Part 33

Of this celebrated city, which, according to Diodorus Siculus, was not less than seven leagues in circumference, and contained a multitude of beautiful temples, not one stone remains to tell the history; even the site on which it stood being disputed. "Is it not astonishing," says Savary, "that the site of the ancient metropolis of Egypt, a city containing magnificent temples and palaces, which art laboured to render eternal, should at present be a subject of dispute among the learned? Pliny removes the difficulty of past doubts--the three grand pyramids, seen by the watermen from all parts, stand on a barren and rocky hill, between Memphis and Delta, one league from the Nile, two from Memphis, and near the village of Busiris." Rennell, however, says, that Memf is on the site of Memphis; since Abulfeda describes it as being a _short_ day's journey from Cairo: Memf being only fourteen road miles from that city. M. Maillet says, "The most probable opinion is, that this superb city was built at the entrance of the town of mummies, at the north of which the pyramids are placed: the prodigious ruins which present themselves in this spot will serve for a long time as proofs of the greatness of that city, of which they are remains, and the incontestible evidences of its true position." Again, he says, that "out of so many superb monuments, &c., there remain only at present some shapeless ruins of broken columns of ruined obelisks, and some other buildings fallen to decay, which one still discovers at the bottom of the lake, when the increase of the Nile is too small to furnish it with its usual supply of water. This circumstance has twice happened during my seventeen years' consulship, particularly in the year 1677, when the surface of the lake sank between eight and nine feet, and discovered at the bottom of this vast reservoir a kind of city, which excited the admiration of every one. This lake can never be dried up, or drawn off again as before; because they have neglected to keep up the canal which served to drain off the water. There are, also, some heaps of ruins in the plain of three leagues in width, that separates the northern from the southern pyramids, and in which this ancient city extended from the borders of the lake towards the Nile eastward. These are the faint traces of so much magnificence."

Dr. Shaw is of opinion that Djizeh, or Giseh, now occupies the site of Memphis; and that the city is entirely buried in soil. Other authorities, however, place it, and perhaps with greater probability, near the village of Menshee or Dashoo. Norden says: "If we give credit to some authors, the city of Memphis was situated in the place where at present stands the village of Gize, and I own that this opinion does not want probability. But if we attend to it carefully, we shall find it necessary to strike off a great deal of grandeur of that ancient capital of Egypt, or else raise extremely all the plains about it. In effect, Gize does not occupy half the space of Old Cairo, and the plains that extend all round never fail to be deluged at the time of the overflowing of the waters of the Nile. It is incredible, that they should have built a city, so great and famous, in a place subject to be under water half of the year; still less can it be imagined that the ancient authors have forgotten so particular a place."

Mr. Browne says: "I visited the pleasant site of the ancient Memphis on the left bank of the Nile, about two hours to the south of Kahira, in a plain about 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 by a canal. 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 the ruins. None of the fine marbles, which are scattered so profusely at Alexandria, are discoverable here; whether it be that they were never used, or were carried away to adorn other cities."[360]

But though the site of the city is not absolutely known, certain it is, that many wonderful erections in its neighbourhood denote its former grandeur, power, and magnificence. These are the Catacombs, the Sphinx, the lake of Moeris, and the Pyramids.

"The entrances into the Catacombs," says the Earl of Sandwich, "where the inhabitants of the neighbouring city of Memphis entombed their embalmed bodies, are near the last Pyramid of Sakara. The greatest part of the plain of Sakara is hollowed into subterraneous cavities, all cut out of the solid rock; not of a hard nature, but yielding to the least violence. The entrances are many in number; and are in form a square of three feet, and about twenty feet deep. The vaults contain embalmed bodies, scattered in confusion, and many of them broken in pieces. These have been taken out of their chests or coffins; and after having been ransacked in search of any idol of value, which are frequently found within the bodies, thrown aside by persons, who would not be at the trouble of carrying them away. The farther the recesses are penetrated, however, the bodies are much more entire, and everything less disturbed. These subterraneous passages are divided into many different chambers; in the sides of which are to be seen a multitude of perpendicular niches, of sufficient height to contain the bodies upright."

A little to the east of the second pyramid, is the SPHINX, cut out of the same rock upon which the pyramids are built. The length is about twenty-five feet; and its height, from the knees to the top of the hand, thirty-eight feet.

