[Illustration: Two broken obelisks, covered in hieroglyphics.]
An obelisk is a single block of stone with four faces, which are not
quite perpendicular, but inclined a little, each towards the opposite
face, so that the width of each side gradually diminishes to the top of
the shaft, which is crowned with a pyramid. There are two small obelisks
of basalt in the British Museum, numbered 70 and 5. They are entire from
the base upwards, but the upper part, together with the little pyramid
at the top, is broken off. Both of them were brought from Grand Cairo in
Egypt, where they were first taken possession of by the French, but they
afterwards came into the hands of the English when the French army
capitulated at Alexandria in 1801, and quitted the country.
The one numbered 70 was used as the door-sill of a mosque in the castle
of Cairo, where that excellent traveller, Niebuhr, saw it in 1762, and
copied part of the figures. By comparing his drawing with the north side
of this obelisk (as it now stands), we readily discover it to be the
same. This obelisk, besides losing its top and part of the shaft, has
been broken into two unequal pieces, which are now united. The lower
part, however, is quite complete, which is evident from there being a
smooth unsculptured surface on all the four sides, to the height of
about 10¼ inches above the base. In all the obelisks that have been
accurately measured, at least in all of which we have been able to
procure a complete account, the width of the adjacent sides is
different. For example, in this Museum obelisk, as it now stands, the
north and south sides are of the same dimensions, being about 1 foot 4⅞
inches wide, while the east and west sides are each about 1 foot 5½
inches: the height of this fragment is about 8 feet 1¾ inch, measured
along one of the faces.
These two obelisks have a great number of figures cut on each face,
representing either natural objects, such as birds and serpents, or
various other things which it is not in all cases easy to identify. They
are cut deep into the stone, and, in some instances, a considerable
elevation or relief is given to the parts contained within the deep
incision, for the purpose of showing the round and prominent parts of
the figure. On all Egyptian monuments of an early age, animals are cut
with great accuracy of outline and spirit, especially birds, of which
this obelisk offers some excellent specimens in the goose, the ibis,
known by his long beak and legs, and another bird in walking attitude,
near the base of the south side. The execution of this last is above all
praise.
It is now ascertained that the figures enclosed in oblong rings contain
the titles and names of kings. These are the same on the two obelisks,
and they happen also to be the same as those on the great sarcophagus,
No. 6.
There have been many disputes among the learned as to the origin and
meaning of obelisks, into which we shall not enter here. We know that
they were generally placed in pairs at the entrances of the great
Egyptian temples and palaces; and there are still two standing, in their
original position, before the gateway of a large edifice at Thebes. When
the Romans got possession of Egypt, Augustus removed two of the largest
obelisks from Heliopolis (the city of the sun) to Rome, where they still
exist, and attest the fact of their removal at that period, by a Latin
inscription on the pedestal. During the troubles of the city and the
disastrous period of the decline of the Roman Empire, these and other
obelisks were thrown down and broken; but they have since been set on
pedestals by the enterprising spirit of some of the popes. Sixtus V., in
1586, set the first example, in which he was followed by several of his
successors; and Pius VI. restored other obelisks in the years 1786,
1789, and 1792. Two have been raised since the last-mentioned date.
The largest obelisk now at Rome, and perhaps the largest in the world,
is that which stands in front of the Lateran church. It was originally
erected by the Emperor Constantius[4], in the Circus Maximus, by means
of a most cumbrous machinery of wood-work and ropes, after having been
brought from Egypt in a ship built expressly for the purpose, and manned
with three hundred rowers. Pope Sixtus V. set it up in its present place
in 1588, after it had lain on the ground broken in three pieces for
several centuries. Though the shaft has sustained some damage at the
base, it is still 105 feet long; the width of the two larger sides at
the base is 9 feet 8⅗ inches, and of the smaller 9 feet. It now stands
on a kind of pedestal, quite unsuited to the simple character of the
genuine Egyptian supports. The whole height at present, with its
pedestal and ornaments on the top, is about 150 English feet, and the
weight of the obelisk itself may probably be about 440 tons. The
material is the red granite of Syene, resembling that of the altar, No.
2, in the British Museum.
It is not so much the actual magnitude of an obelisk which excites our
wonder, for the London monument is 50 feet higher than the tallest of
the Roman obelisks--but the simplicity of the obelisk form, which is not
disfigured by any irregularity, its gradual diminution towards the
summit, which takes away all appearance of heaviness, the beautiful
sculptures with which most of them are covered, and the unity of the
huge mass cut from the quarries of Syene, conveyed so many hundred
miles, and then set firmly on its pedestal--all these combined fill us
with admiration at the boldness and taste of the designer, and the
unwearied patience and skill of the sculptor.
The following account of the mode in which an obelisk was carried down
the Nile, is preserved in Pliny’s Natural History[5], a book containing
a mass of information in a very crude, and often almost unintelligible
shape.
“A canal was dug from the river to the place where the obelisk lay, and
two boats were placed side-by-side, filled with pieces of stone of the
same material as the obelisk. These pieces were in the shape of a brick,
and a foot in length (or cubical pieces, each side measuring one foot),
so that the proportion between the quantity of matter in the obelisk and
that held by the boats could be determined. The boats were loaded to
twice the weight of the obelisk, in order that they might go under it,
its two ends resting on the two sides of the canal. Then, as the pieces
of stone were taken out, the boats of course rose, and at last supported
the obelisk and carried it off.”
This obelisk, according to the same authority, was eighty cubits high,
or about 120 English feet[6], and was erected at Alexandria by Ptolemæus
Philadelphus, the second Greek king of Egypt.
The obelisk in St. George’s Fields, London, will give some idea of the
figure of one of these stupendous masses, though it is deficient in
accurate proportions, insignificant in size, and placed on an ugly
pedestal. The obelisk at Alexandria, commonly called Cleopatra’s Needle,
stands first of all on a block of stone, which is in height about
one-ninth of the whole height of the obelisk itself; and this block
again rests on three rectangular plinths, placed one above another, the
base of the lowest being larger than that of the stone above it, and
this larger than the third; so that the three plinths form three steps
on each of the four sides of the obelisk.
The following are the dimensions of Cleopatra’s Needle, as given by the
French:--
Feet. Ins.
Height of shaft from its base to the base of the
pyramidal top 57 6-2/5
Ditto of pyramidal top 6 6-4/5
Height of pedestal on which obelisk stands 6 11
Whole height of the three steps 5 5-17/20
---------------
Whole height 76 6-1/20
This is not quite the whole height of the obelisk, as the French
measures do not seem to include about 3 ft. ¼ in. of one side, of which
they have given the dimensions.
It has been stated in the House of Commons (April 15th, 1832) that this
obelisk is 64 feet long, which is exactly the height of the shaft
according to the French measurement, and that it weighs 284 tons. We are
not able to learn whether it is this obelisk that is to be brought to
England, or another at Thebes, which is in a much better state of
preservation. The Alexandrine obelisk is so much damaged by the
atmosphere of the sea, particularly on the south side, that it is hardly
worth bringing. Our climate would, perhaps, be still more unfavourable
to its preservation.
It has been suggested to us that this Theban obelisk, if it be brought
to England, should be set up in some advantageous position in the
metropolis, where it might not only form a great ornament, but serve the
useful purpose of a centre to measure roads from--a thing, the want of
which is generally known and felt.
-----
Footnote 4:
Ammianus Marcellinus, xvii. 4.
Footnote 5:
Book xxxvi. chap. 9.
Footnote 6:
Only a rough approximation.
---------------------