Step Pyramid of Djoser

Step Pyramid of Djoser

c. 2675-2625 BCE

1746

Step Pyramid of Zoser

House of the North

Imhotep

Egyptian

built works

Egypt (nation)

Ṣaqqâra (ruins)

Third Dynasty (Egyptian)

temples (buildings)

columns (architectural elements)

Detail view of columns with papyrus blossom capitals at the House of the North near the Step Pyramid in Saqqara, Egypt. "Most of the structures within the precinct were "dummy" buildings, with stone walls enclosing a fill of rubble. Stone had only been used for door frames so Imhotop found his precedents in organic forms: "bundles of reeds tied together in the corners of brick structures with heads fanning out. . . transcribed into stone, ...became the fasciculated column with capital; he simulated in stone the logs placed edgewise to form a roof; palm stalks, reed fences, matting, papyrus and other soft materials of which the contemporary houses were constructed, and which have all perished, thus became petrified in a medium that lent itself to stateliness and austerity." Most of the main structures were in pairs, symbolic of the North and South, and indicating that rituals were probably repeated. House of the South with engaged proto-Doric columns and House of the North with engaged columns in the shape of the papyrus plant (even to the triangular shaft, imitating the stem) and right: columns of the "T" temple and one of the shrines around the Heb-Sed (Jubilee) Court,"--by Mary Ann Sullivan, Bluffton University.

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