"The sphinx," says Mr. Wilkinson, "stands nearly opposite the south end of the pyramid Cephren: between its paws were discovered an altar and some tablets; but no entrance was visible. Pliny says, they suppose it the tomb of Amasis;--a tradition which arose, no doubt, from the resemblance of the name of the king, by whose order the rock was cut into this form. But one author has gone farther, and given to Amasis the pyramids themselves. The cap of the sphinx, probably the pshent, has long since been removed; but a cavity in the head, attests its former position, and explains the mode in which it was fixed. The mutilated state of the face, and the absence of the nose, have led many to the erroneous conclusion, that the features were African; but by taking an accurate sketch of the face, and restoring the Egyptian nose, any one may convince himself, that the lips, as well as the rest of the features, perfectly agree with the physiognomy of a Pharaoh; for the reader must be aware, that this, and all other sphinxes, are emblematic representations of Egyptian kings."

Between the paws of the sphinx, a perfect temple was discovered, a few years ago, by the intrepid traveller Belzoni, on clearing away the sand by which it had been choked up for ages.

This figure was[361], a few years ago, at an expense of 800 or 900_l._ (contributed by some European gentlemen,) cleared from the sand which had accumulated in front of it, under the superintendence of Captain Caviglia.

The noblest and most wonderful of all the structures[362] or works of the kings of Egypt, was the lake of Moeris; accordingly, Herodotus considers it as vastly superior to the pyramids and labyrinth. As Egypt was more or less fruitful in proportion to the inundations of the Nile; and as, in these floods, the first general flow or ebb of the waters were equally fertile to the land; King Moeris, to prevent these two inconveniences, and correct, as far as lay in his power, the irregularities of the Nile, thought proper to call art to the assistance of nature; and so caused the lake to be dug, which afterwards went by his name. This lake was several thousand paces long, and very deep. Two pyramids, on each of which stood a colossal statue, seated on a throne, raised their heads to the height of three hundred feet, in the midst of the lake, whilst their foundations took up the same space under the waters; a proof that they were erected before the cavity was filled; and a demonstration that a lake of such vast extent, was the work of man's hands, in one prince's reign. This is what several historians have related concerning the Lake Moeris, on the testimony of the inhabitants of the country. This lake had a communication with the Nile, by a great canal, four leagues long, and fifty feet broad. Great sluices either opened or shut the canal and lake, as there was occasion.

When it is considered, that the object of this work was the advantage and comfort of a numerous people, all must agree, with M. Savary, that Moeris, who constructed it, performed a far more glorious work than either the labyrinth or the pyramids.

At present, this lake is of a much smaller extent: but this by no means proves that Herodotus and other writers were deceived in their calculations; for, considering the revolutions to which Egypt has been subject for a series of two thousand years, it might have undergone still greater changes.

For the period of nearly one thousand two hundred years, since which Egypt has fallen into the hands of barbarous nations, they have either destroyed, or suffered to perish, the chief part of this lake, and the canal belonging to it. The Moereotis is dried up, the canal of Alexandria is no longer navigable, and the Moeris is only fifty leagues in circumference. "If," says an enlightened writer, "the Canal of Joseph was cleared out, where the mud is raised up to a vast height; if the ancient dykes were re-established; and the sluices of the canals of Tamich and Bouch restored; Lake Moeris would still serve the same purposes. It would prevent the devastation of the too great swellings of the rivers, and supply the deficiency of those that are inadequate. We should see it, as on former occasions, extending itself from Nesle and Arsinoe, to the Lybian mountains, and offering to astonished travellers what is no where else to be seen;--a sea formed by the hand of man."

The annihilation of Memphian palaces and temples indeed is almost compensated by the existence of the pyramids, which alone are sufficient to engage the attention of mankind. The three largest are situated at Gees, or Ghesa, and named from their founders, CHEOPS, CHEPHREN, and MYCERINES; of these only we shall speak.

1. That of CHEOPS, the largest, is four hundred and forty-eight feet in height, and seven hundred and twenty-eight on each side of the base: that is, forty feet higher than St. Peter's, at Rome; and one hundred and thirty-three feet higher than St. Paul's, in London.

This pyramid, like the rest, was built on a rock, having a square base, cut on the outside as so many steps, and decreasing gradually quite to the summit. It was built with stones of a prodigious size, the least of which were thirty feet, wrought with wonderful art, and covered with hieroglyphics. According to several ancient authors, each side was eight hundred feet broad, and as many high. The summit of the pyramids, which, to those who viewed it from below, seemed a point, was a fine platform, composed of ten or twelve massy stones, and each side of that platform sixteen or eighteen feet long.

It is also remarkable that the four sides of this, and indeed of all the pyramids, face the cardinal points. The inside contained numberless rooms and apartments. There were expressed on the pyramid, in Egyptian characters, the sums it cost only in garlic, leeks, onions, and the like, for the workmen; and the whole amounted to sixteen hundred talents of silver; from whence it was easy to conjecture what a vast sum the whole must have amounted to.

Herodotus ascribes this pyramid to Cheops, a tyrannical and profligate sovereign. He barred the avenues to every temple, and forbade the Egyptians to offer sacrifice to their gods; after which he compelled the people at large to perform the work of slaves. Some he condemned to hew stones out of the Arabian mountains, and drag them to the banks of the Nile; others were stationed to receive the same in vessels, and transport them to the edge of the Libyan Desert. In this service a hundred thousand men were employed, who were relieved every three months. Ten years were spent in the hard labour of forming the road on which these stones were to be drawn,--a work of no less difficulty and fatigue than the erection of the pyramid itself. This causeway is five stadia in length, forty cubits wide, and its greatest height thirty-two cubits; the whole being composed of polished marble, adorned with the figures of animals. Ten years were consumed in forming this pavement, in preparing the hill on which the pyramids are raised, and in excavating chambers under the ground. The burial-place which he intended for himself, he contrived to insulate within the building, by introducing the waters of the Nile. The pyramid itself was a work of twenty years; it is of a square form, every side being eight plethra in length and as many in height. The stones are very skilfully cemented, and none of them of less dimensions than thirty feet. Such is the account of Herodotus.

Pliny and Diodorus Siculus agree in stating that not less than three hundred and sixty thousand men were employed in the work[363].

The pyramid next in size was erected by Cephrenus, and is thence called CEPHREN: he was the son of Cheops. These two princes, who were truly brothers by the similitude of their manners, seem to have striven which of them should distinguish himself most, by a barefaced impiety towards the gods, and a barbarous inhumanity to men. Cheops reigned fifty years, and his son Cephrenus fifty-six years after him. They kept the temples shut during the whole time of their long reigns, and forbade the offering of sacrifices under the severest penalties. On the other hand, they oppressed their subjects, by employing them in the most grievous and useless works; and sacrificed the lives of numberless multitudes of men, merely to gratify a senseless ambition of immortalising their names by edifices of an enormous magnitude and a boundless expense. It is remarkable, that those stately pyramids which have so long been the admiration of the whole world, were the effect of the irreligion and merciless cruelty of those princes.

The magnificent prospect from the top of this pyramid has been described by the French traveller, Savary, who visited Egypt in 1770, in glowing terms. After occupying seven hours in ascending to its summit, "the morning light," says he, "discovered to us every moment new beauties: the tops of gilded minarets, and of date-tree and citron groves, planted round the villages and hills; anon the herds left the hamlets; the boats spread their light sails, and our eyes followed them along the vast windings of the Nile. On the north appeared sterile hills and barren sands; on the south, the river and waving fields, vast as the ocean; to the west, the plain of Fayum, famous for its roses: to the east, the picturesque town of Gizeh, and the towers of Fostat, the minarets of Cairo, and the castle of Saladin, terminated the prospect. Seated on the most wonderful of the works of man, as upon a throne, our eyes beheld by turns a dreadful desert; rich plains in which the Elysian fields had been imagined; villages; a majestic river; and edifices which seemed the work of giants. The universe contains no landscape more variegated, more magnificent, or more awful."

The ancients knew little of the interior structure of these giant piles.[364] Herodotus, who lived 445 years before Christ, merely speaks of an entrance leading to the interior, by hearsay from the priests, who informed him that there were secret vaults beneath, hewn out of the natural rock. Strabo, who lived after the Christian era, only describes a single slanting passage which led to a chamber in which was a stone tomb. Diodorus Siculus, who lived forty-four years before Christ, agrees with this; and Pliny, who lived A.D. 66, adds, that there was a well in the Great Pyramid, eighty cubits deep. This is all the ancients have said about the interior.

"The Egyptian priests, indeed, assured Aristides, a Greek traveller about two centuries before Christ, that 'the excavations beneath were as great as the height above.' And Ebn Abd Alkokim, an Arabic writer of the ninth century, says, that the builders 'constructed numerous excavated chambers, with gates to them, forty cubits under ground.' Other Arabian writers say, that these chambers contain chests of black stone, in which were deposited the sacred archives of king Saurid, who built the pyramid. Many discoveries (perhaps a burial-place under ground) obviously remain to be made.

