with but a line on this subject: "Sais," he says, "especially worships Athenè
(Neith). The tomb of Psammitichos is in the very temple of that goddess"
(xvii. 18).
Herodotus affirms (ii. 129-132) that Mycerinus caused the body of his
daughter to be inclosed in the flank of a wooden cow, richly gilt, and he
says that "the cow in question was never placed in the earth." In his time it
was exposed to the view of all comers in a magnificently decorated saloon
of the royal palace of Sais. We may be allowed to suggest that Herodotus
was mistaken in the name of the prince; Mycerinus is not likely to have so
far abandoned all the funerary traditions of his time, or to have entombed
the body of his daughter in a spot so distant from his own pyramid at
Gizeh. There is one hypothesis, however, which may save us from the
necessity of once again accusing the Greek historian of misunderstanding
what was said to him; in their desire to weld together the present with the
past, and to collect into their capital such national monuments as might
appeal to the imaginations of their subjects, the Sait princes may have
transported such a curiously shaped sarcophagus either from the pyramid
of Mycerinus or from some small pyramid in its neighbourhood.
Herodotus, iii. 16. Upon this subject see an interesting article by M.
Eugène Revillout, entitled: Le Roi Amasis et les mercenaires Grecs, selon
les Donnés d'Hérodote et les Renseignements de la Chronique Démotique
de Paris. ( Revue Égyptologique, first year; p. 50 et seq. )
There are two passages in Herodotus (ii. 91, and 138) from which we may
infer that the Egyptians were fond of planting trees about their temples.
Lettres Écrites d'Égypte et de Nubie, 2nd edition, 1868, p. 41.
Similar structures exist in lower Chaldæa, and have furnished many
inscriptions of great interest and value to assyriologists.
Rhind, Thebes, etc. p. 51. Belzoni, Narrative of the Operations, etc. p. 167.
Rhind, p. 52. Among the mummified animals found at Thebes, Wilkinson
also mentions monkeys, sheep, cows, cats, crocodiles, etc. See Belzoni,
Narrative, p. 187.
When Mariette discovered the tomb of the Apis which had died in the
twenty-sixth year of the reign of Rameses II., the fingers of the Egyptian
mason who laid the last stone of the wall built across the entrance to the
tomb were found marked upon the cement, and "when I entered the
sarcophagus-chamber I found upon the thin layer of dust which covered
the floor the marks made by the naked feet of the workmen who had
placed the god in his last resting place 3,200 years before." (Quoted by
Rhôné in L'Égypte à Petites Journées, p. 239.)
We may take a few of those in the Boulak Museum at random: Ra-Hotep
(No. 590), Hathor-En-Khéou (588), Ra-Nefer (23), Ra-Our (25), Sokar-
Kha-Ca-u (993), Noum-Hotep (26), Hathor-Nefer (41), Ptah-Asses (500),
Ptah-Hotep, &c. The names of several deities are to be found in the
inscription upon the wooden coffin or mummy-case of Mycerinus, now in
the British Museum. (Maspero, Histoire Ancienne, p. 75). A priest of Apis is
mentioned upon a tomb of the fourth dynasty; Osiris is invoked in the
steles of the sixth dynasty. (Boulak Catalogue, No. 41.)
Amen, or Ammon, is never mentioned on the monuments of the Ancient
Empire; his first appearance is contemporary with the twelfth dynasty.
(Grébault, Hymne à Ammon-Ra, Introduction, part iii. p. 136.) This is
natural enough. Amen was a Theban god, and Thebes does not seem to
have existed in the time of the Ancient Empire.
Notice des principaux Monuments exposés dans les Galeries provisoires
du Musée d' ntiquités Égyptiennes à Boulak. (Edition of 1876, No. 582.)
