I SHOULD like to give you a conception, however faint, of the Tombs of
the ancient Egyptians, for in them is to be found the innermost
secret of the character, the belief, the immortal expectation of that
accomplished and wise people. A barren description of these places
of sepulchre would be of small service to you, for the key would be
wanting, and you would be simply confused by a mass of details and
measurements, which convey no definite idea to a person who does not see
them with his own eyes. I should not indeed be warranted in attempting
to say anything about these great Tombs at Thebes, which are so
completely described in many learned volumes, did I not have the hope
that some readers, who have never had access to the works referred to
will be glad to know something of that which most engaged the educated
Egyptian mind.
No doubt the most obvious and immediate interest of the Tombs of old
Egypt, is in the sculptures that depict so minutely the life of the
people, represent all their occupations and associations, are, in fact,
their domestic and social history written in stone. But it is not of
this that I wish to speak here; I want to write a word upon the tombs
and what they contain, in their relation to the future life.
A study of the tombs of the different epochs, chronologically pursued,
would show, I think, pretty accurately, the growth of the Egyptian
theology, its development, or rather its departure from the primitive
revelation of one God, into the monstrosities of its final mixture
of coarse polytheistic idolatry and the vaguest pantheism. These two
extremes are represented by the beautiful places of sepulchre of the
fourth and fifth dynasties at Geezeh and Memphis, in which all the
sculptures relate to the life of the deceased and no deities are
represented; and the tombs of the twenty-fourth dynasty at Thebes which
are so largely covered with the gods and symbols of a religion become
wholly fantastic. It was in the twenty-sixth dynasty (just before the
conquest of Egypt by the Persians) that the Funeral Ritual received
its final revision and additions—the sacred chart of the dead which had
grown, paragraph by paragraph, and chapter by chapter, from its brief
and simple form in the earliest times.
The Egyptians had a considerable, and also a rich literature, judging by
the specimens of it preserved and by the value set upon it by classical
writers; in which no department of writing was unrepresented. The works
which would seem of most value to the Greeks were doubtless those
on agriculture, astronomy, and geometry; the Egyptians wrote also on
medicine, but the science was empirical then as it is now. They had
an enormous bulk of historical literature, both in verse and prose,
probably as semifabulous and voluminous as the thousand great volumes of
Chinese history. They did not lack, either, in the department of belles
lettres; there were poets, poor devils no doubt who were compelled to
celebrate in grandiose strains achievements they did not believe; and
essayists and letter-writers, graceful, philosophic, humorous. Nor
was the field of fiction unoccupied; some of their lesser fables and
romances have been preserved; they are however of a religious
character, myths of doctrine, and it is safe to say different from our
Sunday-School tales. The story of Cinderella was a religious myth. No
one has yet been fortunate enough to find an Egyptian novel, and we may
suppose that the quid-nunes, the critics of Thebes, were all the time
calling upon the writers of that day to make an effort and produce The
Great Egyptian Novel.
The most important part, however, of the literature of Egypt was the
religious, and of that we have, in the Ritual or Book of the Dead,
probably the most valuable portion. It will be necessary to refer to
this more at length. A copy of the Funeral Ritual, or “The Book of
the Manifestation to Light” as it was entitled, or some portion of
it—probably according to the rank or wealth of the deceased, was
deposited with every mummy. In this point of view, as this document was
supposed to be of infinite service, a person's wealth would aid him in
the next world; but there came a point in the peregrination of every
soul where absolute democracy was reached, and every man stood for
judgment on his character. There was a foreshadowing of this even in the
ceremonies of the burial. When the mummy, after the lapse of the seventy
days of mourning, was taken by the friends to the sacred lake of the
nome (district), across which it must be transported in the boat of
Charon before it could be deposited in the tomb, it was subjected to an
ordeal. Forty-two judges were assembled on the shore of the lake, and if
anyone accused the deceased, and could prove that he led an evil life,
he was denied burial. Even kings were subjected to this trial, and those
who had been wicked, in the judgment of their people, were refused the
honors of sepulchre. Cases were probably rare where one would dare to
accuse even a dead Pharaoh.
Debts would sometimes keep a man out of his tomb, both because he was
wrong in being in debt, and because his tomb was mortgaged. For it was
permitted a man to mortgage not only his family tomb but the mummy of
his father,—a kind of mortmain security that could not run away, but a
ghastly pledge to hold. A man's tomb, it would seem, was accounted his
chief possession; as the one he was longest to use. It was prepared at
an expense never squandered on his habitation in life.
