time of war.