KING DJOSER’S (ZOSER’S) FUNERARY COMPLEX
King Djoser funerary complex, 2630 BCE
Saqqara, Lower Egypt
Let us look at the entry hall to the complex. It is the rectangular volume furthest left in the image above (there is an opening at its bottom you can almost see). The images shown help to reveal the approach sequence. First, notice how small the entry is relative to the rest of the site in the site plan (the entry hall is at the bottom-left). Looking at the plan, photos, and drawings, we can see and feel the ebb and flow of the entry hall. Note how columns appear at regular spacing, creating a rhythm, and they are not free-standing but, rather, engaged to walls (they are called “engaged columns”). As those engaged columns compress toward the center and then recede back to the boundary walls, a repetitive contraction-and-expansion of space is felt, like exhaling and inhaling with our lungs. The hall is mostly symmetrical, so this rhythm is the dominant effect of the sequence. Also felt is the symbolic entrance of light from above; it enters from a clerestory (empty volume at the top of the structure), which also allows hot air to escape while being replaced by cooler shaded air. One would not be able to resist noticing and interacting with the many engaged columns, and we can see how their fluting (the vertical carvings) is convex (pushes outward); this is the inverse of what we will see in Greek columns, which have concave (pulling inward) fluting. The Egyptian use of convex fluting is a representation in stone of the way the columns were
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made out of branches bundled together into one “column” of many round verticals.
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Detail of existing columns, King Djoser Mortuary Complex (2780-2680 BCE, by Imhotep)
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King Djoser Mortuary Complex, site plan, Entry Hall at #10 (2780-2680 BCE, by Imhotep)
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King Djoser Mortuary Complex (2780-2680 BCE, by Imhotep)
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Detail of existing columns, King Djoser Mortuary Complex (2780-2680 BCE, by Imhotep)
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King Djoser Mortuary Complex, site plan, Entry Hall at #10 (2780-2680 BCE, by Imhotep)
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The clerestory is an essential component in this architectural sequence. The long entry hall would be extremely dark without it, and our eyes would not be able to discern the contours of the fluted columns. The rhythmic penetration of light augments the anatomical metaphor of the expansion-and-contraction spatial sequence. With special spiritual importance given to the sun, the fact that it illuminates the space from high above, crossing through the tops of the columns, heightens the sacred experience. Simultaneously, the hot air rises and is allowed to escape out the clerestory, while the cooler shaded air is more than willing to replace it, creating a natural cycle of ventilation.
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