in Kahira. As soon as the Nile begins to fill the several pools,
_birkets_, in the neighbourhood, the fishermen go to the river, and
collecting several sorts of spawn, distribute it into the pools, where
in the space of three or four days, it produces fish in abundance.
Nov. 1796. Achmet Aga, a Zanthiote, who has been already mentioned,
about this time left Kahira on his way to Dar-Fûr, by the return of
the caravan with which I came. The Sultan Abd-el-rachmân, desirous
of gaining a name among the neighbouring princes, but injudicious
and governed by caprice in the choice of the means, and stung with
the rage of conquest, though regardless of the means of security,
sought for some person to exhibit to him the European invention of
artillery; and though he had not yet been witness to its effects,
conceived that the possession of some of the gold mines under
_Sennaar_ would soon be realized on his obtaining these powerful
engines. He wrote to the Beys to request they would send him some
one from among their servants, who might make him master of this
important discovery. He also sought for a medical practitioner.
The person abovementioned had embraced Islamism, and possessed some
ingenuity in mechanical operations, particularly the construction
of artillery. He was not extremely at ease in Kahira; and Murad
Bey, unable to improve his situation from the multitude of prior
claimants, consented to his request for permission to depart. He
gave him strong recommendations to the monarch, and a horse, camels,
and other requisites for the journey. Achmed commenced his route with
eclat, having with him fifty or sixty artificers, who had enterprize
enough to encounter the difficulties of so long a passage, or who
thought no change could render their situation worse. He had also
four pieces of brass cannon, six pounders.
Thus an opening seemed offered to furnish the people of Soudân
with one more, at least, of the equivocal blessings of civilized
society.—What may have been the termination of Achmet’s voyage
I have not heard; but his perseverance was scarcely equal to the
undertaking, and it seems likely, that when his golden hopes should
have vanished, he would return to Egypt in despondency, or perish
in Dar-Fûr.
CHAP. XII.
ANTIENT EGYPTIANS.
_Their persons, complexion, &c._
In the history of nations, some facts may gradually become
obscure, by having appeared to the historiographer of the time,
and even to those of some ages after, too notorious to require being
particularly recorded. Amid the various information respecting the
manners of the Athenians and Romans to be drawn from their respective
historians, poets, and orators, we are not furnished with the means
of ascertaining the appropriate enunciation of their own languages. A
few casual hints, from Dionysius of Halicarnassus and Cicero, afford
all the light that antiquarian labour has been able to throw on
this subject.
The colour of the antient Egyptians has of late become a matter of
doubtful investigation from the same causes; but is in its nature
more interesting, and therefore merits a short discussion. By one
of the most recent and intelligent travellers in that country,
a conjecture, apparently novel, has been offered to the public,
viz. that the original inhabitants of Egypt were _negroes_, and that,
accordingly, the world is indebted for all those branches of science
which had their origin in Egypt, and were afterwards perfected by
the Greeks, and for all those monuments of art, the feint remains
of which still excite admiration, to a people of that description.
The philanthropy of Volney has induced him to rely more on the
arguments he adduces in support of his hypothesis, than the nature
of those arguments seems to admit: and the authority of an author who
justly holds so high a place in the public estimation, is sufficient
to give currency to error.
If plausible arguments were brought to establish the doctrine
here mentioned, it would be unreasonable to refuse assent to it
solely as militating against a commonly received opinion. But to
fix beyond controversy an historical fact, more surely is required
than ingenious conjecture, fancied resemblances, and quotations of
but dubious meaning.
The subject in question ought not to be clouded by any prejudicated
opinion relative to the physical differences between the white and
black race of men. The evidence should be patiently weighed, and the
whole left to stand on a solid basis, or fall by its own infirmity.
The Coptic language bears a manifest relationship to the Arabic
and Syriac, as Volney allows. But are the languages allied, and the
nations who speak them strangers to each other? It would seem, on
the contrary, the subject of proof, that if the languages be indeed
cognate, the nations who speak them must have proceeded from one
parent stock; for what resemblance between the sonorous copiousness
of the Arabic, and the ineffable mendicancy of the native African
tongues[27]?
