Friday, June 26, 2009

Saving the West Bank temples in Luxor

Luxor News Blog (Jane Akshar)

Good news about the problems of the rising of the water table and destruction of the monuments. The problems is that with the building of the Aswan Dam water is now available to the farmer all year round. The temples were built taking into account they would be flooded 3 months of the year and bone dry for the other 9 months. The farmer would have one crop a year, he would sow his seed as the waters of the inundation receded and the yearly crop would grow and be harvested.

Now water is available all year round. The farmer flood irrigates his field and can crop 2 to 3 times a year. This has risen the water table and the temple foundations how sit in water all year round. This is decaying the stone and sand stone becomes sand again.


See the above page for Jane's complete post.

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