THE NEW YORK OBELISK

Cleopatra's Needle

WITH A PRELIMINARY SKETCH OF THE HISTORY
ERECTION, USES, AND SIGNIFICATION
OF OBELISKS

BY

CHARLES E. MOLDENKE, A.M., Ph.D.

NEW YORK

ANSON D. F. RANDOLPH AND CO.

38 West Twenty-Third Street

1891

Copyright, 1891,
By Charles E. Moldenke.

University Press:
PRESSWORK BY
John Wilson and Son, Cambridge.

TABLE OF CONTENTS.

EXPLANATION OF THE VIGNETTES AT THE HEAD OF THE CHAPTERS.

PREFATORY.

The oldest nation on the globe sends her greeting to her youngest sister. The "Setting Sun" has shed its last rays on the Old World from Egypt's sunny land and now appears on this western shore as a brilliant "Rising Sun". In the metropolis of the Western Hemisphere one of Egypt's grandest treasures meets our eyes and, though silent, reminds us of her former greatness. Here stands a monument of two of her greatest Pharaohs, lords and conquerors, scourges of their people, and a terror to their foes. It tells the story of serfs and teems with cringing words and the praise of despots. Yet it was a glorious time when this monument was erected and inscribed, a time of power, pride, learning, greatness, conquest for the lords, but for the people a time of abject subjection, misery, and hardships. Pharaoh was master of all. But the sun of his grandeur has set and vanished, and our obelisk, that proud monument of Pharaonic times, now sees a spectacle which the greatest flight of fancy could not have pictured to any man of those by-gone days.

Here in the western land the obsequious adoration of one man is no more. Here the people are not under the lash and miserable; they are, with all their cares and labors, a happy and contented people. The realm is not, as in those former days, the result of a despot's triumphant march, but a grand, harmonious union of friends.

On such a picture our obelisk looks down from its lofty pedestal. Had it a tongue, it could tell us many a tale of the past, when Thothmes III. erected it with pomp and festivities, when Ramses II. engraved his name upon it, and the law-giver Moses, the Israelite, played and studied in its view, how it escaped the fury of the demoniac ravager Cambyses, was transported by the Romans to Alexandria, escaped Mohammedan fanaticism, and was at last conveyed as a precious prize from its sunny home to our fitful climate. It seems oddly out of place here, and its coat of paraffine will not protect it wholly from bleak winds and rain, and winter's ice and snow. It has lived its longest time on earth, and at the advanced age of thirty-four centuries it must decline, until it will totter and fall. Then having so long symbolized the "Rising Sun" in all its beauty, and having greeted its glorious advent with every dawn and break of day, the "Setting Sun" will shroud it for the last time in its light, but the new sun of morning will seek its old friend in vain. It will fade away, but its memory will last much longer than inscriptions on stone which must perish sooner or later. Let us, however, the children of a new era, learn from it the greatness of its authors!

CHAPTER I

Obelisks—where found, and when, and by whom erected.

§1. Obelisks have been found in various localities of the ancient Egyptian empire. Possibly almost every city of some prominence will have boasted of some, no matter how small, especially such cities as became for a time the residence of the Pharaoh. They would also be placed in cities in which grand temples had been erected for the worship of some prominent deity, and if we can rely upon the reports of travelers, they are even found in the adjacent Sinaitic Peninsula to serve as monuments to the praise of some king's achievements. Unfortunately, however, for any deductions, most of the obelisks which were certainly erected in various places are completely gone either through the violence of foes, the ravages of a Cambyses, or else the internal dissensions of the people and the subsequent ruin, and the ruthless sand of the desert. Of the obelisks, which formerly must have been counted by hundreds, we can scarcely find fifty, and of these only a few are perfect or of purely Egyptian origin.

As far as can be ascertained from the obelisks of the present day, most of them point as the original place of their erection to that city preëminently called the "City of Obelisks" in Lower Egypt, the Heliopolis of the ancients, at present مطريه Matarīyeh, near Cairo. They were here placed around and in front of the temple of the sun, which was the principal sanctuary of the city. From this fact Heliopolis received the name "house of the sun", or בֵּת שֶׁמֶשׁ [bêth shêmesh], as mentioned in the Bible. These obelisks formed the leading attraction at that remote time and undoubtedly remained such until the city's utter destruction. Their fame spread far and wide, for in Jeremiah xliii:13 we find the prophet mentioning the "upright stones" [מַצְבוֹת mazzebhôth] of Heliopolis, which were doomed to perish. Heliopolis, in the days of its power, must have presented a glorious picture to the observer, no less when Joseph wedded a daughter of the high-priest, as when, some centuries later, the law-giver Moses was a student at Egypt's foremost university in this city.

Another city, however, claims our attention as on an almost equal footing with Heliopolis as regards obelisks. Thebes in Upper Egypt, the famous city of one hundred gates, as Homer calls it, the largest city of the ancient world, had besides its many grand temples and palaces a number of the largest obelisks extant. Four of them still tower above the piles of ruins scattered on all sides, while a still larger number must lie buried deep in the ground. It was quite appropriate that here in the metropolis of Upper Egypt, where Pharaoh passed much of his time and where he was crowned with all the pomp and magnificence of a victor, a number of obelisks should proclaim his praise. They were made for the living to gaze upon, and were therefore erected on the eastern bank of the Nile where the city proper stood, while the western bank was wholly surrendered to the dead. The modern villages of Karnak (قرناق) and Luxor (اقصر) now mark the spot where Thebes was situated. However, if we are to believe a traveler, Villiers Stuart, who found two prostrate obelisks of an old dynasty in the necropolis or cemetery on the western bank of the Nile, and take into account that Lepsius found his obelisk at Gizeh, the necropolis of Memphis, also on the western bank of the Nile, we must infer that the oldest obelisks were not always set up with a view to being admired by the living, but simply served as head-stones for the dead.

The majority of all extant obelisks was erected at Heliopolis and Thebes. Others, however, have been discovered in different places: some as far north as Saïs and Tanis, and as far south as the boundary of Egypt on the island of Philæ, called Elephantinê by the ancients. The limit in the opposite directions seems to have been the Fayoom on the west, and the Sinaitic Peninsula on the east. Outside of Egypt and Africa other Egyptian and some pseudo-Egyptian obelisks are to be found. They are the work of Roman emperors. These, jealous of the great achievements of the Pharaohs and desirous of adding to the many Pharaonic obelisks in Rome some of their own making and inscribed with their own name, had the stone quarried in Syene and transported to Rome. Domitian and Hadrian erected such to their honor in the "Eternal City".

§2. The obelisk is certainly a very early invention of the Egyptians. As a matter of fact, it was at first of small size and could hardly have been used as an ornament of temples, which purpose it served in later times. We find very little of the commonplace laudatory titles on the earliest specimens of obelisks, and, as mentioned above, some of them were even found in the necropolis or cemetery, apparently to serve as mementos or head-stones. A passage on the monuments, mentioning that a certain Merab ( "love-heart") was priest of Khufu's obelisk, points to the fact, that as early as the fourth dynasty (about 3100 B. C.) the form of the obelisk was known. In the inscriptions of the fifth dynasty we meet with the hieroglyphic sign of the obelisk . The XIth dynasty has bequeathed to us three obelisks. It was not, however, until the XIIth dynasty that the true beauty of the obelisk was fully appreciated. Usertesen I. (2371 B. C., according to Lepsius) may be considered to have been the first to erect obelisks of large dimensions, as is well illustrated by the obelisk at present standing in Matarîyeh near Cairo, though another of his obelisks at Bejij, or the ancient Crocodilopolis, in the Fayoom has more of the appearance of a stelé with a rounded top.

From this time until the beginning of the XVIIIth dynasty we possess no obelisks. A new era then began for Egypt. It ushered in its golden age. Thothmes I. was the first to claim for himself equal honor with Usertesen. He erected two magnificent obelisks in Karnak, where they are still conspicuous. Here his daughter, queen Hatasu, co-regent with her brothers Thothmes II. and III., also erected two obelisks. It is true her name does not appear on them, but it is a well established fact, that her great brother Thothmes III., mighty as he was, showed an ignoble jealousy of his valiant sister and, on coming to power, erased her name from the monuments and substituted his own instead. As he had, however, left the feminine pronouns and endings in the inscriptions, his knavery was readily discovered. Notwithstanding this serious defect in his character, he celebrated his many victories by the erection of obelisks of his own. To him belongs the palm in this line of monumental structures. Besides him, one other Pharaoh of this dynasty, Amenophis II., seems to have erected one small obelisk.

After the death of Thothmes III. there was a comparative quiet in the erection of obelisks, although one of his obelisks was finished, inscribed, and then erected by Thothmes IV. The great Pharaoh was praised for his imposing monuments, but none dared emulate him until with a new dynasty a new line of rulers came to Egypt. Of Seti I. two excellent obelisks have come down to us, both being at present in Rome. The name, however, most frequently mentioned on the obelisks is that of Ramses II. (1200 B. C.). Although he erected comparatively few obelisks, he inscribed his name and deeds on those of his predecessors, thereby engaging in no legitimate business. He considered himself the equal of Thothmes III., and therefore chose the obelisks of the latter, which had but one—the central—column inscribed, and put two more columns on each side with vainglorious praise of himself. With him the erection of large obelisks seems to have ceased for a time.

It was not until the reign of king Psametik II. that we come across another large obelisk of superior workmanship. This is at present in Rome. Ptolemy Euergetes II. and Cleopatra II. have left us a fine obelisk on the island of Philæ, and this represents the last of a long line of truly Egyptian monoliths. The Roman emperors who erected obelisks of their own were Hadrian and Domitian. Since their time obelisks with hieroglyphic inscriptions have neither been quarried nor erected.

§3. It fell to the lot of the greater number of Egyptian obelisks to be transported from their native land and to serve as objects of curiosity to the multitudes, which had and still have no conception of what they represent. This was due to foreigners; for there is no case on record where the obelisk of one Pharaoh has been transported to a different place by another. Not until the Romans invaded Egypt and carried off its grain and gold, did it occur to man's mind to despoil it of some of its wonders. The first to adorn Rome and Alexandria with them was the emperor Augustus, who carried off two to Rome and left two in Alexandria,—the London and New York Obelisks. Caligula (40 A. D.) and Claudius (41-54 A. D.) followed his example, and about 90 A. D. Domitian removed two to Rome and two to Benevento in Italy. Constantine the Great (306—337 A. D.), after establishing himself in Byzantium [Constantinople], transported a large obelisk to this city, but left a second one, which he had begun to remove in 330, in Alexandria, until Constantius brought it over to Constantinople in 357. During the Middle Ages and up to the present century the other obelisks still remaining in Egypt were left undisturbed. In 1832-1833 the French removed the Luxor Obelisk to Paris, the English the prostrate Alexandrian Obelisk in 1877-1878 to London, and the Americans the erect Obelisk of Alexandria, commonly called "Cleopatra's Needle" in 1880-1881 to New York.

§4. It would be quite impossible to give an absolutely correct list of all obelisks existing at the present time, since with regard to some of them we must take the word of travelers, who were not acquainted with Egyptian studies and would therefore easily have been imposed upon, or else the books of reference describing them are in some cases very much at variance. The following list is as near correct as it can at present be made.

Besides the above, we are told that there were in Rome in 1676 four fragments of obelisks, which have since disappeared. Another obelisk is said to have been near the Porta del Popolo in Rome, in the burial place of Nero, which was only a Roman imitation, called the Esmeade Obelisk. Zoëga states that a fragment of an obelisk was brought to Wanstead, England. It was 2½ ft. high, and comprised only a part of the pyramidion. Another fragment of an obelisk is mentioned as having been at Cairo, Egypt. Bonomi calls attention to one at Soughton Hall, England. None of these, however, can now be traced.

CHAPTER II

The quarrying, transporting, and raising of obelisks.

§1. Egypt is undoubtedly in every respect a land of wonders. At the most remote period of its history we observe that it was already in such an advanced state of civilization, as would appear to us to be wholly incompatible with its venerable age. When Greece first began to issue from its times of heroes and demi-gods and advance on a path of civilization, Egypt had already for at least twenty centuries possessed everything that enlightened Greece could boast of. The first objects among the many wonders that still remain in Egypt to catch the eye of a traveler, are the grand monuments set up in honor of various divinities or as proud guide-posts for future generations. Among these obelisks and pyramids rank first. We marvel at the enormous stones which our modern steam-engines would lift with difficulty, yet which the ancient Egyptians quarried, transported, and erected in their proper places, not only setting them on the ground, but even lifting them some hundred feet, as in the case of the Pyramids. We look upon the greater number of obelisks, each made of one unbroken piece of stone, and are forced to admire the workmanship and engineering skill which they exhibit. We may endeavor to grasp this wonderful achievement, but must continually ask: how was it done, and how was it possible to do so at that time, when even now with all our many inventions and contrivances we should perhaps fail. Unfortunately we receive no definite answer. It is so long ago since the Egyptian stone-cutters plied their chisels and the engineers built their machines, and no papyrus or inscription tells us directly how the work was accomplished. A relic of indomitable labor and uncompleted work still lies in the quarry at Assuan. It is an obelisk of 95 feet still cleaving on its fourth side to the native rock. This may throw some light on the mystery.

We notice the nicety and precision with which the stone-cutter went to work in hewing out and polishing the monument. His art was one that had been brought to the highest state of perfection in Egypt; and no wonder, for in a country where timber was scarce and hardly one tree was suitable for wood-work, men had to fall back on their natural supply which the mountains rising on both sides of the valley yielded. Stone was there in abundance. Hence from the earliest times of Egyptian history the stone-cutter receives a prominent place. The implements he employed must have had a wonderful degree of hardness to chip and polish the tenacious rock of Syene.

With regard to the quarrying of the rock, that is, how, after having selected a properly-sized piece of rock without a flaw and having carefully marked it, the stone-cutters were able to detach 50-100 feet of it without a break—that has given rise to many conjectures. Belzoni held, that after a groove of about two inches had been cut along the line, the blow of some machine must have separated the pieces of rock, as glass when cut by a diamond. Others believe that a saw was employed to sever the rock. Sir J. F. Herschel prefers to accept the theory that the separation of the rocks was caused by fire, a method still employed in India. He calls attention to the fact, that after the workmen there have cut a groove into the rock they kindle a small fire on top of this line, and that after the rock is thoroughly heated they suddenly pour cold water on it, causing the rock to split with a clean fracture. It is, however, more probable that the Egyptians made use of wooden wedges to accomplish their purpose. We frequently find not only grooves in the rock but also wedge-holes inside these grooves. Wedges with their slow and steady pressure would insure a good fracture. Possibly, as Wilkinson surmises, the grooves themselves may have carried water to the wooden wedges which, being kept continually moist and thereby expanding, would have caused the rock to split. The saw was undoubtedly used for the last cutting to separate the piece from the native rock.