treated, being sculptured with lotus or papyrus stems in high relief, as on the pillar-stelae of Karnak, or adorned with a head of Hathor crowned with the sistrum, as in the small speos of Abu Simbel (fig. 57), or sculptured with a full-length standing figure of Osiris, as in the second court of Medinet Habu; or, as at Denderah and Gebel Barkal, with the figure of the god Bes.  At Karnak, in an edifice which was probably erected by Horemheb with building material taken from the ruins of a sanctuary of Amenhotep II. and III., the pillar is capped by a cornice, separated from the architrave by a thin abacus (fig. 58).  By cutting away its four edges, the square pillar becomes an octagonal prism, and further, by cutting off the eight new edges, it becomes a sixteen-sided prism.  Some pillars in the tombs of Asuan and Beni Hasan, and in the processional hall at Karnak (fig. 59), as well as in the chapels of Deir el Bahari, are of this type.  Besides the forms thus regularly evolved, there are others of irregular derivation, with six, twelve, fifteen, or twenty sides, or verging almost upon a perfect circle.  The portico pillars of the temple of Osiris at Abydos come last in the series; the drum is curved, but not round, the curve being interrupted at both extremities of the same diameter by a flat stripe.  More frequently the sides are slightly channelled; and sometimes, as at Kalabsheh, the flutings are divided into four groups of five each by four vertical flat stripes (fig. 60).  The polygonal pillar has always a large, shallow plinth, in the form of a rounded disc.  At El Kab it bears the head of Hathor, sculptured in relief upon the front (fig. 61); but almost everywhere else it is crowned with a simple square abacus, which joins it to the architrave.  Thus treated, it bears a certain family likeness to the Doric column; and one understands how Jomard and Champollion, in the first ardour of discovery, were tempted to give it the scarcely justifiable name of “proto-Doric.”

[Illustration:  Fig. 59.—­Sixteen-sided pillars, Karnak.]

The column does not rest immediately upon the soil.  It is always furnished with a base like that of the polygonal pillar, sometimes square with the ground, and sometimes slightly rounded.  This base is either plain, or ornamented only with a line of hieroglyphs.  The principal forms fall into three types:  (1) the column with campaniform, or lotus-flower capital; (2) the column with lotus-bud capital; (3) the column with Hathor-head capital.

[Illustration:  Fig. 60.—­Fluted pillar, Kalabsheh.]

[Illustration:  Fig. 61.—­Polygonal Hathor-headed pillar, El Kab.]