26/11/2021
Egypt reopens ancient Avenue of Sphinxes in Luxor
Egypt reopened on Thursday the ancient Avenue of Sphinxes in Luxor in a ceremony in the same style of the Pharaohs Golden Parade that impressed the world in April.
The long-awaited inauguration was attended by President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi, First Lady Entissar Amer, 20 ministers including Minister of Tourism and Antiquities Khaled El-Enani, and 35 foreign ambassadors.
The inauguration of the avenue, which connects an ancient quay on the Nile with the first pylon of Karnak Temple, marked the launch of a major campaign to promote Luxor as one of the world’s largest open-air museums.
The Avenue of Sphinxes was built during the reign of King Nectanebo I, the founder of the 30th and last native dynasty of Egypt, about 2,400 years ago.
At sunset, the ceremony started with lighting up the 2,700-metre-long ancient walkway, unveiling the recently restored sphinxes that adorn the walkway on both flanks.
As many as 1,057 ram-headed and man-headed sphinxes appeared sitting on sandstone plinths opposite one another along the course of the ceremonial route. Many of the statues were recently restored after centuries spent under the desert sands.
The ceremony also saw a re-enactment of the ancient Opet Festival, with dozens of performers wearing ancient Egyptian-style clothes and treading the Great Processional Path while carrying three golden, boat-shaped shrines to the deities Amun-Re, Mut, and Khonsu.
Thursday’s festival was accompanied by a lively musical performance by the United Philharmonic Orchestra and Choir under maestro Nader Abbasi, who also led the orchestra during the Pharaohs’ Golden Parade in April.
Some 160 musicians took part in the event, in addition to dozens of technicians, Egyptologists, and experts on hieroglyphics.
The event, which led to full bookings in Luxor for the first time in more than 10 years, was covered by some 200 accredited foreign media correspondents, and thousands of viewers watched the event online.