You may see as many tombs as you like at Thebes, you may spend weeks
underground roaming about in vast chambers or burrowing in zig-zag
tunnels, until the upper-world shall seem to you only a passing show;
but you will find little, here or elsewhere, after the Tombs of the
Kings, to awaken your keenest interest; and the exploration of a very
few of these will suffice to satisfy you. We visited these gigantic
masoleums twice; it is not an easy trip to them, for they are situated
in wild ravines or gorges that lie beyond the western mountains which
circle the plain and ruins of Thebes. They can be reached by a footpath
over the crest of the ridge behind Medeenet Haboo; the ancient and usual
road to them is up a valley that opens from the north.
The first time we tried the footpath, riding over the blooming valley
and leaving our donkeys at the foot of the ascent. I do not know how
high this mountain backbone may be, but it is not a pleasant one to
scale. The path winds, but it is steep; the sun blazes on it; every
step is in pulverized limestone, that seems to have been calcined by
the intense heat, and rises in irritating powder; the mountain-side
is white, chalky, glaring, reflecting the solar rays with blinding
brilliancy, and not a breath of air comes to temper the furnace
temperature. On the summit however there was a delicious breeze, and we
stood long looking over the great basin, upon the temples, the villages,
the verdant areas of grain, the patches of desert, all harmonized by the
wonderful light, and the purple eastern hills—a view unsurpassed. The
descent to the other side was steeper than the ascent, and wound by
precipices, on narrow ledges, round sharp turns, through jagged gorges,
amid rocks striken with the ashy hue of death, into the bottoms of
intersecting ravines, a region scarred, blasted, scorched, a grey
Gehenna, more desolate than imagination ever conceived.
Another day we rode to it up the valley from the river, some three
miles. It is a winding, narrow valley, little more than the bed of a
torrent; but as we advanced windings became shorter, the sides higher,
fantastic precipices of limestone frowned on us, and there was evidence
of a made road and of rocks cut away to broaden it. The scene is wilder,
more freakishly savage, as we go on, and knowing that it is a funereal
way and that only, and that it leads to graves and to nothing else, our
procession imperceptibly took on the sombre character of an expedition
after death, relieved by I know not what that is droll in the impish
forms of the crags, and the reaction of our natures against this
unnecessary accumulation of grim desolation. The sun overhead was like a
dish from which poured liquid heat, I could feel the waves, I thought I
could see it running in streams down the crumbling ashy slopes; but
it was not unendurable, for the air was pure and elastic and we had no
sense of weariness; indeed, now and then a puff of desert air suddenly
greeted us as we turned a corner. The slender strip of sky seen above
the grey limestone was of astonishing depth and color—a purple, almost
like a night sky, but of unimpeachable delicacy.
Up this strange road were borne in solemn state, as the author of Job
may have seen, “the kings and counsellors of the earth, which built
desolate places for themselves;” the journey was a fitting prelude to
an entry into the depths of these frightful hills. It must have been an
awful march, awful in its errand, awful in the desolation of the way:
and, in the heat of summer, a mummy passing this way might have melted
down in his cercueil before he could reach his cool retreat.
When we come to the end of the road, we see no tombs. There are paths
winding in several directions, round projecting ridges and shoulders of
powdered rock, but one might pass through here and not know he was in a
cemetery. Above the rubbish here and there we see, when they are pointed
out, holes in the rock. We climb one of these heaps, and behold the
entrance, maybe half-filled up, of one of the great tombs. This entrance
may have been laid open so as to disclose a portal cut in the face of
the rock and a smoothed space in front. Originally the tomb was not
only walled up and sealed, but rocks were tumbled down over it, so as
to restore that spot in the hill to its natural appearance. The chief
object of every tomb was to conceal the mummy from intrusion forever.
All sorts of misleading devices were resorted to for this purpose.
Twenty-five tombs (of the nineteenth and twentieth dynasties) have been
opened in this locality, but some of them belonged to princes and other
high functionaries; in a valley west of this are tombs of the eighteenth
dynasty, and in still another gorge are the tombs of the queens. These
tombs all differ in plan, in extent, in decoration; they are alike in
not having, as many others elsewhere have, an exterior chamber where
friends could assemble to mourn; you enter all these tombs by passing
through an insignificant opening, by an inclined passage, directly
into the heart of the mountain, and there they open into various halls
chambers, and grottoes. One of them, that of Sethi I., into whose
furthermost and most splendid halls Belzoni broke his way, extends
horizontally four hundred and seventy feet into the hill, and descends
to a depth of one hundred and eighty feet below the opening. The line
of direction of the excavation is often changed, and the continuation
skillfully masked, so that the explorer may be baffled. You come by
several descents and passages, through grand chambers and halls, to a
hall vast in size and magnificently decorated; here is a pit, here is
the granite sarcophagus; here is the fitting resting-place of the royal
mummy. But it never occupied this sarcophagus. Somewhere in this hall is
a concealed passage. It was by breaking through a wall of solid masonry
in such a room, smoothly stuccoed and elaborately painted with a
continuation of the scenes on the side-walls, that Belzoni discovered
the magnificent apartment beyond, and at last a chamber that was never
finished, where one still sees the first draughts of the figures for
sculpture on the wall, and gets an idea of the bold freedom of the
old draughtsmen, in the long, graceful lines, made at a stroke by the
Egyptian artists. Were these inner chambers so elaborately concealed,
by walls and stucco and painting, after the royal mummy was somewhere
hidden in them? Or was the mummy deposited in some obscure lateral pit,
and was it the fancy of the king himself merely to make these splendid
and highly decorated inner apartments private?
It is not uncommon to find rooms in the tombs unfinished. The excavation
of the tomb was began when the king began to reign; it was a work of
many years and might happen to be unfinished at his death. He might
himself become so enamoured of his enterprise and his ideas might expand
in regard to his requirements, as those of builders always do, that
death would find him still excavating and decorating. I can imagine that
if one thought he were building a house for eternity—or cycles beyond
human computation,—he would, up to his last moment, desire to add to it
new beauties and conveniences. And he must have had a certain humorous
satisfaction in his architectural tricks, for putting posterity on a
false scent about his remains.
It would not be in human nature to leave undisturbed tombs containing
so much treasure as was buried with a rich or royal mummy. The Greeks
walked through all these sepulchres; they had already been rifled by
the Persians; it is not unlikely that some of them had been ransacked by
Egyptians, who could appreciate jewelry and fine-work in gold as much as
we do that found by M. Mariette on the cold person of Queen Aah-hotep.
This dainty lady might have begun to flatter herself, having escaped
through so many ages of pillage, that danger was over, but she had not
counted upon there coming an age of science. It is believed that she was
the mother of Amosis, who expelled the Shepherds, and the wife of Kamés,
who long ago went to his elements. After a repose here at Thebes, not
far from the temple of Koorneh, of about thirty-five hundred years,
Science one day cried,—“Aah-hotep of Drah-Aboo-l-neggah! we want you
for an Exposition of the industries of all nations at Paris; put on your
best things and come forth.”
I suppose that there is no one living who would not like to be the
first to break into an Egyptian tomb (and there are doubtless still some
undisturbed in this valley), to look upon its glowing paintings before
the air had impaired a tint, and to discover a sweet and sleeping
princess, simply encrusted in gems, and cunning work in gold, of
priceless value—in order that he might add something to our knowledge of
ancient art!
But the government prohibits all excavations by private persons. You are
permitted, indeed, to go to the common pits and carry off an armful of
mummies, if you like; but there is no pleasure in the disturbance of
this sort of mummy; he may perhaps be a late Roman; he has no history,
no real antiquity, and probably not a scarabæus of any value about him.
When we pass out of the glare of the sun and descend the incline down
which the mummy went, we feel as if we had begun his awful journey. On
the walls are sculptured the ceremonies and liturgies of the dead, the
grotesque monsters of the under-world, which will meet him and assail
him on his pilgrimage, the deities friendly and unfriendly, the
tremendous scenes of cycles of transmigration. Other sculptures there
are; to be sure, and in some tombs these latter predominate, in which
astronomy, agriculture, and domestic life are depicted. In one chamber
are exhibited trades, in another the kitchen, in another arms, in
another the gay boats and navigation of the Nile, in another all the
vanities of elegant house-furniture. But all these only emphasize the
fact that we are passing into another world, and one of the grimmest
realities. We come at length, whatever other wonders or beauties may
detain us, to the king, the royal mummy, in the presence of the
deities, standing before Osiris, Athor, Phtah, Isis, Horus, Anubis, and
Nofre-Atmoo.
