Qasr el-Ghweita
Vivian, Cassandra (2000) The Western Deserts of Egypt, pp. 81-2:
"Qasr al-Ghweita, Fortress of the Small Garden, is located 18 kilometers (11 miles) south of Qasr Kharga, atop a high sandstone hill to the east of the main road. This beautiful and picturesque fortress commands a strategic view of the entire area and was once the center of an extensive agricultural community. Little remains of the buildings of the village, which once tumbled down the hillside and onto the plain below, or of the vineyards that once supplied wine to the royal court in the Nile Valley. Inscriptions in the tombs at Thebes attest to the excellent quality of the grapes of Ghweita. This means the ancient Egyptians inhabited the area long before the erection of the present fortress and some other type of fortification must have existed on the top of the hill. In fact, there is evidence that the site was inhabited in prehistory.
The fortress dominates the hilltop. It could well have been the headquarters for the garrison in Roman times. Within its walls is a well preserved sandstone temple dedicated, like its sister at Hibis, to the Theban triad of Amun, Mut, and Khonsu. The present temple was originally constructed by Darius I with additions by Ptolemies III, IV, and X, and is a three-room temple with a courtyard, hypostyle hall, and sancruary. Within the hypostyle hall, on the lower register circling all four walls are scenes of Hapi, god of the Nile, holding symbols of the nomes of ancient Egypt. The sancruary has plenty of decorations, some ruined by the black soot of many fires. Around the exterior are several areas where ancient houses are being excavated and a small sand dune hugs one of the exterior walls.
In 1819 Drovetti and Edmondstone, separately, found the ruins of an Arab village inside the large temple. Excavated by Ahmed Fakhry in 1972, the yellow sandstone temple has undergone more recent excavations by the Egyptian Antiquities Organization."
"Qasr al-Ghweita, Fortress of the Small Garden, is located 18 kilometers (11 miles) south of Qasr Kharga, atop a high sandstone hill to the east of the main road. This beautiful and picturesque fortress commands a strategic view of the entire area and was once the center of an extensive agricultural community. Little remains of the buildings of the village, which once tumbled down the hillside and onto the plain below, or of the vineyards that once supplied wine to the royal court in the Nile Valley. Inscriptions in the tombs at Thebes attest to the excellent quality of the grapes of Ghweita. This means the ancient Egyptians inhabited the area long before the erection of the present fortress and some other type of fortification must have existed on the top of the hill. In fact, there is evidence that the site was inhabited in prehistory.
The fortress dominates the hilltop. It could well have been the headquarters for the garrison in Roman times. Within its walls is a well preserved sandstone temple dedicated, like its sister at Hibis, to the Theban triad of Amun, Mut, and Khonsu. The present temple was originally constructed by Darius I with additions by Ptolemies III, IV, and X, and is a three-room temple with a courtyard, hypostyle hall, and sancruary. Within the hypostyle hall, on the lower register circling all four walls are scenes of Hapi, god of the Nile, holding symbols of the nomes of ancient Egypt. The sancruary has plenty of decorations, some ruined by the black soot of many fires. Around the exterior are several areas where ancient houses are being excavated and a small sand dune hugs one of the exterior walls.
In 1819 Drovetti and Edmondstone, separately, found the ruins of an Arab village inside the large temple. Excavated by Ahmed Fakhry in 1972, the yellow sandstone temple has undergone more recent excavations by the Egyptian Antiquities Organization."
Page last updated, 2nd June, 2011