The Ethiopians, or in a more confined sense, the Abyssinians,
though so much farther removed from Asia, the source of migration,
are far from partaking what is properly called the negro character,
as the narratives of the Portuguese writers, who first knew them, with
those of Poncet, and in our times of Bruce, abundantly testify. The
_Fungni_, or people of Sennaar, with those of Dongola, Mahas, &c. in
_Barabra_, or _Nubia_, are, as all the Europeans who have seen them
in Kahira can affirm, not negroes. And if all these be colonies
from Syria or Arabia Felix, how are we constrained to acknowlege
that the Egyptians must have been of the African race?
It has been urged that the Colossal figure of the _Sphinx_, near
the pyramids, gave additional countenance to the opinion that the
Egyptians were black, the face of that statue having been said to
resemble the negro. But, not to mention that the form of the visage is
now become entirely dubious, in forming statues of mere ornament, or
as representations of the human figure, the artist endeavours to give
the features most habitual to him, or what are most admired among his
countrymen; but as to a merely emblematical figure, the same reasoning
is not conclusive. Would it be imagined that a dog-headed nation
once existed from the figure of _Latrator Anubis_? Unfortunately,
of the Sphinxes at Thebes, innumerable fragments of which are yet
remaining, scarcely one is entire enough to give any idea of the
form of the visage which the sculptor designed to attach to it.
The statues of the Nile, it is said, were made of black marble,
in allusion to his coming from Ethiopia. If this symbol, hitherto
so unsatisfactorily explained, (the Sphinx,) had any relation to
the same subject, might not the negro face be given to it for a
similar reason[28]? It would hardly have been thought necessary to
explain why the figure of the Nile was black, if the complexion of
the natives of Egypt had been generally acknowleged of the same tinge.
The complete silence of the antient writers, concerning so singular a
circumstance as that of the negro character of the Egyptians, if all
other arguments were equally balanced, would be sufficient to decide
this point in the negative. In defect, however, of historical and
positive testimony, strong circumstantial evidence is drawn from the
monuments of undoubted antiquity yet remaining. Among these are the
small statues of Isis, &c. daily found among the ruins in various
parts of Egypt. These are adorned with a profusion of long hair,
peculiarly contorted, and the nose, lips, and other features, are far
from resembling those of the negro. The same may be observed of the
figures in alto relievo and basso relievo, on the walls at Thebes,
in the caverns of Gebel-el-Silsili, &c. Of the Colossal statues at
Thebes, the features are too much damaged to be adduced in proof.
The two harpers, and several other human figures in the caverns
of Thebes, called _Biban-el-molûk_, (tombs of the kings,) and in
which the colours are perfectly well preserved, have the features
and complexion exactly resembling the Egyptians of the present day.
The apparent testimony of Herodotus, the earliest historian whose works
have reached our days, is not so strong as might at first appear. The
terms μελάγχροες και ουλότριχες are merely relative, and apply to the
greater or less degree of blackness and crispature of the Egyptians, as
compared with the Greeks, to whom the writer was addressing himself; and
certainly cannot be confined to positive blackness or woolly hair. To
corroborate this interpretation of the passage from Herodotus, may be
adduced a similar one from Ammianus Marcellinus, lib. xxii. That author
says, that the Egyptians are _Atrati_, a term of equally strong import
with the μελάγχροες of Herodotus, but, like it, evidently applied in a
comparative sense; for, in the very next sentence, he says,
_erubescunt_, they blush, or grow red. It is true, indeed, negroes
suffer a certain change of countenance when affected with the sentiment
of shame, but it would be rather a bold assertion that the word
_erubescere_ can ever be applied to characterise the effect of that
feeling on a negro. Even in the vernacular idioms of modern Europe, by
the term a _black man_, is daily designated one of visibly a darker
complexion than ourselves. Besides, what antient writer has described
the inhabitants of Colchis? Was Medea, the Love of the Grecian heroes,
a negress?
Volney has offered as a general remark on the Mamlûks of Egypt,
that they are easily distinguishable from the natives by having
light hair. It is certain that dark hair, eyes, and complexion, do
not obtain so universally among them as among the native Egyptians
or Arabs; yet in fact, their eyes and hair may be observed much
more commonly of a dark than light hue. If then the fondness for
generalizing his remarks have operated to deprive this author of
the knowlege which hourly experience, continued for several months,
could not fail to have given him, what may not be credited as to the
effect of his prejudices in matters of remote and doubtful history,
where truth is to be drawn out only by patient inquiry, and the
frequency of error is exactly proportioned to that of conjecture?