The total height of the Sphinx is 66 feet; the ear is 6 feet 4 inches high; the
nose is 6 feet, the mouth 7 feet 9 inches, wide. The greatest width of the
face across the cheeks is 14 feet 2 inches. If cleared entirely of sand the
Sphinx would thus be higher than a five-storied house. For the history of
the Sphinx, the different restorations which it has undergone, and the
aspect which it has presented at different epochs, see Mariette, Questions
relatives aux nouvelles Fouilles. Our plan (Fig. 204) shows the wide flight of steps which was constructed in the time of Trajan to give access to a
landing constructed immediately in front of the fore-paws. Between these
paws a little temple was contrived, where the steles consecrated by
several of the Theban kings in honour of the Sphinx were arranged.
Caviglia was the first to bring all these matters to light, in 1817, but the
ensemble, as it now exists, only dates back to the Roman epoch. It is
curious that neither Herodotus, nor Diodorus, nor Strabo, mention the
Sphinx. Pliny speaks of it (N. H. xxxvi. 17); some of the information which
he obtained was valuable and authentic, but it was mixed with errors; it
was said to be, he tells us, the tomb of the king Armais, but he knows that
the whole figure was painted red. The Denkmæler of Lepsius (vol. i. pl. 30)
gives three sections and a plan of the little temple between the paws. The
same work (vol. v. pl. 68) contains a reproduction of the great stele of
Thothmes relative to the restoration of the Sphinx.
Champollion, Lettres d'Égypte et de Nubie, pp. 125, 143, and 166. Under
both the temples at Ombos, Champollion discovered remains of a building
of the time of Thothmes III. The same thing occurred at Edfou and at
Esneh. We except Philæ, because there is good reason to believe that in
the time of the Ancient Empire that island did not exist, and that the
cataract was then at Silsilis.
Strabo, xvii. 128: Οὐδὲν ἔχει χαρίεν ὀυδὲ γραφικόν, etc.
Lucian, § 3: Ἀξοάνοι νηοί, etc.
The piers are not quite equidistant; their spacing varies by some
centimetres. Exact symmetry has been sacrificed in consequence of the
different lengths of the stones which formed the architrave.
Mariette, Questions relatives aux nouvelles Fouilles à faire en Égypte.
( Académie des Inscriptions, Comptes Rendus des Séances de l'Année,
1877, pp. 427-473.)
Itinéraire des Invités du Vice-roi, p. 99.
Bædeker, Guide to Lower Egypt, p. 350.
The actual distance is about 670 yards.
Mariette, Questions relatives aux nouvelles Fouilles, etc.
Description de l'Égypte, Ant. , vol. v. p. 654.
Belzoni, Narrative of the Operations, etc. pp. 261-2.
The little that now remains of the columns and foundations of the ancient
temple is marked in the plan which forms plate 6 of Mariette's Karnak, Fig.
a. In plate 8 the remains of all statues and inscriptions which date from the
same period are figured. See also pages 36, 37, and 41-45 of the text.
Mariette, Karnak, p. 4.
We may infer from what Mariette says that they were separated from one
another by a distance of 12 feet 4 inches.
Mariette, Karnak, p. 5. We find, however, that sphinxes were sometimes
placed in the interior of a temple. The two fine sphinxes in rose granite
which form the chief ornaments of the principal court of the Boulak
museum, were found in one of the inner halls of the temple at Karnak.
They date, probably, from the time of Thothmes III., to whom this part of
the building owes its existence.
Description, etc.; Description générale de Thèbes, section viii. § 1.
The wall of the principal inclosure at Denderah, that on the north, is not
less than 33 feet high, and between 30 and 40 thick at the base. Its surface
is perfectly smooth and naked, without ornament of any kind, or even
rough-cast. (Mariette, Denderah, p. 27.) At Karnak the bounding walls are
in a much worse state of preservation; they are ten or twelve centuries
older than those of Denderah, and those centuries have had their effect
upon the masses of crude brick. Our only means of estimating their original
height is by comparing, in the representations furnished to us by certain
bas-reliefs, the height of walls with that of the pylons on which they abut.
Mariette, Karnak, pp. 5, 6.
