Across the river Nile, the whole structure points towards the monumental Eighth Pylon, Hatshepsut's most recognizable addition to the Temple of Karnak and the site from which the procession of the Beautiful Festival of the Valley departed.

In its design, it was heavily influenced by the adjacent Temple of Mentuhotep II of the Eleventh Dynasty built six centuries earlier.

The porticoes that front the terrace here host the most notable reliefs of the temple; those of the expedition to the Land of Punt and the divine birth of Hatshepsut, the backbone of her case to rightfully occupy the throne as a member of the royal family and as godly progeny.

Perhaps the concept of a female king was anathema to ancient Egyptian society, or a dynastic dispute between the Ahmosid and Thutmosid lineages needed resolving.

A Coptic monastery of Saint Phoibammon was built between the 6th and 8th centuries AD, and images of Christ were painted over original reliefs.

Since 1961, the Polish Centre of Mediterranean Archaeology (PCMA) has carried out extensive consolidation and restoration works throughout the temple, and it was opened to the public in March 2023.

This terrace featured two Persea (Mimusops schimperi) trees, two T-shaped basins that held papyri and flowers, and two recumbent lion statues on the ramp balustrade.

[39][40] The 25 m (82 ft) wide porticoes of the lower terrace contain 22 columns each, arranged in two rows,[41][42] and feature relief scenes on their walls.

[44] The north portico's reliefs depict Hatshepsut as a sphinx crushing her enemies, along with images of fishing and hunting, and offerings to the gods.

[13] Eight smaller and ten larger niches were cut into the west wall, these are presumed to have contained kneeling and standing statues of Pharaoh Hatshepsut.

[45] Reliefs on the walls of the shrine depict Hathor with Hatshepsut, the goddess Weret-hekhau presenting the pharaoh with a Menat necklace, and Senenmut.

[45][53] Hathor holds special significance in Thebes, representing the hills of Deir el-Bahari, and also to Hatshepsut, who presented herself as a reincarnation of the goddess.

[43][53] It comprises a hypostyle hall adorned with 12 columns arranged into three rows of four, followed by a sequence of two rooms terminating at a small niche.

[45] The name of Anubis was used to designate the heir to the throne, which the Egyptologist Ann Macy Roth associates with the reliefs depicting Hatshepsut's divine birth.

[34][60] The lintel of the red granite entrance depicts two Amuns seated upon a throne with backs together and kings kneeling in submission before them, a symbol of his supreme status in the sanctuary.

[75] Broadly, pottery, votives, food and ritual offerings, tools, scarabs, and seal amulets were deposited into the prepared holes.

[91] In Hatshepsut's time, the barque of Amun was a miniaturized copy of a transport barge equipped with three long carrying-poles borne by six priests each.

[91] The procession carried on through the entrance-gate, up the temple's great ramps, and into the sanctuary where the barque and Amun were kept for a night before being returned home to Karnak.

[91] On this day, bounteous offerings of food, meat, drink, and flowers were presented on tables to Amun, with smaller quantities reserved for the king.

At other times, hymns were sung, apotropaic rituals performed to protect Amun-Re's barque as it voyaged across the sky, and wax or clay images of enemies destroyed.

[97][98] Two decades after her death, during Thutmose III's forty-second regnal year, he decided that all evidence of her reign as king of Egypt should be erased.

This hypothesis holds that Hatshepsut usurped the throne as sole ruler, relegating Thutmose III, and consequently, he sought to erase her memory.

Workers dragged the statues from her temple to one of two designated sites: a quarry – a burrow from which fill material was obtained – and the Hatshepsut Hole.

During the Amarna Period, further erasure of the reliefs was inflicted by order of Akhenaten, albeit the target of this persecution were images of the gods, particularly Amun.

[107][113] During this time, between the Twenty-First and Twenty-Fifth Dynasties, the temple was used as a burial ground for priests of the cults of Amun and Montu, as well as for members of the royal family.

[114] During the reign of Ptolemy III Euergetes, a stone chapel was built on the middle terrace for Asklepios, a god of the Greek pantheon.

Under his supervision, the remains of the monastery of Saint Phoibammon were destroyed, and the shrines to Hathor and Anubis, as well as the south colonnade of the middle terrace, were revealed.

During the Egypt Exploration Fund's (EEF) expedition, under Édouard Naville and his assistant Howard Carter, from 1893–1906, the entire temple was excavated.

Since 1961, the Polish Center of Mediterranean Archeology (PCMA) of Warsaw University in Cairo has been engaged in restoration and consolidation efforts at the site.

[117][27] The Polish-Egyptian Archaeological and Conservation Expedition was established by Kazimierz Michałowski after he was approached by the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA).