[1] Fergusson (in vol. i. p. 118, of his History of Architecture in all Countries, etc.) proposes that Karnak should be called a Palace-Temple, or Temple-Palace.
[2] Du Barry de Merval, Études sur l'Architecture Égyptienne (1875), p. 271.
[3] The contrast between the palaces of the East and Versailles is hardly so strong as M. Perrot seems to suggest. The curious assemblage of buildings of different ages and styles which forms the eastern façade of the dwelling of Louis XIV. does not greatly differ in essentials from the confused piles of Delhi or the old Seraglio.—Ed.
[4] Nestor L'Hôte—a fine connoisseur, who often divined facts which were not finally demonstrated until after his visit to Egypt—also received this impression from his examination of the remains at Tell-el-Amarna: "Details no less interesting make us acquainted with the general arrangement ... of the king's palaces, the porticos and propylæa by which they were approached, the inner chambers, the store-houses and offices, the courts, gardens, and artificial lakes; everything, in fact, which went to make up the royal dwelling-place." Lettres écrites d'Égypte (in 1838-9; 8vo, 1840); pp. 64-65.
[5] Lettres écrites d'Égypte, p. 62. In some other plans from Tell-el-Amarna, given by Prisse, several of these altars are given upon a larger scale, showing the offerings with which they are heaped. One of them has a flight of steps leading up to it.
[6] In this we are supported by the opinions of Mariette (Itinéraire, p. 213) and Ebers (L'Égypte, du Caire à Philæ, p. 317).
[7] Itinéraire, p. 213.
[8] See the curious extracts from the Papyrus Anastasi III., given by Maspero, Histoire Ancienne, pp. 267-269.
[9] A careful examination of these tablets has yet to be made; at present we are without any information as to their probable uses. The authors of the Description thought it likely that they were meant to receive metal trophies of some kind. They might have been covered with a painted decoration, or they might have been intended to be cut into barred windows and left unfinished. In the photographs the stone of which they are made seems to be different in grain from the rest of the walls.
[10] Ebers, L'Égypte, du Caire à Philæ, pp. 317-318.
[11] Herodotus, ii. 148; Diodorus Siculus, i. 64; Strabo, xvii. 37.
[12] Description de l'Égypte, vol. iv. p. 478.
[13] Denkmæler, vol. i. plates 46-48. Briefe aus Ægypten, pp. 65-74.
[14] See a remarkable paper on this question contributed by Mr. F. Cope Whitehouse to the Revue Archéologique for June, 1882.—Ed.
[15] Ebers, Ægypten, p. 174.
[16] Diodorus, i. 31, 6.—Josephus (The Jewish War, ii. 16, 4) speaks of a population of seven millions and a half, exclusive of the inhabitants of Alexandria.
[17] Herodotus, ii. 137; Diodorus, i. 57.
[18] Édouard Mariette, Traité pratique et raisonné de la Construction en Égypte, p. 139.
[19] The first elements for the Restoration of an Egyptian House which Mariette exhibited in the Universal Exhibition of 1878, were furnished, however, by some remains at Abydos. These consisted of the bases, to the height of about four feet, of the walls of a house. The general plan and arrangement of rooms was founded upon the indications thus obtained; the remainder of the restoration was founded upon bas-reliefs and paintings. The whole was reproduced in the Gazette des Beaux-Arts of November 1st, 1878, to which M. A. Rhoné (L'Égypte Antique) contributed an analysis of the elements made use of by Mariette in his attempt to reconstruct an Egyptian dwelling.
[20] See Brugsch-Bey's topographical sketch of a part of ancient Thebes in the Revue archéologique of M. E. Revillout, 1880 (plates 12 and 13).
[21] See, in the Revue archéologique, the Données géographiques et topographiques sur Thébes extraites par MM. Brugsch et Revillout des Contrats démotiques et des Pièces corrélatives, p. 177.
[22] E. Revillout, Taricheutes et Choachytes (in the Zeitschrift für Ægyptische Sprache und Alterthumskunde, 1879 and 1880).
[23] In the Egyptian language, buildings like the Ramesseum and Medinet-Abou were called Mennou, or buildings designed to preserve some name from oblivion. This word the Greeks turned into μεμνόνια, because they thought that the term mennou was identical with the Homeric hero Memnon, to whom they also attributed the two famous colossi in the plain of Thebes. Ebers, Ægypten, p. 280.
[24] Diodorus (i. 45, 4) talks of a circumference of 140 stades (28,315 yards), without telling us whether his measurement applies to the whole of Thebes, or only to the city on the right bank. Strabo (xvii. 46) says that "an idea of the size of the ancient city may be formed from the fact that its existing monuments cover a space which is not less than 80 stades (16,180 yards) in length (τὸ μῆκος)." This latter statement indicates a circumference much greater than that given by Diodorus. Diodorus (i. 50, 4) gives to Memphis a circumference of 150 stades (30,337 yards, or 17-1/4 miles).
[25] Diodorus, i. 45, 5.
[26] In a tale translated by M. Maspero (Études Égyptiennes, 1879, p. 10), a princess is shut up in a house of which the windows are 70 cubits (about 105 feet) above the ground. She is to be given to him who is bold and skilful enough to scale her windows. Such a height must therefore have seemed quite fabulous to the Egyptians, as did that of the tower which is so common in our popular fairy stories.
[27] In M. Maspero's translated Roman de Satni (Annuaire de l'Association pour l'Encouragement des Études grecques, 1878), the house in Bubastis inhabited by the daughter of a priest of high rank is thus described: "Satni proceeded towards the west of the town until he came to a very high house. It had a wall round it; a garden on the north side; a flight of steps before the door."
[28] Quintus Curtius, v. 1, 127.
[29] Wilkinson, The Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians, vol. i. p. 377.
[30] We have borrowed this short description from a Review of M. Gailhabaud's Monuments anciens et modernes, Style Égyptien. Maisons. Those who require further details may consult Chapter V. of Sir Gardner Wilkinson's Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians.
[31] Herodotus (ii. 95) says that they did so in the marshy parts of Lower Egypt.
[32] It is difficult to say what the artist meant by the little oblong mark under these windows. Perhaps it represents an outside balcony by which the window could be reached either for the purposes of inspection or in order to add to the store within.
[33] These trees must have been planted in large terra-cotta pots, such as are still used in many places for the same purpose.
[34] Diodorus, i. 45, 6.
[35] Thucydides, i. 104. Cf. Herodotus, iii. 94, and Diodorus, xi. 74. After the Persian conquest it was occupied by the army corps left to ensure the submission of the country.
[36] Plate 55 of the first volume of Lepsius's Denkmæler contains traces of the enceintes of Sais, Heliopolis, and Tanis. See also the Description de l'Égypte, Ant., Ch. 21, 23, 24.
[37] At Heliopolis they were 64 feet thick (Description), at Sais 48 feet (ibid.) while at Tanis they were only 19 feet.
[38] Isambert, Itinéraire de l'Égypte.
[39] Maxime du Camp, Le Nil, p. 64.
[40] Lepsius, Denkmæler, vol. ii. pl. 100.—Ebers, (Ægypten,) makes the enceinte of Nekheb a square.
[41] Mariette, Abydos, Description des Fouilles, vol. ii. pp. 46-49, and plate 68.
[42] We have been able to make use, for this reconstruction, of two plans which only differ in details, and otherwise mutually corroborate each other. One is given by Lepsius, Plate 111, vol. ii. of his Denkmæler; the plans of the two fortresses are in the middle of his map of the valley where they occur. In plate 112 we have a pictorial view of the ruins and the ground about them. In the Bulletin archéologique de l'Athenæum Français (1855, pp. 80-84, and plate 5), M. Vogüé also published a plan of the two forts, accompanied by a section and a description giving valuable details, details which Lepsius, in his Briefe aus Ægypten, passed over in silence.
