Esna

The Greco-Roman Temple and a previous temple built here by Tuthmosis III were dedicated to the ram headed god Khnum. The Temple of Khnum owes its unique situation to Nile floods which buried it; modern Esna was built over it. Excavation from the 1860s revealed the hall, built during the reign of the Roman emperor Claudius (AD 41-54).

The temple sitting 10 meters (33 feet) below street level gives you a feeling of what it must have been like for those who excavated other semi-buried monuments elsewhere in Egypt.

Esna was known by the ancient Greeks as Latopolis because the Nile perch (lates in Greek) was worshiped here; in 1902, thousands of mummified Nile perch from the Greco-Roman period were discovered.

Previously most visitors came to Esna specifically to see the temple. Esna has become increasingly worthwhile to visit with the restoration and reopening in 2021 of the Wekalet Al-Geddawi, a caravanserai built in 1792 to store goods and as lodging for traveling merchants. You will also see 19th Century homes and the redeveloped old Ottoman market of Al-Qissariya adjacent to the temple, and some of Esna’s heritage of craft traditions.

There are two dams, one from the colonial period and a new dam that has two locks. This is why we prefer starting dahabiya tours from Esna – we can avoid going through the locks. Exceptions are dahabiya tours that run in the other direction, from Aswan. There are also some dahabiya tours that start in Luxor and cross the lock, however these take six or seven nights.

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