Somewhere in this vast and dark mausoleum the mummy has been deposited;
he has with him the roll of the Funeral Ritual; the sacred scarabæus is
on his breast; in one chamber bread and wine are set out; his bearers
withdraw, the tomb is closed, sealed, all trace of its entrance effaced.
The mummy begins his pilgrimage.
The Ritual * describes all the series of pilgrimages of the soul in the
lower-world; it contains the hymns, prayers, and formula for all funeral
ceremonies and the worship of the dead; it embodies the philosophy and
religion of Egypt; the basis of it is the immortality of the soul,
that is of the souls of the justified, but a clear notion of the soul's
personality apart from the body it does not give.
* Lenormant's Epitome.
The book opens with a grand dialogue, at the moment of death, in which
the deceased, invoking the god of the lower-world, asks entrance to
his domain; a chorus of glorified souls interposes for him; the priest
implores the divine clemency; Osiris responds, granting permission, and
the soul enters Kar-Neter, the land of the dead; and then renews his
invocations. Upon his entry he is dazzled by the splendor of the
sun (which is Osiris) in this subterranean region, and sings to it a
magnificent hymn.
The second part traces the journeys of the soul. Without knowledge, he
would fail, and finally be rejected at the tribunal.
Knowledge is in Egyptian sbo, that is, “food in plenty,” knowledge and
food are identified in the Ritual; “the knowledge of religious truths is
the mysterious nourishment that the soul must carry with it to sustain
it in its journeys and trials.” This necessary preliminary knowledge
is found in the statement of the Egyptian faith in the Ritual; other
information is given him from time to time on his journey. But although
his body is wrapped up, and his soul instructed, he cannot move, he has
not the use of his limbs; and he prays to be restored to his faculties
that he may be able to walk, speak, eat, fight; the prayer granted, he
holds his scarabæus over his head, as a passport, and enters Hades.
His way is at once beset by formidable obstacles; monsters, servants of
Typhon, assail him; slimy reptiles, crocodiles, serpents seek to devour
him; he begins a series of desperate combats, in which the hero and his
enemies hurl long and insulting speeches at each other. Out of these
combats he comes victorious, and sings songs of triumph; and after rest
and refreshment from the Tree of Life, given him by the goddess Nu,
he begins a dialogue with the personification of the divine Light, who
instructs him, explaining the sublime mysteries of nature. Guided
by this new Light, he advances, and enters into a series of
transformations, identifying himself with the noblest divine symbols: he
becomes a hawk, an angel, a lotus, the god Ptah, a heron, etc.
Up to this time the deceased has been only a shade, an eidolon, the
simulacrum of the appearance of his body. He now takes his body, which
is needed for the rest of the journey; it was necessary therefore that
it should be perfectly preserved by the embalming process. He goes on to
new trials and dangers, to new knowledge, to severer examinations of his
competence: he shuns wiles and delusions; he sails down a subterranean
river and comes to the Elysian Fields, in fact, to a reproduction of
Egypt with its camels and its industries, when the soul engages in
agriculture, sowing and reaping divine fruit for the bread of knowledge
which he needs now more than ever.
At length he comes to the last and severest trial, to the judgment-hall
where Osiris awaits him, seated on his throne, accompanied by the
forty-two assessors of the dead. Here his knowledge is put to the test;
here he must give an account of his whole life. He goes on to justify
himself by declaring at first, negatively, the crimes that he has not
committed. “I have not blasphemed,” he says in the Ritual; “I have not
stolen; I have not smitten men privily; I have not treated any person
with cruelty; I have not stirred up trouble; I have not been idle; I
have not been intoxicated; I have not made unjust commandmants; I
have shown no improper curiosity; I have not allowed my mouth to tell
secrets; I have not wounded anyone; I have not put anyone in fear; I
have not slandered anyone; I have not let envy gnaw my heart; I have
spoken evil neither of the king nor of my father; I have not falsely
accused anyone; I have not withheld milk from the mouths of sucklings; I
have not practiced any shameful crime; I have not calumniated a slave to
his master.”
The deceased then speaks of the good he has done in his lifetime; and
the positive declarations rise to a higher morality than the negative;
among them is this wonderful sentence:—“I have given food to the hungry,
drink to the thirsty, and clothes to the naked.”
The heart of the deceased, who is now called Osiris, is then weighed in
the balance against “truth,” and (if he is just) is not found wanting;
the forty-two assessors decide that his knowledge is sufficient, the god
Osiris gives sentence of justification, Thoth (the Hermes of the
Greeks, the conductor of souls, the scribe of Osiris, and also the
personification of literature or letters) records it, and the soul
enters into bliss.
