Even though in the Old Kingdom the Egyptians already erected giant pyramids of stone
for their pharaohs, provincial temples were still being constructed of nondurable mud-bricks.
It is usually considered that the construction of stone temples was initiated in the provinces
at the behest of the early XIth dynasty kings Wahankh Intef and Nakht-Nebtepnefer Intef
(21st cent. BC). The article explores the Intefs’ incentive for such a grand and labour-intensive
innovation, which happened amidst First Intermediate Period turmoil, at the moment when
their fledgling Theban monarchy controlled only ten southernmost nomes.
It is argued that the Intefs’ stone building in the provinces was mainly confined to the
construction and redevelopments of the chapels of the goddess Satet and the god Khnum on
the island of Elephantine of the archipelago of the First Cataract of the Nile. Close scrutiny of
the inscriptions from the chapels proves that Satet and Khnum were invoked there primarily
as the lords of the sources of the Upper Egyptian inundation, believed to be located at the
First Cataract. This correlates well with the fact that deficient Nile floods and acute food
shortages are mentioned in the First Intermediate Period and early Middle Kingdom writings
far more often than in any other period of Egyptian history. It is highly probable that the
Intefs undertook innovative stone construction on Elephantine first and foremost for the sake
of deliverance from such calamities. Later, The Book of the Temple and the famous Famine
Stele emphasized that it had been the deficiency of the Nile floods that had once forced kings
to dramatically increase royal favours to provincial temples