DENDERAH (1870-74)
by Auguste Mariette
The Foundation is pleased to make available for free download pdfs of all six volumes of Auguste Mariette’s monumental work, Denderah. Mariette was often called Mariette Bey, Bey being a title of honour in the Egypt of that time under the Khedive (to whom the volumes are dedicated). Mariette was born February 11, 1821, in France, and died January 19, 1881, in Cairo. He was one of the ‘founding fathers’ of modern Egyptology. His volumes represent a complete publication of the wall paintings and carvings and texts of the Temple of Hathor in five volumes, plus a final text volume comprising extended captions and comments for all the illustrations in the five plate (planche) volumes. These six volumes were all published between 1870 and 1875 in both Paris and Cairo. The illustrations as preserved here represent some of imagery which later suffered damage or degradation, so that in some cases, the only full and correct representations are to be found in the Mariette volumes. All of his illustrations were meticulously drawn by hand, and no photography was used. The quality is so good and so clear that it has not been found necessary to add magnification software to enlarge the details. The publication dates of the successive volumes are as follows: Volume 1, 1870; Volume 2, 1870; Volume 3, 1871; Volume Four, 1873; Volume 5 is not called that but is called Supplément aux Planches (Supplementary Plates), was published in 1874, and is a thin volume containing only one foldout plate and six regular plates, one of which contains plans and elevations of some of the crypts, one of which is a plan of the terrace, and one of which is a very important representation of a detail of the astronomical ceiling of a chapel; Volume 6 is smaller format than the preceding large folio volumes, is not numbered as a volume, was published in 1875, and contains extended introductory comments, full and extended captions for all the illustrations of the preceding five volumes, followed by an extended Afterword and a Table of Contents. It is necessary to refer to the final volume for explanations.
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Download Volume I (1870) as PDF (26MB)
Download Volume II (1870) as PDF (46MB)
Download Volume III (1871) as PDF (21MB)
Download Volume IV (1873) as PDF (45MB)
Download Supplement (1874) as PDF (6MB)
