This central building is called the Akhonuti, or private dwelling of kings or nobles, to which only the family and intimate friends had access.  The number of storeys and the arrangement of the facade varied according to the taste of the owner.  The frontage was generally a straight wall.  Sometimes it was divided into three parts, with the middle division projecting, in which case the two wings were ornamented with a colonnade to each storey (fig. 18), or surmounted by an open gallery (fig. 19).  The central pavilion sometimes presents the appearance of a tower, which dominates the rest of the building (fig. 20).  The facade is often decorated with slender colonnettes of painted wood, which bear no weight, and merely serve to lighten the somewhat severe aspect of the exterior.  Of the internal arrangements, we know but little.  As in the middle-class houses, the sleeping rooms were probably small and dark; but, on the other hand, the reception rooms must have been nearly as large as those still in use in the Arab houses of modern Egypt.

[Illustration:  Fig. 17.—­Perspective view of the Palace of AT, Eighteenth Dynasty, El Amarna.]

[Illustration:  Fig. 18.—­Frontage of house, second Theban period.]

[Illustration:  Fig. 19.—­Frontage of house, second Theban period.]

[Illustration:  Fig. 20.—­Central pavilion of house, in form of tower, second Theban period.]

The decoration of walls and ceilings in no wise resembled such scenes or designs as we find in the tombs.  The panels were whitewashed or colour-washed, and bordered with a polychrome band.  The ceilings were usually left white; sometimes, however they were decorated with geometrical patterns, which repeated the leading motives employed in the sepulchral wall-paintings.  Thus we find examples of meanders interspersed with rosettes (fig. 21), parti-coloured squares (fig. 22), ox-heads seen frontwise, scrolls, and flights of geese (fig. 23).

[Illustration:  Fig. 21.—­Ceiling pattern from behind, Medinet Habu, Twentieth Dynasty.]

[Illustration:  Fig. 22.—­Ceiling pattern similar to one at El Bersheh, Twelfth Dynasty.]

I have touched chiefly upon houses of the second Theban period,[2] this being in fact the time of which we have most examples.  The house-shaped lamps which are found in such large numbers in the Fayum date only from Roman times; but the Egyptians of that period continued to build according to the rules which were in force under the Pharaohs of the Twelfth, Eighteenth, Nineteenth, and Twentieth Dynasties.  As regards the domestic architecture of the ancient kingdom, the evidences are few and obscure.  Nevertheless, the stelae, tombs, and coffins of that period often furnish designs which show us the style of the doorways (fig. 24), and one Fourth Dynasty sarcophagus, that of Khufu Poskhu, is carved in the likeness of a house (fig. 25).

[1] Many of the rooms at Kahun had vaulted ceilings.