[43] In this case the inclination is, however, in the lower half of the wall; a device which would be far less efficient in defeating an escalade than that at Semneh.—Ed.
[44] Both the plate in the Description de l'Égypte (Ant. vol. ii. pl. 31), and that in Lepsius (part iii. pl. 166), suggest this interpretation.
[45] Lepsius, Briefe aus Ægypten, p. 259.—See also Maspero, Histoire Ancienne, pp. 111-113.
[46] It is of Mokattam limestone (see vol. i., p. 223). M. Perrot probably meant to refer to the two upper "chambers," both of which are lined with granite.—Ed.
[47] Mariette, Voyage dans la Haute-Égypte, vol. i. p. 59.
[48] Exodus v. 6-8.
[49] Mariette, Traité pratique et raisonné de la Construction en Égypte, p. 59. All these operations are shown upon the walls of a tomb at Abd-el-Gournah (Lepsius, Denkmæler, p. 111, pl. 40). Labourers are seen drawing water from a basin, digging the earth, carrying it in large jars, mixing it with the water, pressing the clay into the moulds, finally building walls which are being tested with a plumb-line by an overseer or foreman (see also Fig. 16).
[50] Prisse, Histoire de l'Art Égyptien, letter-press, p. 179.
[51] Lepsius (Denkmæler, part iii. plates 7, 25A, 26, 39) has reproduced a certain number of these stamped bricks.
[52] We do not here refer to the kind of maple which is often erroneously called a sycamore with us, but to a tree of quite a different family and appearance, the Ficus Sycomorus of Linnæus.
[53] Ed. Mariette, Traité Pratique, etc., p. 95.
[54] In his Histoire de l'Habitation, Viollet-le-Duc has sought to find the origin of this cornice in an outward curve imparted to the upper extremity of the reeds of which primitive dwellings were made, and maintained by the weight of the roof. He published a drawing in justification of his hypothesis. There are, however, many objections to it. It requires us to admit the general use of the reed as the material for primitive dwellings. Branches which were ever so little rigid and firm could not have been so bent, and yet they are often found in the huts to which we refer. It may even be doubted whether the reeds employed would bear such a curvature as that of the Egyptian cornice without breaking.
[55] This imitation of wooden roofs was noticed by the savants of the Institut d'Égypte. They drew a rock-cut tomb in which the ceiling is carved to look like the trunks of palm trees (Description, Antiquités, vol. v. pl. 6, figs. 3, 4, and 5). See also Baedeker, part i. p. 360.
[56] Pierret, Dictionnaire d'Archéologie Égyptienne.
[57] This pylon dates from the Ptolemies, but if there was anything that did not change in Egypt, it was their processes of construction.
[58] This has been well shown by Champollion à propos of one of the Nubian buildings constructed by the Theban kings. He speaks thus of the hemispeos of Wadi-Esseboua: "This is the worst piece of work extant from the reign of Rameses the Great. The stones are ill-cut; their intervals are masked by a layer of cement over which the sculptured decoration, which is poorly executed, is continued.... Most of this decoration is now incomprehensible because the cement upon which a great part of it was carried out, has fallen down and left many and large gaps in the scenes and inscriptions."—Lettres d'Égypte et de Nubie, 121.
[59] Description de l'Égypte, Antiquités, vol. ii. p. 437.
[60] Strabo, xvii. 37.—Lepsius, Briefe aus Ægypten, p. 74.
[61] Prisse, Histoire de l'Art Égyptien, text, p. 364.
[62] The columns at Luxor are constructed in courses. The joints of the stone are worked carefully for only about a third of their whole diameter. Their centres are slightly hollowed out and filled in with a mortar of pounded brick which has become friable. (Description de l'Égypte, Antiquités, vol. ii. p. 384.)
[63] See p. 29, vol. i. (Note 1) and p. 170. The engineers who edited the Description make similar remarks with regard to Karnak. (Antiquités, vol. ii. pp. 414 and 500.)
