Kom Ombo I, Les inscriptions du naos (sanctuaires, salle de l'enneade, salle des offrandes, couloir mysterieux).

• Author: Cruz-uribe, Eugene

By ADOLPH GUTBUB. Texts edited by DANIELLE INCONNU-BOCQUILLON. Cairo: INSTITUT FRANCAIS D'ARCHEOLOGIE ORIENTALE, 1995. Pp. xxxix + 523, 8 plates.

With the appearance of Gutbub's seminal study in Textes fondamentaux de la theologie de Kom Ombo (1973), scholars of late-Egyptian religion found that de Morgan's original publication (Catalogue des monuments et inscriptions de l'Egypte antique, 1894-1909) was inadequate and eagerly waited for the IFAO publication of the temple inscriptions. With Gutbub's death in 1987 the work he began was assumed by Danielle Inconnu-Bocquillon. The volume under review is the first of four planned volumes.

In an introductory chapter Inconnu-Bocquillon helps readers acquire a good overview of the site and understand the publication style. She comments on the location and description of the temple site, the construction and decoration schema, and the theological definition of the temple; she discusses the divinities at the temple and their role in the theology; she catalogues the variety of texts found in the temple corpus and provides the reader with useful diagrams on the terminology used when texts are placed on the walls or gates (pp. xxiii-xxv, fig. 7-8). Inconnu-Bocquillon completes the introduction by discussing the epigraphy of the texts at this temple and by listing the unusual signs. While much of the information in this chapter was developed in earlier articles, the editor has done an admirable job of presenting a clear synopsis of the material.

The remaining pages give the hieroglyphic texts, juxtaposing the numbered outline drawings where possible. A new item of great benefit is the placement of temple diagrams placed before each section of the texts. Thus for the section labeled "salle des offrandes" (scenes 228-329) (pp. 307-448), a temple diagram shows from where the following drawings derive. While one could use the complete detailed drawings on p. xiii (fig. 4), these abbreviated drawings provide a more convenient manner of determining the location...