"The same Arab historian, Alkokim, gives an account of the opening of this building under the Caliphate, from which time it has remained in the condition seen and described by all modern travellers, to the time of the Italian traveller Caviglia, who made a discovery of a new chamber and passages about ten years ago. 'After that, Almamon the Caliph (A.D. 820) entered Egypt, and saw the Pyramids: he desired to know what was within, and therefore would have them opened. He was told it could not possibly be done. He replied, I will have it certainly done. And that hole was opened for him, which stands open to this day, with fire and vinegar. Two smiths prepared and sharpened the iron and engines, which they forced in: and there was a great expense in the opening it; and the thickness of the wall was found to be twenty cubits. Within they found a square well, and in the square of it there were doors: every door of it opened into a house (or vault), in which there were dead bodies wrapped up in linen. Towards the upper part of the pyramid, they found a chamber, in which was a hollow stone; in it was a statue of stone, like a man, and within it a man, upon whom was a breast-plate of gold, set with jewels, and on him were written characters with a pen, which no man can explain.'

"Greaves, an Englishman, who visited the Great Pyramid in 1648, described the passages thus opened, and then open, very accurately, and suspected that at the bottom of a well in the pyramid was the passage to those secret vaults mentioned by Herodotus; but he made no new discovery. Davison, who visited it in the middle of the eighteenth century, discovered some secret chambers and passages connecting the largest gallery with the central room, and an apartment four feet high over it. He descended the well 155 feet, but found farther progress blocked up. Caviglia was the first to discover the above suspected passage. After much trouble in clearing the narrow opening at the end of the first or entrance gallery of the pyramid, he found that it did not terminate at that point, as hitherto supposed, but proceeded downwards to the distance of two hundred feet. It ended in a doorway on the right, which was found to communicate with the bottom of the well. But the new passage did not terminate here: it went beyond the doorway twenty-three feet, and then took a horizontal direction for twenty-eight more, where it opened into a spacious chamber immediately under the central room.

"This new chamber is twenty-seven feet broad, and sixty-six feet long. The floor is irregular; nearly one half of the length from the eastern, or entrance end, being level, and about fifteen feet from the ceiling; while, in the middle, it descends five feet lower, in which part there is a hollow space bearing all the appearance of the commencement of a well, or shaft. From thence it rises to the western end, so that there is scarcely room between the floor and the ceiling to stand upright.

"On the south of this chamber is a passage hollowed out, just high and wide enough for a man to creep along upon his hands and knees, which continues in the rock for fifty-five feet, and then suddenly ends. Another at the east end commences with a kind of arch, and runs about forty feet into the solid body of the pyramid.

Mr. Salt, the late intelligent British Consul to Egypt, was so struck by this discovery, as to express his belief that the under-ground rooms were used for 'the performance of solemn and secret mysteries.'

"As to the second pyramid of Gizeh, the ancients knew less about it than they did of the first. Herodotus says it has no under-ground chambers, and the other ancient authorities are silent. But the enterprising Belzoni found its entrance, in the north front, in 1818, and discovered, at the same time, that it had been previously forced open by the Arabian Caliph, Ali Mehemet, A.D. 782, more than a thousand years before. After forcing an entrance, and advancing along a narrow passage, one hundred feet long, he found a central chamber, forty-six feet long by sixteen wide, and twenty-three high, cut out of the solid rock. It contained a granite sarcophagus, (a tomb,) half sunk in the floor, with some bones in it, which, on inspection by Sir Everard Home, proved to be those of a cow. An Arabic inscription on the walls implies that it had been opened in the presence of the Sultan Ali Mehemet[365]."

This pyramid was, as has been already said, opened by Belzoni. We shall select another account of this enterprise.

"According to Herodotus, (whose information has generally been found correct,) this pyramid was constructed without any internal chambers. M. Belzoni, however, believed the fact might be otherwise; and having reasons of his own for commencing his operations at a certain point, he began his labours, and with so much foresight as actually to dig directly down upon a forced entrance. But, even after this success, none but a Belzoni would have had the perseverance to pursue the labour required to perfect the discovery. It was by attending to the same kind of indications, which had led him so successfully to explore the six tombs of the kings in Thebes, that he was induced to commence his operations on the north side.