In a chamber at Dayr el Medeeneh you may see this judgment-scene. Osiris
is seated on his throne waiting the introduction of souls into Amenti;
the child Harpocrates, with his finger on his lip, sits upon his crook;
behind are the forty-two assessors. The deceased humbly approaches;
Thoth presents his good deeds written upon papyrus; they are weighed in
the balance against an ostrich-feather, the symbol of truth; on the beam
sits a monkey, the emblem of Thoth.
The same conceit of weighing the soul in judgment-scenes was common to
the mediaeval church; it is very quaintly represented in a fresco in the
porch of the church of St. Lawrence at Rome.
Sometimes the balance tipped the wrong way; in the tomb of Rameses VI.
is sculptured a wicked soul, unjustified, retiring from the presence of
Osiris in the ignoble form of a pig.
The justified soul retired into bliss. What was this bliss? The third
part of the Ritual is obscure. The deceased is Osiris, identified with
the sun, traversing with him, and as him, the various houses of heaven;
afterwards he seems to pass into an identification with all the deities
of the pantheon. This is a poetical flight. The justified soul was
absorbed into the intelligence from which it emanated. For the wicked,
there was annihilation; they were destroyed, decapitated by the evil
powers. In these tombs you will see pictures of beheadings at the block,
of dismembered bodies.
It would seem that in some cases the souls of the wicked returned to
the earth and entered unclean animals. We always had a suspicion, a mere
idle fancy, that the chameleon, which we had on our boat, which had a
knowing and wicked eye, had been somebody.
The visitor's first astonishment here is to find such vast and rich
tombs, underground temples in fact, in a region so unutterably desolate,
remote from men, to be reached only by a painful pilgrimage. He is
bewildered by the variety and beauty of the decorations, the grace and
freedom of art, the minute finish of birds and flowers, the immortal
loveliness of faces here and there; and he cannot understand that all
this was not made for exhibition, that it was never intended to be seen,
that it was not seen except by the workmen and the funeral attendants,
and that it was then sealed away from human eyes forever. Think of the
years of labor expended, the treasure lavished in all this gorgeous
creation, which was not for men to see! Has human nature changed?
Expensive monuments and mausoleums are built now as they have been in
all the Christian era; but they are never concealed from the public
view. I cannot account for these extraordinary excavations, not even for
one at the Assaseef, which extends over an acre and a quarter of ground,
upon an ostentation of wealth, for they were all closed from inspection,
and the very entrances masked. The builders must have believed in the
mysteries of the under-world, or they would not have expended so much in
enduring representations of them; they must have believed also that
the soul had need of such a royal abode. Did they have the thought that
money lavished in this pious labor would benefit the soul, as much as
now-a-days legacies bequeathed to missions and charities?
On our second visit to these tombs we noticed many details that had
escaped us before. I found sculptured a cross of equal arms, three or
four inches long, among other sacred symbols. We were struck by the
peculiar whiteness of the light, the sort of chalkiness of the sunshine
as we saw it falling across the entrance of a tomb from which we were
coming, and by the lightness of the shadows. We illuminated some of
the interiors, lighting up the vast sculptured and painted halls and
corniced chambers, to get the tout ensemble of colors and figures. The
colors came out with startling vividness on the stuccoed, white walls,
and it needed no imagination, amidst these awful and bizarre images and
fantastic scenes, to feel that we were in a real underworld. And all
this was created for darkness!
But these chambers could neither have been cut nor decorated without
light, and bright light. The effect of the rich ceiling and sides could
not have been obtained without strong light. I believe that these rooms,
as well as the dark and decorated chambers in the temples, must have
been brilliantly illuminated on occasion; the one at the imposing
funeral ceremonies, the other at the temple services. What light was
used? The sculptures give us no information. But the light must have
been not only a very brilliant but a pure flame, for these colors were
fresh and unsullied when the tombs were opened. However these chambers
were lighted, some illuminating substance was used that produced no
smoke, nor formed any gas that could soil the whiteness of the painted
lotus.
