Thebes

An ancient Egyptian city on the Nile, centered around modern Luxor, that became a major religious and political center, especially during the New Kingdom.

Luxor: A modern Egyptian city on the Nile that occupies the site of ancient Thebes. Its urban core overlies the eastern part of the ancient city.
Theban Triad: The group of gods Amun, Mut, and Khonsu worshipped together at Thebes. Their shared cult gave the city a distinct religious identity.
Mentuhotep II: An Egyptian pharaoh who reunified the country and established the Middle Kingdom’s Eleventh Dynasty rule. His Theban dynasty first made the city a seat of reunified Egypt.
Colossi of Memnon: Two monumental seated statues of Amenhotep III that once guarded his mortuary temple on Thebes’s west bank. They are conspicuous survivors of a largely vanished royal temple complex.
Memphis, Egypt: An ancient Egyptian city near the apex of the Nile Delta that served as a major capital for much of pharaonic history. Its northern political role contrasts with Thebes’s southern religious and dynastic prominence.
Nile: A major African river flowing north through Egypt to the Mediterranean Sea. The river linked Thebes to Egypt’s agricultural heartland and transport network.
Mut: An ancient Egyptian mother goddess and consort of Amun in the Theban Triad. Her precinct formed a major part of the religious landscape at Karnak.
Eleventh Dynasty of Egypt: An ancient Egyptian ruling dynasty based at Thebes, associated with the reunification that began the Middle Kingdom. Its rise explains Thebes’s early emergence as a royal center.
Mortuary Temple of Hatshepsut: A terraced temple at Deir el-Bahri built for the Eighteenth Dynasty pharaoh Hatshepsut. Its design and setting show how royal commemoration used Thebes’s western cliffs.
Amarna: The short-lived city founded by Akhenaten as the center of his worship of the Aten. Akhenaten’s court shifted power away from Thebes and challenged Amun’s clergy.

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