Dan Jackson/Manifest Photography -Haggadah Project

I have been looking forward to visiting Abydos more than any other temple. It is impressive and, of the dozen or so I’ve visited, probably my favourite. It isn’t grand like Karnak or pretty like Philae but it is informative, detailed and remarkably well preserved. It’s roof is still intact which makes photography difficult but moody, dramatic and mysterious. Permission to use my tripod seems to be left to the whim of the antiquity guards or Allah or both. No luck today. Abydos is a remarkable place with many rooms each with a specific function. Carved into the walls of one of the corridors are Pharaonic cartouches that serve as a chronology of all the Pharaohs that had come to power leading up to Seti I who commissioned it’s construction and his son Ramses II who expanded on it. There are a few omissions though; Hatshepsut who usurped control from her nephew and Akhenaten who was considered a heretic for abandoning polytheism.