[64] Mariette, Itinéraire, p. 179. The pavement of the great temple is now about six feet below the general level of the surrounding plain.
[65] Mariette, Les Tombes de l'Ancien Empire, p. 10.
[66] Mariette, Abydos, vol. i. p. 8.—Catalogue général des Monuments d'Abydos, p. 585. Similar tenons were found by the members of the Institut d'Égypte in the walls of the great hall at Karnak (Description de l'Égypte, Antiquités, vol. ii. p. 442.—See also Plates, vol. ii. pl. 57, figs. 1 and 2). We took this illustration for our guide in compiling our diagram of Egyptian bonding in Fig. 69.
[67] Description de l'Égypte, Ant., vol. v. p. 153. Jomard, Recueil d'Observations et de Mémoires sur l'Égypte Ancienne et Moderne, vol. iv. p. 41.
[68] Mariette, Karnak, p. 18.
[69] This is clearly indicated by Diodorus (i. 63, 66): τὴν κατασκευὴν διὰ χωμάτων γενέσθαι.
[70] Wilkinson, Manners and Customs, etc., vol. ii. p. 309. In speaking of the pyramids Herodotus mentions what seems to have been a kind of crane, but he gives us no information as to its principle or arrangement (ii. 125).
[71] The painting in question dates from the reign of Ousourtesen II. and was found at El-Bercheh, a short distance above the ruins of Antinoë.
[72] The position of this man and the general probabilities of the case suggest perhaps, that his jar contains oil rather than water.—Ed.
[73] Brugsch, Histoire d'Égypte, vol. i. pp. 74 et seq.
[74] We agree with Wilkinson in taking for the height that which Herodotus calls the length. In all monuments of the kind the height is the largest measurement. Herodotus's phrase is easily explained. The monolith appears to have been lying in front of the temple into which they had failed to introduce it. (κείται παρὰ τὴν ἔσοδον, he says). Its height had thus become its length.
[75] Herodotus, ii. 155.
[76] The text in question is quoted in the notes contributed by Dr. Birch to the last edition of Wilkinson (vol. ii. p. 308, note 2). Pliny's remarks upon the obelisks are intersprinkled with fabulous stories and contain no useful information (H. N., xxxvi. 14).
[77] Pierret, Dictionnaire d'Archéologie Égyptienne. (The dates upon which this assertion depends have been disputed. M. Chabas reads the inscription "from the first of Muchir in the year 16, to the last of Mesore in 17," making nineteen months in all, a period which is not quite so impossible as that ordinarily quoted.—Ed.)
[78] Maxime du Camp, Le Nil, pp. 261 and 262.
[79] Wilkinson, Manners and Customs, etc., vol. i. pp. 357-358: vol. ii. pp. 262, 298-299.
[80] P. 148.
[81] "An arch never sleeps" says the Arab proverb.
[82] Denkmæler, part i. pl. 94.
[83] Ramée, Histoire générale de l'Architecture, vol. i. p. 262.
[84] Prisse, Histoire de l'Art Égyptien, p. 174.—Mariette (Voyage dans la Haute-Égypte, vol. ii. pp. 59-60) was struck by a similar arrangement. "Murray's Guide," he says, "tells us, in speaking of Dayr-el-Medineh, that the walls which inclose the courts of this temple present a striking peculiarity of construction. Their bricks are laid in concave-convex courses which rise and fall alternately over the whole length of the walls." This curious arrangement deserved to be noticed, but Dayr-el-Medineh is not the only place where it is to be found. The bounding wall of the temple of Osiris at Abydos affords another instance of it. It should also be noticed that the problem offered to us by such a mode of building is complicated by the fact that, in the quay at Esneh and in some parts of the temple of Philæ, it is combined with the use of very large sandstone blocks.
[85] Viollet-le-Duc, Histoire de l'Habitation humaine, pp. 85-88. Alberti and other Renaissance architects recommended this method of construction for building upon a soft surface. (L'Architettura di Leon Batista Alberti, tradotta in lingua fiorentina da Cosimo Bartoli, Venice, 1565, 4to, p. 70.)