In one of these brilliant apartments, which is finished with a carved
and painted cornice, and would serve for a drawing-room with the
addition of some furniture, we almost had a feeling of comfort and
domesticity—as long as the illumination lasted. When that flashed but,
and we were left in that thick darkness of the grave which one can feel
gathering itself in folds about him, and which the twinkling candles in
our hands punctured but did not scatter, and we groped our way, able
to see only a step ahead and to examine only a yard square of wall at a
time, there was something terrible in this subterranean seclusion. And
yet, this tomb was intended as the place of abode of the deceased owner
during the long ages before soul and body, united, should be received
into bliss; here were buried with him no doubt some portions of his
property, at least jewels and personal ornaments of value; here were
pictured his possessions and his occupations while on earth; here were
his gods, visibly cut in stone; here were spread out, in various symbols
and condensed writing, the precepts of profound wisdom and the liturgies
of the book of the dead. If at any time he could have awakened (as
no doubt he supposed he should), and got rid of his heavy granite
sarcophagus (if his body ever lay in it) and removed the myrrh and pitch
from his person, he would have found himself in a most spacious and gay
mansion, of which the only needs were food, light, and air.
While remembering, however, the grotesque conception the Egyptians had
of the next world, it seems to me that the decorators of these tombs
often let their imaginations run riot, and that not every fantastic
device has a deep signification. Take the elongated figures on the
ceiling, stretching fifty feet across, the legs bent down one side and
the head the other; or such a picture as this:—a sacred boat having a
crocodile on the deck, on the back of the crocodile a human head, out
of the head a long stick protruding which bears on its end the crown of
lower Egypt; or this conceit:—a small boat ascending a cataract, bearing
a huge beetle (scarabæus) having a ram's head, and sitting on each side
of it a bird with a human head. I think much of this work is pure fancy.
In these tombs the snake plays a great part, the snake purely, coiled
or extended, carried in processions his length borne on the shoulders
of scores of priests, crawling along the walls in hideous convolutions;
and, again, the snake with two, three, and four heads, with two and six
feet; the snake with wings; the snake coiled about the statues of the
gods, about the images of the mummies, and in short everywhere. The
snake is the most conspicuous figure.
The monkey is also numerous, and always pleasing; I think he is the
comic element of hell, though perhaps gravely meant. He squats about
the lower-world of the heathen, and gives it an almost cheerful and
debonnair aspect. It is certainly refreshing to meet his self-possessed,
grave, and yet friendly face amid all the serpents, crocodiles, hybrids,
and chimerical monsters of the Egyptian under-world.
Conspicuous in ceremonies represented in the tombs and in the temples
is the sacred boat or ark, reminding one always, in its form and use and
the sacredness attached to it, of the Jewish Ark of the Covenant. The
arks contain the sacred emblems, and sometimes the beetle of the sun,
overshadowed by the wings of the goddess of Thmei or Truth, which
suggest the cherubim of the Jews. Mr. Wilkinson notices the fact, also,
that Thmei, the name of the goddess who was worshipped under the double
character of Truth and Justice, is the origin of the Hebrew Thummim—a
word implying “truth”; this Thummim (a symbol perfectly comprehensible
now that we know its origin) which was worn only by the high priest of
the Jews, was, like the Egyptian figure, which the archjudge put on when
he sat at the trial of a case, studded with precious stones of various
colors.
Before we left the valley we entered the tomb of Menephtah (or
Merenphtah), and I broke off a bit of crumbling limestone from the inner
cave as a memento of the Pharaoh of the Exodus. I used to suppose that
this Pharaoh was drowned in the Red Sea; but he could not have been if
he was buried here; and here certainly is his tomb. It is the opinion
of scholars that Menephtah long survived the Exodus. There is nothing
to conflict with this in the Biblical description of the disaster to the
Egyptians. It says that all Pharaoh's host was drowned, but it does not
say that the king was drowned; if he had been, so important a fact, it
is likely, would have been emphasized. Joseph came into Egypt during the
reign of one of the usurping Shepherd Kings, Apepi probably. Their seat
of empire was at Tanis, where their tombs have been discovered.
The Israelites were settled in that part of the Delta. After some
generations the Shepherds were expelled, and the ancient Egyptian race
of kings was reinstated in the dominion of all Egypt. This is probably
the meaning of the passage, “now there arose up a new king over Egypt,
which knew not Joseph.” The narrative of the Exodus seems to require
that the Pharaoh should be at Memphis. The kings of the nineteenth
dynasty, to which Menephtah belonged, had the seat of their empire at
Thebes; he alone of that dynasty established his court at Memphis. But
it was natural that he should build his tomb at Thebes.
