the “Delight of Ra”, the “Sun Temple” of King NiuserRa (ca. 2420–2389 BCE) a

the “Delight of Ra”, the “Sun Temple” of King NiuserRa (ca. 2420–2389 BCE) at Bousiri (pr-Wsjr, “the House of Osiris”, that is the name of more than ten sacred cities of Egypt)“In addition to His extensive rebuilding of Userkaf’s "Sun Temple”, NiuserRa built His own, named “Delight of Ra”. The upper Temple was set within a rectangular enclosure oriented to the cardinal directions. A T-shaped entrance hall had five granite-lined doorways. Those on the centre axis gave on to a broad rectangular court, dominated on the west by the obelisk, 36 m (118 ft) tall, built of limestone blocks. It stood on a pedestal in the form of a truncated pyramid, itself 20 m (65 ft 6 in) high, and built of limestone with red granite around the base. The combined height equalled or surpassed that of NiuserRa’s pyramid. In front of the obelisk and aligned with its centre axis stands an altar consisting of five slabs of white alabaster. The central element takes the form of a circle, 1.8 m (6 ft) in diameter, flanked by four slabs with the top carved in relief as the “Hotep” hieroglyph - a stylized conical bread loaf on a reed mat. This is the sign for ‘offering’, ‘satisfied’ or ‘peace’, commonly found at the base of false doors in Old Kingdom tombs. The whole arrangement can be read as “May Ra be satisfied”. (…)From the entrance hall a right turn led along a corridor to a set of magazines built against the north enclosure wall, probably for short-term storage of offerings. At the east end a stairway led to the roof. A left turn in the entrance hall led to corridors with a wealth of fine relief carvings. These include one of the earliest scenes of the Sed festival of the King’s renewal. In a section that attached to the pedestal building the three seasons were depicted. (…)Just outside the enclosure of the upper Temple a huge mudbrick model of a boat, 30 m (98 ft) long, was found. This colossal simulacrum of a ship perhaps signifies the mythic boat in which Ra sailed across the ocean of the sky. It also hints that the “Sun Temple”, like the pyramid complexes, was seen as a symbolic port to the world of the Gods.“(from "The Complete Pyramids” by M. Lehner) -- source link

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