Dendera Zodiac

The Dendera Zodiac is a circular bas-relief carved into the ceiling of the Osiris chapel on the roof of the Temple of Hathor, dating to the late Ptolemaic or early Roman period. It is the oldest known full representation of the classical Western zodiac in a circular form, combining Egyptian astronomical tradition with Greek iconography introduced after Alexander the Great's conquest of Egypt.

The zodiac depicts the constellations in a circular arrangement, including figures recognisable as Taurus, Leo, Scorpio, and other zodiac signs alongside Egyptian deities. Its astronomical accuracy and the precision of its astronomical alignments have been the subject of scholarly analysis for two centuries. What you see in the chapel today is a painted plaster cast; the original sandstone relief is displayed at the Louvre in Paris.

things to do sight
A story
When Napoleon's engineers discovered the Dendera Zodiac in 1799, it caused a crisis for Biblical chronology. The zodiac appeared to date from far earlier than the accepted age of the world according to 18th-century theology — scholars debated its age fiercely for decades. The original zodiac was cut from the ceiling of the Osiris chapel in 1820 by French entrepreneur Sébastien Louis Saulnier, who reportedly used saws and gunpowder to remove it. It is now in the Louvre; a painted cast remains in the chapel ceiling in Dendara.

Other places in Things to Do