Sunlight festival of Abu Simbel

The festival

Two mornings a year, the sun travels more than three thousand years old. At the Grand Temple of Abu Simbel, carved in the rock by Ramses II around 1264 B.C.E., the rays of dawn pass through the great hall and reach the sanctuary at the bottom of the temple. They illuminate three of the four statues sitting there — Amon-Ra, Ra-Horakhty and Ramses II divinized — while Ptah, god bound to the underground world, remains in the shadow.

The Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities confirms the phenomenon on 22 February and 22 October, two meetings where one rises before dawn to see light enter the mountain.