IN AND AROUND LUXOR, WITH A SIDE LIGHT ON RAMESES THE GREAT
Until we arrived at Luxor we did not know the total meaning of the word
"old." The ruins, which are the stock in trade of this ancient City of
Thebes, date so far back into the dimness of Nowhere that all the other
antiquities of earth seem as fresh and recent as a morning newspaper.
"Old" is merely a relative term, after all. I remember in my native
town we small boys used to gaze in reverent awe at a court house that
was actually built before the Civil War. We would look up at that
weather-beaten frame structure, two stories high, with a square bird
cage on top of it, and to us it had all the historic interest of a
mediaeval castle. Later, in Chicago, when the special writer on the
newspaper ran short of topics he would dish up an illustrated story on
the oldest building in town. It was constructed away back in 1833.
When a man from the West goes East for the first time and sees
Independence Hall in Philadelphia, he takes off his hat and tries to
grasp the overwhelming fact that the building stood there even in the
far distant Colonial period. When he travels to London and walks
through St. Paul's or stands in the Henry VII. Chapel at Westminster he
begins to get a new line on the meaning of "old." Later he sees the
Forum at Rome and declares to himself:--"At last I have found something
really ancient."
But when he arrives at Luxor and rambles among the elephantine ruins
and sits in the deep cool shade of temples that had been standing a
good many centuries before anyone thought of laying out the Forum in
Rome he will begin to understand how everything else in the world is
comparatively hot from the griddle. One day we were in the shop of
Mouhammed Mouhassib, in Luxor, and the old antiquarian reached under
the counter and lugged out a mummy. The body was well preserved, and
the embalming cloth in which it was wrapped and cross-wrapped still
retained a definite texture.
"This mummy dates back beyond any of the dynasties of which we have a
record," said the dealer. "There were no inscriptions on the mummy
case, because when this gentleman lived it was not the custom to
inscribe the cocoon. You will observe, however, that he was buried in
a sitting posture, and we know that this manner of burial was
discontinued about 6000 B.C."
As we stood there gazing into the calm features of the unidentified
has-been and realised that he had been sitting in that easy attitude
for eight thousand years waiting for us to come along and be presented
to him, we began to get a faint inkling of what the word "old" really
means.
Goodness knows I am not going to attempt any detailed description of
the stupendous ruins which make Luxor the most interesting spot in
Egypt. Anyone who is going to describe Luxor needs a new box of
adjectives every few minutes, and, besides, to repeat over and over
again that the columns and cavernous sanctuaries at Karnak are
"gigantic," and "colossal," and "huge," and so on, cannot bring the
reader to any actual conception of the barbaric massiveness of these
ancient structures.
The rulers who built the main temple of Karnak, a section at a time,
thought they were not doing themselves credit unless they piled up
columns about the size of the redwood trees in California and guarded
each entrance with statues as big as the Goddess of Liberty in New York
Harbour, and when they made a wall to enclose a courtyard, they put up
something to resemble a mountain range. The ordinary 150 pound mortal
edging his way through the corridors and under the vast shadows of
these overwhelming uplifts of masonry feels about as large and as
important as a gnat.
Everywhere about these temples there are uniformed guards whose duty it
is to protect the remains against the vandal and the relic hunter. The
guard follows a few feet behind you as you roam through the many acres
of toppling ruin. He is afraid that you will steal something.
Inasmuch as the smallest fragment of one of these huge statues, or
obelisks, would weigh probably six hundred pounds, we felt that he was
not justified in suspecting us. But he followed along and then, when
we were leaving, he calmly came forward and indicated that he was ready
to take a money insult. This move on his part was most characteristic
of the Egyptian attitude toward visitors in general. Every native
expects to get something out of a traveller for the simple reason that
he needs the money. Suppose that a suspicious character should arrive
in an American city and the chief of police sent out a detective to
shadow him and see that he did not blow open any safes or crawl into
any second stories. The detective, having followed the suspect all
day, approaches him at nightfall and says, "Look here; you have put me
to a lot of trouble. I have been on my feet all day watching you for
fear that you were going to commit a burglary, and I think it is only
right that you should pay me something."
Every time we visited an antiquity these guards tagged at our heels,
watching us like hawks, and invariably they tried to hold us up for a
piece of silver before we departed. There is a Masonic understanding
among the natives that the tourist is to be fleeced. For instance,
although the copper coins are in common use among the natives, and in
the cheaper shops the prices are usually reckoned in milliemes, it is
almost impossible for a traveller to get any of these copper coins
because the natives want him to bestow his gratuities in piastres. A
millieme is worth one-half cent, and then the millieme is further
subdivided into fractional coins, some of which are about the size of
the mustard seed and worth about as much as a share of mining stock.
Egyptian money is very easily understood by Americans. The piastre is
the same as our five-cent piece or nickel. The silver five piastre
piece resembles our quarter and has the same value. The ten piastre
piece is the same as our half-dollar. The 100 piastre bill is worth
five dollars. Inasmuch as many of the prices sound large and important
when quoted in piastres, the dealers have learned to demand English
pounds sterling or American dollars. That is, they name their first
prices in sovereigns and dollars and then gradually work down to
piastres. I saw a native trying to sell a scarab to a tourist. His
first price was L7, equivalent to $35. After a half-hour of haggling
he had cut it to 7 piastres, or 35 cents, and the deal was consummated.