We went again and again to the temples on the west side and to the tombs
there. I never wearied of the fresh morning ride across the green plain,
saluting the battered Colossi as we passed under them, and galloping
(don't, please, remember that we were mounted on donkeys) out upon the
desert. Not all the crowd of loping Arabs with glittering eyes and lying
tongues, who attended us, offering their dead merchandise, could put me
out of humor. Besides, there were always slender, pretty, and cheerful
little girls running beside us with their water-koollehs. And may I
never forget the baby Charon on the vile ferry-boat that sets us over
one of the narrow streams. He is the cunningest specimen of a boy in
Africa. His small brothers pole the boat, but he is steersman, and
stands aft pushing about the tiller, which is level with his head. He is
a mere baby as to stature, and is in fact only four years old, but he
is a perfect beauty, even to the ivory teeth which his engaging smile
discloses. And such self-possession and self-respect. He is a man of
business, and minds his helm, “the dear little scrap,” say the ladies.
When we give him some evidently unexpected coppers, his eyes and whole
face beam with pleasure, and in the sweetest voice he says, Ket'ther
khdyrak, keteer (“Thank you very much indeed”).
I yield myself to, but cannot account for the fascination of this vast
field of desolation, this waste of crumbled limestone, gouged into
ravines and hills, honeycombed with tombs and mummy-pits, strewn with
the bones of ancient temples, brightened by the glow of sunshine on
elegant colonnades and sculptured walls, saddened by the mud-hovels of
the fellaheen. The dust is abundant, and the glare of the sun reflected
from the high, white precipices behind is something unendurable.
Of the tombs of the Assaseef, we went far into none, except that of the
priest Petamunoph, the one which occupies, with its many chambers and
passages, an acre and a quarter of underground. It was beautifully
carved and painted throughout, but the inscriptions are mostly illegible
now, and so fouled by bats as to be uninteresting. Our guide said truly,
“bats not too much good for 'scriptions.” In truth, the place smells
horribly of bats,—an odor that will come back to you with sickening
freshness days after,—and a strong stomach is required for the
exploration.
Even the chambers of some of the temples here were used in later times
as receptacles for mummies. The novel and most interesting temple
of Dayr el Bahree did not escape this indignity. It was built by
Amun-noo-het, or Hatasoo as we more familiarly call her, and like
everything else that this spirited woman did it bears the stamp of
originality and genius. The structure rises up the side of the
mountain in terraces, temple above temple, and is of a most graceful
architecture; its varied and brilliant sculptures must be referred to a
good period of art. Walls that have recently been laid bare shine with
extraordinary vividness of color. The last chambers in the rock are
entered by arched doorways, but the arch is in appearance, not in
principle. Its structure is peculiar. Square stones were laid up on each
side, the one above lapping over the one beneath until the last two met
at the top; the interior corners were then cut away, leaving a perfect
round arch; but there is no lateral support or keystone. In these
interior rooms were depths on depths of mummy-wrappings and bones, and a
sickening odor of dissolution.
There are no tombs better known than those of Sheykh el Koorneh, for it
is in them that so much was discovered revealing the private life, the
trades, the varied pursuits of the Egyptians. We entered those called
the most interesting, but they are so smoked, and the paintings are so
defaced, that we had small satisfaction in them. Some of them are full
of mummy-cloths and skeletons, and smell of mortality, to that degree
that it needs all the wind of the desert to take the scent of death out
of our nostrils.
All this plain and its mounds and hills are dug over and pawed out
for remnants of the dead, scarabæi, beads, images, trinkets sacred and
profane. It is the custom of some travelers to descend into the horrible
and common mummy-pits, treading about among the dead, and bring up in
their arms the body of some man, or some woman, who may have been, for
aught the traveler knows, not a respectable person. I confess to an
uncontrollable aversion to all of them, however well preserved they are.
The present generation here (I was daily beset by an Arab who wanted
always to sell mean arm or a foot, from whose eager, glittering eyes
I seemed to see a ghoul looking out,) lives by plundering the dead. A
singular comment upon our age and upon the futile hope of security for
the body after death, even in the strongest house of rock.
Old Petamunoph, with whom be peace, builded better than he knew; he
excavated a vast hotel for bats. Perhaps he changed into bats himself in
the course of his transmigrations, and in this state is only able to see
dimly, as bats do, and to comprehend only partially, as an old Egyptian
might, our modern civilization.
0386