But if all the arguments to confute this new theory should fail,
one fact remains which is invincible. The persons of the antient
Egyptians, preserved as it were entire by the prescience of that
people concerning the errors into which posterity might fall,
exhibit an irrefragable proof of their features and of the colour
of their skin, which is now, by the quantity of mummies that have
been imported into Europe, subject to the inspection of the curious
almost throughout that quarter of the globe. This resurrection of
witnesses also evinces, that the Copts are their genuine descendants,
and preserve the family likeness in their complexion of dusky brown,
dark hair and eyes, lips sometimes thick, but the nose as often
aquiline, and other marks of a total dissimilitude between them and
the negro race.
* * * * *
The black complexion of the Africans seems to extend much farther
North in the Western, than in the Eastern part of the continent
they inhabit. The people of Fezzân, whose capital is in latitude
27° 48″ or about 2° 10″ to the South of Kahira, are black,
while the Egyptians, in the same latitude, are only of brown or
olive colour. The Fezzâners, however, have not entirely the negro
feature. They have frequently children by their negro slaves, the
Egyptians but seldom. The island, near Assûan, consists chiefly
of blacks; but the townsmen of Assûan are of a red colour, and
have the features of the Nubians, _Barabra_, whose language they
also willingly speak. The people of El-wah are quite of Egyptian or
Arab complexion and feature, none of them black: so that I scarcely
conceived myself to have arrived at the confines of the blacks,
till we reached the first inhabited part of Dar-Fûr. The first
I saw are called _Zeghawa_; they are not negroes, but a distinct
race. The Arabs of this empire remain always very distinguishable
in colour and feature. The people of _Harrâza_ are of a reddish
complexion. Perhaps this being a very mountainous district may
occasion some peculiarity. The Fûrians are perfectly black. I
have seen some of the natives of Kulla, whence slaves are brought,
and which is farther South than Dar-Fûr, that were red. On the
whole, one might be inclined to go as far fifteen degrees of north
latitude in this part of Africa, to find the line between the Arabs
and the Blacks.
CHAP. XIII.
JOURNEY TO FEIUM.
_Tamieh — Canals — Feiûm — Roses — Lake Mœris — Oasis
Parva_ — PYRAMIDS — _of Hawara — of Dashûr — of Sakarra
— of Jizé, or the great Pyramids — Antient Memphis — Egyptian
Capitals._
On the 28th of December 1792 left Kahira to visit Feiûm, a city
distant about sixty miles to the South-west. At Moknân procured from
the Shech a letter to one of his officers, residing at Bedis, another
village further on to the Southward, commanding him to accompany me
to Feiûm. Proceeded through a grove of large date trees, which are
watered from several cisterns, all of them supplied from the Nile,
during its increase.
Between Bedis and Tamieh passed a natural opening, in the chain
which constitutes the Western wall of Egypt. A small canal runs
through Tamieh[29], and here the country again assumes the aspect
of cultivation. This little town is remarkable for a manufacture
of mats, though the situation be so insecure, that the Arabs in
the preceding night had plundered their whole stock, to the value,
as they said, of five or six thousand patackes. The Arabs still
haunted the neighbourhood, and we were forced to discharge a few
musket shot to keep off a small party that assailed us in the morning.
Passed another canal at Senûris, the seat of an hospitable Shech of
the Bedouins. These canals reach from the Nile to the lake called
Mœris. Left Senûris at half past seven on the 1st January 1793
and in two hours arrived at Feiûm.
At a small distance to the North are the ruins of an antient town,
called by the Arabs _Medinet Faris_, city of the Persians, probably
antient Arsinoe. Some mutilated busts and statues found here were
offered for sale. I also observed some jars, resembling those used
to contain the dead Ibis, and some vitrifications that seemed to
indicate an Arab glass-work.