The word πυλών strictly means the place before the door (like θυρών), or
rather great door (upon the augmentative force of the suffix ών, ῶνος, see
Ad. Regnier, Traité de la Formation des Mots dans la Langue Grecque, §
184). Several passages in Polybius ( Thesaurus, s. v.) show that in the
military language of his time the term was employed to signify a fortified
doorway with its flanking towers and other defences. We may therefore
understand why Diodorus (i. 47) made use of it in his description of the so-
called tomb of Osymandias. Strabo (xvii. 1, 28) preferred to use the word
πρόπυλων. Modern usage has restricted the word propylœum to Greek
buildings, and pylon to the great doorways which form one of the most
striking features of Egyptian architecture.
We learn the part played by these masts and banners in Egyptian
decoration entirely from the representations in the bas-reliefs. The façade
of the temple of Khons is illustrated in one of the bas-reliefs upon the same
building. That relief was reproduced in the Description de l'Égypte (vol. iii.
pl. 57, Fig. 9), and is so well known that we refrained from giving it in these
pages. It shows the masts and banners in all their details. Another
representation of the same kind will be found in Cailliaud, Voyage à Méroé,
plates, vol. ii. pl. 64, Fig. 1. See in the text, vol. iii. p. 298. It is taken from a
rock-cut tomb between Dayr-el-Medinet and Medinet-Abou.
This plate (v.) is not a picturesque restoration; it is merely a map in relief.
Only those buildings are marked upon it which have left easily traceable
remains. No attempt has been made to reconstruct by conjecture any of
those edifices which are at present nothing but confused heaps of débris.
The obelisk of Ousourtesen at Heliopolis is 20·27 metres, or 67 feet 6
inches, high; the Luxor obelisk at Paris, 22·80 metres, or 76 feet; that in
the piazza before St. Peter's in Rome, 83 feet 9 inches; that of San
Giovanni Laterano, the tallest in Europe, is 107 feet 2 inches; and that of
Queen Hatasu, still standing amid the ruins at Karnak, 32·20 metres, or
107 feet 4 inches. This is the highest obelisk known. [The Cleopatra's
Needle on the Victoria Embankment is only 68 feet 2 inches high.—Ed.]
At Thebes, still existing inscriptions prove this to be the case, and at
Memphis the same custom obtained, as we know from the statements of
the Greek travellers. The temple of Ptah—the site of which seems to be
determined by the colossal statue of Rameses which still lies there upon its
face—must have rivalled Karnak in extent and in the number of its
successive additions. According to Diodorus (i. 50) it was Mœris
(Amenemhat III.) who built the southern propylons of this temple, which,
according to the same authority, surpassed all their rivals in magnificence.
At a much later period, Sesostris (a Rameses) erected several colossal
monoliths, from 20 to 30 cubits high, in front of the same temple (Diodorus,
cap. lvii.; Herodotus, ii. 140); at the same time he must have raised
obelisks and constructed courts and pylons. Herodotus attributes to two
other kings, whom he names Rhampsinite and Asychis, the construction of
two more pylons on the eastern and western sides of the temple (ii. 121
and 136). Finally Psemethek I. built the southern propylons and the
pavilion where the Apis was nursed after his first discovery. (Herodotus, ii.
153.)
Strabo, xvii, 1, 28.
This is the temple which the members of the Egyptian institute call the
Great Southern Temple. In the background of our illustration (Fig. 208) the hypostyle hall and the southern pylons of the Great Temple are seen.
Τοῦ δὲ προνάου παρ' ἑκάτερον πρόκειται τὰ λεγόμενα πτερά· ἔστι δὲ ταῦτα
ἰσοΰψη τῷ ναῷ τείχη δύο, κατ' ἀρχὰς μὲν ἀφεστῶτα ἀπ' ἀλλήλων μικρὸν
πλέον, ἢ τὸ πλάτος ἐστὶ τῆς κρηπῖδος τοῦ νεώ, ἔπειτ' εἰς τὸ πρόσθεν
προϊόντι κατ' ἐπινευούσας γραμμὰς μέχρι πηχῶν πεντήκοντα ἢ
ἑξήκοντα.—Strabo, xvii, 1, 28.
