First constructed during the New Kingdom under the 18th Dynasty (circa mid-15th century BCE) by Thutmose III, the decoration program for this structure was continued by his son and successor, Amenhotep II. Amenhotep II's successor, Thutmose IV decided to place a roof over its forecourt and transform it into a pillared or hypostyle hall.

Erected as a state cult place rather than a tomb, Amada functioned to embody pharaonic presence in a frontier province: it preserves carefully executed offering scenes, foundation rituals, royal titulary and stelae that record both construction and later restorations. Its materiality—sandstone cut into a free-standing façade with an interior of painted reliefs—places it among the handful of Nubian monuments that directly show how royal ideology was exported and adapted along the Nile corridor.

During the Amarna period, Akhenaten had the name Amun destroyed throughout the temple but this was later restored by Seti I of Egypt's 19th Dynasty. Various 19th Dynasty kings especially Seti I and Ramesses II also "carried out minor restorations and added to the temple's decoration."

The original plan of the temple consisted of a pylon, followed by a small court leading to a proto-doric columned portico.

circa 1260 BCE

Pylon and Entrance
The small temple complex is fronted by a pylon, with a sandstone gateway. Seti I had a hand in some small additions, such as a large pylon with a sandstone gateway abutting against the hypostyle hall, along with other 19th Dynasty rulers including his son, Ramesses II.

circa 1380 BCE

Hypostyle Hall
The hypostyle hall was a later addition by Tuthmosis IV. Here the reliefs are executed in raised and sunk relief and include some of the finest examples of New Kingdom royal portraiture and ritual action in Nubia: kings presenting the temple to gods, coronation and offering scenes, and foundation rituals such as the stretching of the cord that document the mechanics of temple building.

circa 1260 BCE

Temple Proper
The temple proper, which was built in sandstone, has a shallow transverse hall decorated with coronation scenes, a deep offering hall connected on either side to a small cult statue shrine for Re-Horakhty (south) and Amun-Re (north).

circa 1400 CE

Also, like many other Nubian temples, the early Christians made the structure a church capped by a cupola, and in the process, contributed their own damage. On the other hand, when these same Christians plastered over many of the reliefs, they in fact preserved many of them, making these depictions some of the finest remaining in any Nubian temple.

circa 1965 CE

The relocation of Amada during the international salvage campaign of the 1960s and 1970s is one of the more remarkable instances of modern archaeological engineering meeting heritage politics. When the construction of the Aswan High Dam threatened to inundate Lower Nubia, Amada stood in the zone destined to become part of Lake Nasser and could not safely be left in place; unlike the massive stone sculptures at Abu Simbel, however, Amada’s delicate painted reliefs made simple cutting into blocks a high-risk option. Under the International Campaign to Save the Monuments of Nubia, and with substantial French technical involvement organized by Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt, conservators and engineers developed a plan to move the monument intact rather than dissecting its decorated surfaces.

Between 1964 and 1975 the temple was therefore raised and transported on a system of rails and hydraulic lifts to a new site set some 60–65 metres higher and a few kilometres inland from its original location; the rock-cut temple of Derr was also moved and re-erected nearby, creating a reconstructed cluster called New Amada. The intervention was not only a technical feat but also a complex cultural decision that balanced authenticity, documentation and the urgent politics of nation-building and international cooperation; the rescued site was later recognized within the larger UNESCO World Heritage inscribed group “Nubian Monuments from Abu Simbel to Philae.” Documentation from the salvage campaign remains a primary source for understanding both the decision-making and the hands-on mechanics of moving an intact decorated temple in the mid-twentieth century.