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Obelisks were prominent in the architecture of the ancient Egyptians, and played a vital role in their religion placing them in pairs at the entrance of the temples.The word "obelisk" as used in English today is of Greek rather than Egyptian origin because Herodotus, the Greek traveler, was one of the first classical writers to describe the objects.
A dagger, obelisk, or obelus † is a typographical mark that usually indicates a footnote if an asterisk has already been used. [1] The symbol is also used to indicate death (of people) or extinction (of species or languages). [ 2 ]
An obelisk is a specialized kind of stele. The Insular high crosses of Ireland and Great Britain are specialized steles. Totem poles of North and South America that are made out of stone may also be considered a specialized type of stele.
The dagger symbol †, also called an obelisk, [10] is derived from the obelus, and continues to be used for this purpose. The obelus is believed to have been invented by the Homeric scholar Zenodotus, as one of a system of editorial symbols. They marked questionable or corrupt words or passages in manuscripts of the Homeric epics. [9]
Heliopolis is the Latinised form of the Greek name Hēlioúpolis (Ἡλιούπολις), meaning "City of the Sun". Helios, the personified and deified form of the sun, was identified by the Greeks with the native Egyptian gods Ra and Atum, whose principal cult was located in the city.
The largest known obelisk, the unfinished obelisk, was never erected and was discovered in its original quarry. It is nearly one-third larger than the largest ancient Egyptian obelisk ever erected (the Lateran Obelisk in Rome); if finished it would have measured around 41.75 metres (137.0 ft) [ 6 ] and would have weighed nearly 1,090 tonnes ...
A pair of obelisks usually stood in front of a pylon. In addition to standard vertical grooves on the exterior face of a pylon wall which were designed to hold flag poles, some pylons also contained internal stairways and rooms. [2] The oldest intact pylons belong to mortuary temples from the Ramesside period in the 13th and 12th centuries BCE. [2]
The obelisk is a determinative in the Egyptian language, and the word t(kh)n has multiple spellings, since obelisk construction was done over various time periods. Some spellings are: [ 1 ] The second spelling uses the shortened variety of the block-of-stone (hieroglyph) ,