Feiûm stands on the principal canal leading from the Nile to the
lake, and is surrounded with cultivated ground, a great part gardens,
producing that profusion of roses for which this place was celebrated,
and which were distilled into rose-water. The mode of propagating them
was by continued layers; the young twigs thence arising being found
to produce the largest and most fragrant flowers. The rose-water
was excellent, and sent to all quarters; but the cultivation is
now running gradually to decay. Wheat and other grain abound in
the vicinity.
This city is not walled, but is populous, though on the decline;
it contains several mosques and okals. There are few Copts, the
inhabitants being chiefly Mohammedans. The houses are partly stone,
partly unburned bricks. It is governed by a Cashef. The fish from the
lake cannot be praised. Provisions tolerably plentiful; water good.
After passing three days at Feiûm, proceeded towards the lake, of
which I wished to make the circuit. This is the Mœris of Strabo
and Ptolemy; and the testimony of the latter, living in Egypt,
seems unquestionable. However this be, the lake, now called
_Birket-el-kerun_, probably from its extremities bearing some
resemblance to horns, bears no mark of being, as some suppose,
the product of human art. The shape, as far as was distinguishable,
seems not inaccurately laid down in D’Anville’s map, unless it
be that the end nearest the Nile should run more in a North-west and
South-east direction. The length may probably be between thirty and
forty miles; the breadth, at the widest part I could gain, was 5000
toises, as taken with a sextant, that is, nearly six miles. The utmost
possible extent of circuit must of course be thirty leagues. On the
North-east and South is a rocky ridge, in every appearance primeval:
there are some isles in the extremity nearest Feiûm, where there
is a flat sandy shore. In short, nothing can present an appearance
more unlike the works of men. Several fishermen, in miserable boats,
are constantly employed on the lake. The water is brackish, like
most bodies of water under the same circumstances.
The western extremity of this lake is in the dominion of the
Muggrebine Arabs, who pass thither from _El-wah el-ghurbi_, and
other places, and who being there under no control, suffer no person
to travel thither, unless under their immediate protection. This
information, which I received not till my arrival at Feiûm,
frustrated my expectations of reaching some ruins which are said to
exist there. The Arab Shech of _Abu-kissé_ told me it would require
four days to go round the lake, and return on the other side. That
there are no villages near it, nor any thing to be procured but from
the Muggrebines just mentioned. On one of the isles at the Eastern
extremity it is said that human bones are sometimes found.
From Feiûm travelled South-east. At Hawâra are two small pyramids
of unburned brick, and another passage through the mountain. The
plain from Feiûm to the Nile is in excellent cultivation, chiefly
wheat, then just rising from the ground. Illahôn is a town or
large village, filled with persons whose chief employment is the
culture of the soil. Passed the _Bahr-bila-ma_, the channel of a
large canal. Farther on is Bathen[30], a long deep cut, supposed to
be the artificial Mœris of Herodotus and Diodorus Siculus.
Returned to Bedis. On the following day passed the pyramids of
Dashûr. Five appear successively, exclusive of those of Sakarra. The
third after those of _Hawâra_, already mentioned, is that of Medûn,
which has been very elegant, and built in this singular form,
[Illustration]
It is composed of large pieces of the usual soft free-stone, joined
together with a little cement; and has been hewn off to a straight
surface. It would be extremely difficult to ascend to the top,
which is now very broad; but it is probable that there was another
square, completing its summit, which has been removed. The north
side has been injured by tearing out stones, which open a view
of the interior, which is however entirely solid. This pyramid
has been supposed to be natural rock at the base, but this mistake
must have arisen from a part being concealed. On removing the sand,
(which rises chiefly in the middle,) and on examining the corners,
the stones and cement may be observed to the very bottom.
The fourth is the most southerly of the four pyramids of Dashûr,
where are two large and two small. It is in the form of a cone,
terminating in an obtuse triangle, and is now much damaged. There is
no appearance of any casing on this or any other of the pyramids. The
stones do not point to the center, like those of the great pyramids
of Jizé. The faces of all these pyramids are directed to the four
cardinal points of the compass. Near them stands one of unburned
brick, and a small one of stone, not completed.
At Sakarra a great number exist, among which ten are of a large
size. The smaller ones are sometimes almost undistinguishable from the
sand-hills, and are dilapidated; the stones being used as materials
for building at Kahira, Jizé, &c.