The old city of Thebes was a huge and hustling metropolis, surrounded
by a high wall of a hundred gates, with countless regiments of soldiers
marching out to conquer distant lands and bring back slaves in little
batches of 80,000 or so. This was along about 2000 B.C. The city
began to lose some of its importance a few centuries before the
Christian era and dwindled in size until twenty years ago it was a mere
village of huts nestling in the shade of the great temples. Then the
tourist travel set in very heavily, and to-day Luxor is a hustling city
with large hotels and fancy shops and a general air of prosperity. The
magnificent temple of Luxor is in the very heart of the new city. The
rambling temple of Karnak is a short donkey ride to the north, and
across the river, some three miles to the west, there are more temples
and shattered statues and the wonderful tombs of the kings. In olden
days there was a broad avenue leading north to Karnak and thence west
to the valley in the desert, where the kings were buried, and this
boulevard was guarded on either side, for the entire distance, by huge
recumbent Sphinxes carved out of granite. Can you imagine a double row
of gigantic figures crouched on each side of the street and about
twenty feet apart all the way up Broadway to Central Park and then
through the Park to Riverside Drive and up the drive to the distant
suburbs? If so, you will understand to what an extent these old rulers
"went in" for sphinxes. Labour cost nothing and time did not count for
anything and if a king wished to build an avenue of sphinxes leading to
his private temple or tomb all he had to do was to give the word.
As soon as a king mounted the throne he began making his funeral
preparations, and ordered the entire staff of stone cutters to chisel
out hieroglyphs explaining that he was great and good and just, and
that he never took off his hat to anyone except the gods, and then not
ordinary picayune gods, but only those of the very first magnitude.
According to the hieroglyphs, every king that ruled in Egypt was as
wise as Solomon, as brilliant in military strategy as Napoleon, and as
hard on the evildoer as our own beloved T.R.
This unanimous outpouring of eulogy is largely explained by the fact
that every memorial in honour of a ruler was erected and supervised by
that ruler himself. It's a fact! Of all the countless temples and
obelisks and godlike granite figures and festal tomb chambers remaining
in Egypt to testify to the majesty and splendour of the ancient
dynasties, every one was built under the personal supervision of the
man who gets all of the glory out of the inscriptions. The succeeding
generation never got up subscription lists to build monuments to
statesmen or military commanders. The dutiful and loving son never
ordered a memorial in honour of his illustrious father. He was too
busy carving his own biography on the sandstone and depicting himself
as pursuing the enemy or taking afternoon tea with haughty three-headed
gods.
In old Egypt every king was his own press agent. These rulers could
have written some great "personal recollections" for the magazines,
because they remembered all the incidents that brought them to the
centre of the stage with the calcium turned on, and wisely forgot all
details calculated to injure their standing with posterity.
[Illustration: _In old Egypt every king was his own press agent_]
You take Rameses the Great. He is regarded as perhaps the king pin of
all the rulers during Egypt's long period of national splendour. Have
you ever heard anyone say a word in criticism of Rameses' fiscal
policy, his treatment of the rebate system, management of the Senate,
or his social relations with the dark emissaries that came up from
Nubia? No! Everyone has a good word for Rameses. The writers of
ancient history extol him, and the guide books print his name in big
black letters, and the travellers to Egypt gather about his
glass-covered coffin in the Ghizeh Museum at Cairo and try to trace
noble lineaments in the shrunken features. They sigh over his
departure and look down at him mournfully, with their hats in their
hands, as if they had lost him this spring, instead of 3164 years ago
this spring. They say:--"Well, he certainly was a grand character and
it's too bad we haven't got some rulers of his calibre nowadays."
[Illustration: _They look down at him mournfully_]
It is not my desire to attack Rameses, but I feel it my duty to submit
to students of history and archaeologists a very interesting papyrus,
which came into my possession at Luxor. If this document is accepted
as authentic and the statements are believed, then it would appear that
Rameses was the champion advertiser of ancient times. If Rameses were
alive to-day he would own all the billboards in America. He would take
a full page in every Sunday paper and have his picture on free
calendars. He would give Lawson cards and spades.
In all accepted records discovered up to this time Rameses has received
nothing but praise. Why? Because all the records were doctored by
Rameses himself. He was the great builder of Egypt and all over the
walls of every building that he erected he had his picture and tales of
his mighty achievements blazoned forth in bright colors like the row of
banners in front of a side show. Wherever in Egypt he could find a
large smooth-faced rock he would engage a member of the Royal Academy
to sculp something about Rameses, and he would always stand and look
over the sculptor's shoulder to make sure that the king didn't get the
worst of it. If the army of Rameses suffered a defeat at the hands of
the Hittites, did any mention of the fact find its way into the
inscriptions? Most assuredly not. Rameses had the hieroglyphs report
that he made a masterly manoeuvre in order to develop the strength of
the enemy and then retired to a new and more strategic position.