[88] See also pp. 385-392, Vol. I. and Fig. 224.—Our perspective has been compiled from the Description de l'Égypte, from Mariette's work and from photographs.
[89] See Chapter II. vol. i.
[90] These slender columns with lotiform capitals are figured in considerable number in the tomb of Ti. Mariette, Voyage dans la Haute-Égypte, vol. i. pl. 10.
[91] Ebers, Ægypten, vol. ii., p. 186. All this passage of Ebers is, however, nothing more than an epitome of a paper by Lepsius, entitled: Ueber einige Ægyptische Kunstformen und ihre Entwickelung (in the Transactions of the Berlin Academy, 1871, 4to). This paper contains many just observations and ingenious notions; but, to our mind it is over systematized, and its theories cannot all be accepted.
[92] See Prisse, Histoire de l'Art Égyptien, pp. 359, 360.
[93] Ibid.
[94] At Dayr-el-Bahari there are some pillars of the same shape but engaged in the wall. They support groups—carved in stone and painted—comprising a hawk, a vulture, cynocephali, and so on. They are in the passage which leads to the north-western speos. Their total height, inclusive of the animals which surmount them, is nearly 18 feet, of which the groups make up nearly a third. The lower part is ornamented by mouldings in the shape of panels. These pilasters should be more carefully studied and reproduced if they still exist: the sketches from which we have described them were made some fifteen years ago. In that monument of Egyptian sculpture which is, perhaps, the oldest of all, namely, the bas-relief engraved by Seneferu upon the rocks of Wadi-Maghara, a hawk crowned with the pschent stands before the conqueror upon a quadrangular pier which has panels marked upon it in the same fashion as at Dayr-el-Bahari.
[95] Ebers, Ægypten, vol. ii., p. 184.
[96] Chipiez, Histoire critique des Origines et de la Formation des Ordres Grecques, p. 44.
[97] Mariette has shown this clearly in his Voyage dans la Haute-Égypte (p. 52). "This light column or shaft was not abandoned, it reappeared in stone ... it reappeared to give birth to the great faggot-shaped column which rivalled the pier in size, solidity, and weight. This column, with its capital in the shape of a lotus-bud or flower, is seen in its full development at Karnak, at Luxor, and in the first temple of the New Empire."
[98] Ebers, L'Égypte, p. 185.
[99] We shall call attention, however, to a hypogeum at Gizeh, which is numbered 81 in Lepsius's map of that tomb-field. As at Beni-Hassan the chamber is preceded by a portico. In Lepsius's drawing (vol. i. pl. 27, fig. 1), the columns of this portico are campaniform.
[100] See also p. 396, Vol. I., and Fig. 230.
[101] There is no pier at Medinet-Abou in so perfect a condition as that figured by us. In order to complete our restoration, for so it is, we had the use of drawings which had been made long ago and of excellent photographs, and by combining one figure with another we obtained all the details necessary.
[102] See Pierret, Dictionnaire d'Archéologie Égyptienne.
[103] The slabs of which the roof is formed are grooved on their upper surfaces at their lines of junction (see Fig. 92), a curious feature which recurs in other Egyptian buildings, but has never been satisfactorily explained.
[104] Lepsius, Denkmæler, part i. pl. 81.
[105] Wilkinson, vol. i. p. 40. In the Description de l'Égypte (Antiquités, vol. ii. p. 474), we find this shape accounted for by opposition of two lotus-flowers, one above another. Such an explanation could only be offered by one who had a theory to serve.
[106] Extract from a letter of M. Brugsch, published by Hittorf in the Athenæum Français, 1854, p. 153.
[107] A good idea of this can be gained from the building known as Pharaoh's bed, at Philæ. It is shown on the right of our sketch at p. 431, Vol. I.
[108] These upstanding flowers and stalks form the distinguishing characteristic of the Nelumbo species.
[109] Herodotus, ii. 92.