The two largest of the pyramids are at about the distance of two
hours and a half from Jizé, and are well known to all who have
visited Egypt. The dimensions of that which has been opened I found
to be as follow:
Feet. Inches.
Great chamber 34 5
Breadth 17 2
Sarcophagus 7 8
Breadth 3 2
Depth within 2 10½
Thickness 0 6
The galleries and great chamber are situated due North and South,
allowing for the variation of the needle.
Feet. Inches.
The first passage descending 105 1
Small chamber, length 18 9
-------------- breadth 17 1
Antichamber, length 7 5
Main gallery, upper part 150 0
------------- lower part 148 0
Passage to inferior chamber 109 1
An absurd opinion has recently been stated, that the pyramids are
hewn out of the rock on which they stand; but the first ocular
inspection would set this aside, the joinings of the stones being
everywhere marked with cement. But it is unnecessary to dwell on a
conjecture so futile.
In the open pyramid, the chamber is lined with granite, and the
sarcophagus also formed of that stone. But the materials used in
the general fabrication of these edifices is free-stone, of a soft
kind and white hue; it is replete with shells. The rock on which
they stand is of the same soft stone. Returned to Kahira.
On another occasion I visited the pleasant site of the antient
Memphis, on the left bank of the Nile, about two hours to the South of
Kahira, in a plain above three miles broad, between the river and the
mountains. The land is now laid down in corn, with date trees toward
the mountains. Nothing remains except heaps of rubbish, in which are
found pieces of sculptured stone. The spot has been surrounded with
a canal, and seems every way a more eligible situation than that of
Kahira[31]. Its extent might be marked by that of the ground where
remains are dug up, and which is always overgrown with a kind of
thistle that seems to thrive among ruins. It is most conveniently
visited from the Coptic convent called _Abu-Nemrûs_.
None of the fine marbles that are scattered so profusely at Alexandria
are discoverable here; whether it be that they were never used,
or carried away to adorn other places.
Of the several capitals of Egypt in successive ages, Thebes, or
Diospolis, seems the most antient. Next was Memphis, itself a city
of the most remote antiquity. Babylon seems to have been only the
capital of a part retained by the Persians, after Cambyses had subdued
Egypt, and was, by all accounts, founded by the Persians. Alexandria
succeeded Memphis, and remained the chief city, till the Saracens
founded _Misr-el-Kahira_.
CHAP. XIV.
JOURNEY TO SINAI.
_Route — Suez — Ships and ship-building — Trade — Scarcity
of water — Remains of the antient canal — Tûr — Mountains
of red granite — Description of Sinai — Eastern gulf of the Red
Sea — Return to Kahira._
On the 1st of March 1793 left Kahira to proceed to Suez. I had made
an agreement with the Arab Shech, who was charged with the care of
the caravan, that he and his servant should accompany me, without
waiting for its slow progress. But he broke his engagement, as usual
with the Arabs, and I was constrained to wait for the departure of
a large body, consisting of an hundred and fifty persons and two
hundred camels.
The route to Suez is nearly one uniform plain, generally hard and
rocky, though here and there spots of deep sand occur. The journey
was very slowly conducted, as the camels were permitted to brouze on
the verdure which sprinkles the desert solely after the winter. On
the third day, a South-west wind having subsided, rain fell for four
hours and a quarter. The mornings and evenings were cold, though
hot in the day. Some have ignorantly conceived that no rain falls in
Egypt. At Alexandria showery weather will prevail for a week together;
and I have sometimes seen rain at Kahira. In Upper Egypt even showers
are very rare, and only one fell while I was in that country.
After a heavy progress of five days reached Suez. The town is small,
and built of unburned brick. It contains twelve mosques, of which some
are stone, but the most are mean buildings. The sea near the town is
very shallow, yet there is a small yard for ship-building. Population,
Mohammedans, with a very few Greeks. Suez is very modern, probably
built within these last three hundred years; being unknown to
travellers of a more antient date.
There are here at present four three-masted vessels, and ten others,
some with two, some with one. Two building, one of which is pierced
for twelve guns; and ten large boats, without masts. The largest of
these ships was intended for the Indian trade, the rest for traffic
to Jidda; one or two of them had been built in Yemen.