Card/Transcription No.: 239-11

NOTE: Fourth (innermost) Shrine - No. 239.

The roof section of this shrine is made in one piece,
comprising: a barrel-vault abutting upright rectangular end
pieces, the cornice, and the torus moulding. It thus formed as
well as the roof the greater part of the entablature of the
shrine.
Its dimensions (overall, extreme edges of the cornice) are: L.
309 cents, W. 181 cents, and H. 40 cents. 
This form of the roof - a barrel-shaped vault abutting upright
rectangular end pieces - is obviously derived from the ancient
system employed when flying a barrel-vault (without centering)
over crude brick buildings (cf the vaults over the store-chambers of the Ramesseum and modern native building South of
Kom Ombo). To eliminate a wooden centering when building an
ordinary vault, an upright end wall is first built, against
which the flat bricks of the leaning courses of the flown-vault were leant to obviate the effects of gravity while
forming the complete vault.  The other end of the flown-vault
was then closed with a similar wall.