Style on the Nile

Why in-the-know travelers are flocking to a chic hideaway in Luxor, once the capital of ancient Egypt.

- Chris Wallace

THE HOUSES in Luxor seem to strive skyward, forever optimistic. From their roofs, brick columns rise to the heavens, sprouting rebar in anticipation of another layer of construction. Homeowners don't have to pay taxes on buildings that remain a work in progress, and many remain hopeful that a windfall might facilitate a new addition. From 1570 to 1069 B.C., this city was the capital of Egypt, and every pharaoh who came to power launched a new construction project within its sprawling temple complex. For half a millennium, it was the center of a civilization. Now, on the strength of a new tide of visitors, the city continues to grow.

In its heyday, Luxor was known as Wase the city of the scepter. The king of the gods, Amon, was said to reside there, along with a cult devoted to him. The Greeks later renamed the place Thebes a corruption of the name of a local temple, perhaps. Nowadays we call it Luxor, from the Arabic Al-Uqsur, meaning "the palaces." My guides said that the name Luxor is the root from which the word luxurious grew. If this is the case, the broad avenues running along the banks of the Nile and the evidence of the magnificently debauched festivals that took place there-including points of rest along the procession route for revelers to consume wine-would go a long way toward explaining why.

The pharaohs' constant expansion of their temples to Amon resulted in the sandstone Luxor and Karnak complexes on the east bank of the Nile, which remain awesome even today. As do the Colossi of Memnon, so called because graffiti misidentified them as statues of the Greek god Memnon, instead of the pharaoh Amenhotep III, who built them in his own image around 1350 B.C.