Description de l'Égypte, Antiquités, vol. i. pl. 5.
Description de l'Égypte, vol. iii. 55.
According to Gau, there was, in 1817, a well preserved tabernacle in the
sanctuary of the temple at Debout, in Nubia. ( Antiquités de la Nubie, 1821,
pl. v. Figs. A and B.)
De Rougé, Notice des Monuments, etc. (Upon the ground floor and the
staircase.) Monuments Divers, No. 29. The term naos has generally been
applied to these monuments, but it seems to us to lack precision. The
Greeks used the word ναός or νεώς to signify the temple as a whole. Abd-
el-Latif describes with great admiration a monolithic tabernacle which
existed in his time among the ruins of Memphis, and was called by the
Egyptians the Green Chamber. Makrizi tells us that it was broken up in
1349. ( Description de l'Égypte, Ant. , vol. v. pp. 572, 573.)
Herodotus, ii. 175.
Translated by Maspero, Histoire Ancienne, p. 385. The whole inscription
has been translated into English by the Rev. T. C. Cook, and published in
vol. ii. of Records of the Past.—Ed.
As M. Maspero has remarked ( Annuaire de l'Association des Études
Grecques, 1877, p. 135), these secret passages remind us of the movable
stone which, according to Herodotus (ii. 121), the architect of Rhampsinit
contrived in the wall of the royal treasure-house which he was
commissioned to build. Herodotus's story was at least founded upon fact,
as the arrangement in question was a favourite one with Egyptian
constructors.
Ἀναγλυφὰς δ' ἔχουσιν οἱ τοῖχοι οὗτοι μεγάλων εἰδώλων (Strabo, xvii, 1, 28).
Description de l'Égypte, Antiquités, vol. i. p. 219. The authors of the
Description générale de Thèbes noticed recesses sunk in the external face
of one of the pylons at Karnak, which they believed to be intended to
receive the leaves of the great door when it was open (p. 234); they also
noticed traces of bronze pivots upon which the doors swung (p. 248), and
they actually found a pivot of sycamore wood.
These measurements are taken from Mariette, Voyage dans la Haute-
Égypte, vol. ii. p. 7.
We have not given a general map. In order to do so we should either have
had to overpass the limits of our page, or we should have had to give it
upon too small a scale. Our fourth plate will give a sufficiently accurate
idea of its arrangement. The plan in Lepsius's Denkmæler (part i. pl. 74-76)
occupies three entire pages.
Diodorus, i. 46.
These are the figures given by Mariette ( Itinéraire de la Haute-Égypte, p.
135). Other authorities give 340 feet by 177. Diodorus ascribed to the
temple of which he spoke a height of 45 cubits (or 69 feet 3 inches). This is
slightly below the true height. We may here quote the terms in which
Champollion describes the impression which a first sight of these ruins
made upon him: "Finally I went to the palace, or rather to the town of
palaces, at Karnak. There all the magnificence of the Pharaohs is
collected; there the greatest artistic conceptions formed and realised by
mankind are to be seen. All that I had seen at Thebes, all that I had
enthusiastically admired on the left bank of the river, sunk into
insignificance before the gigantic structures among which I found myself. I
shall not attempt to describe what I saw. If my expressions were to convey
but a thousandth part of what I felt, a thousandth part of all that might with
truth be said of such objects, if I succeeded in tracing but a faint sketch, in
the dimmest colours, of the marvels of Karnak, I should be taken, at least
for an enthusiast, perhaps for a madman. I shall content myself with saying
that no people, either ancient or modern, have had a national architecture
at once so sublime in scale, so grand in expression, and so free from
littleness as that of the ancient Egyptians." ( Lettres d'Égypte, pp. 79, 80.)
Including a postern of comparatively small dimensions, there are five
doorways to the hypostyle hall.—Ed.
A plan of the successive accretions is given in plates 6 and 7 of Mariette's
work. The different periods and their work are shown by changes of tint.
The same information is given in another form in pages 36 and 37 of the
text. The complete title