[Illustration: _To make sure the King didn't get the worst of it_]
We cannot discover from the old inscriptions that any Egyptian army
ever suffered defeat, and yet it has been learned from other sources
that now and then an invading army had the whole native population
running foot races up and down the Nile. However, it was not
considered good form for historians to mention these painful incidents.
The rate of mortality among those who criticised the administration was
exactly 100 per cent. It is because all of the familiar records are
known to have been under censorship that the papyrus discovered by me
at Luxor possesses a most startling interest.
As a cold matter of fact, I discovered this manuscript by proxy. That
is, I bought it from the man who said he had found it concealed in the
funeral vestments of a mummy uprooted near Thebes in the month of
February. I cannot give the name of this Egyptian for the reason that
all valuable antiquities discovered in Egypt are supposed to belong to
the government, and anyone concealing an art treasure or some document
of rare value may be severely punished. I can say this much,
however--the native from whom I bought the papyrus assured me that he
was an honourable and truthful guide, and he gave me his personal
guarantee that he had removed the document from the mummy's
undergarment with his own hands and had been waiting an opportunity to
offer it to a traveller who was really a _connoisseur_ of antiquities
and a reverent student of ancient languages. All this he told me while
we were out on the desert together, and after looking apprehensively in
all directions to make sure that no human being was within three miles
of us, he pulled a tin cylinder from under his robe and carefully
removed from it the time-stained but still intact roll of papyrus. I
must say that I never saw a more convincing document. The hieroglyphs
looked as Egyptian as anything could be, and as soon as I saw them I
had a burning curiosity to know what message to future generations this
poor mummy had been hugging in his bosom through all these centuries.
I asked regarding the mummy on which the papyrus had been found and
learned that the inscription on his outer coffin indicated that he had
been an officer assigned to the royal palace of Rameses II., the type
of courtier who must bend the supple knee and wear the smiling face, at
all times concealing his real opinion of things in general.
The guarantee which accompanied the papyrus was so heartfelt and
altogether emphatic that I made the purchase. The price was large, but
I felt justified in paying it, for the native assured me that I could
sell it to the British Museum at any time for twice as much. I
promised faithfully that I would never mention his name in connection
with the deal, and this promise was easily kept, because he had a name
that no one could have remembered for two minutes.
For obvious reasons I did not show the document to my travelling
companions. I knew that if people heard of my discovery and got to
talking about it I might not be permitted to take it out of the
country. When we arrived at Cairo I went to Mr. Ralph Blanchard, an
American who is noted as an antiquarian, Egyptologist, and mummy
collector, and after a few cautious preliminaries told him that I had a
document in hieroglyphics of which I desired a translation. I begged
him not to inquire where or how I had obtained the papyrus. All I
wanted him to do was to tell me what the fool thing meant.
Blanchard was startled as soon as he looked at the document. I could
see that. He said he had deciphered a good many acres of
hieroglyphics, but this record was unique and the most interesting that
had ever come under his observation. He spent two days on the
translation, so as to be absolutely accurate regarding every fine point
and get not only the cold words but also the literary style and the
real spirit of the original communication.
[Illustration: _The original papyrus_]
Let the translation speak for itself. I must confess that when it was
completed I was overwhelmed. Not only had a flood of light been let in
upon a most important epoch, but there were also surprising revelations
as to the origin of valued words and phrases. Here is the
translation:--
_Rameses Second is a Smooth Citizen. His Foxy Scheme is to bunko
Posterity. His Soldiers go out and put up a hard Scrap and do up the
enemy and he hires a Stonecutter to give an Account of it on a Granite
Rock and hand all the Bouquets to Rameses. He is building many
Temples. The Architects draw the Plans. The Labourers do the Work.
The Public foots the Bill. Rameses and the Local Deities are the only
ones who butt into the Inscriptions. He has the future doped out as
follows:--Three thousand years from now, when Cook's Tourists see my
Pictures all over the Shop, they will conclude that I must have been
the real Works and they will call me Rameses the Great._
[Illustration: _Translation of the Rameses papyrus_]
This revelation in regard to the self-advertising proclivities of the
great monarch, coming, as it did, from one who had been intimately
associated with him, was so vastly important that Mr. Blanchard thought
it better to verify the translation. He took a copy of the document to
several eminent Egyptologists, and they agreed with him on every point.
They said there was no getting away from "scraps" and "butt in" and
"dope out" and other characters which seemed to me to have somewhat of
a modern flavour.
After a man has been universally respected for nearly three thousand
two hundred years it does seem a low down trick to show him up. And,
possibly, the anonymous writer was prejudiced because he had failed to
secure an appointment. Did the papyrus really come from the bosom of
the mummy? Who knows? Sometimes it is the duty of the traveller to
record facts as they come under his observation and not to draw hasty
conclusions.
The documentary evidence is submitted herewith--first a copy of the
original papyrus and then the translation, word for word and phrase by
phrase. The testimony should convince any who are disposed to be
sceptical. My only hope is that it will not entirely blast the
reputation of Rameses.