Scratched in Stone: The Isis Temple Graffiti Project In Antiquity it was common practice for visitors to leave graffiti on the walls of Egyptian temples during festivals or on other occasions. Like modern graffiti, graffiti from Egyptian temples often consist of informal writings, but unlike today these ancient graffiti have usually been incised with religious intentions. They are therefore a treasure trove for the study of the personal piety of the ordinary visitors of temples in Ancient Egypt. The case of the temple of Isis at Aswan, a less well-known temple than the famous temple of Isis at nearby Philae but completely preserved, illustrates this: the temple contains more than 300 graffiti, both texts and figures, which give a detailed insight into the more than a thousand years the temple functioned as a religious building and how ordinary Egyptians experienced their religion – we cannot get closer to them than that!