CHAPTER X.

THE SOLAR TEMPLE OF AMEN-RĀ AT KARNAK.

So much having been premised concerning the early temple-worship of the sun in Egypt and the adjacent countries, and the survival of some of the ideas connected with it down to our own day, I next propose to describe the finest Egyptian solar temple which remains open to our examination--that of Amen-Rā at Karnak.

Of the chief solar temples referred to in a previous chapter, two have passed away; even the orientation of the one at Heliopolis I was only able to determine by the mounds, assuming them to bear the same relation to the temple as other mounds do, and the remaining obelisk.

The temple at Abydos is also a mound; but in the case of the temple of Amen-Rā at Thebes the case is different: instead of being a mere heap, the orientation of which is obtainable only by the general lie of the remains, this temple is still in such preservation that Lepsius in the year 1844 could give us a large number of details about it, and locate the position of the innumerable courts. Its orientation to the solstice we can claim, as I hope to be able to show, as an early astronomical observation. So it is quite fair to say that, many thousand years ago at all events, the Egyptians were perfectly familiar with the solstices, and therefore more or less fully with the yearly path of the sun.

This temple of Amen-Rā is beyond all question the most majestic ruin in the world. There is a sort of stone avenue in the centre, giving a view towards the north-west, and this axis is something like five hundred yards in length. The whole object of the builder of the great temple at Karnak--one of the most soul-stirring temples which have ever been conceived or built by man--was to preserve that axis absolutely open; and all the wonderful halls of columns and the like, as seen on one side or other of the axis, are merely details; the point being that the axis should be absolutely open, straight, and true. The axis was directed towards the hills on the west side of the Nile, in which are the tombs of the kings. From the external pylon the South-eastern outlook through the ruins shows the whole length of the temple, and we see at the very extremity of the central line a gateway nearly six hundred yards away. This belonged to a temple pointing towards the south-east. There were really two temples in the same line back to back, the chief one facing the sunset at the summer solstice, the other probably the sunrise at the winter solstice. The distance which separates the outside entrances of both these temples is greater than that from Pall Mall to Piccadilly; the great temple covers about twice the area covered by St. Peter's at Rome, so that the whole structure was of a vastness absolutely unapproached in the modern ecclesiastical world.

Some Egyptian temples took many tens of years to build; the obelisks, all in single blocks, were brought for hundreds of miles down the Nile. The building of a solar temple like that of Amen-Rā meant to the Egyptians a very serious undertaking indeed.

Some of the structural details are of a very curious nature, while the general arrangement of the temple itself is no less extraordinary. First, with regard to the temple axis. It seems to be a general rule that from the entrance-pylon the temple stretches through various halls of different sizes and details, until at last, at the extreme end, what is called the Sanctuary, Naos, Adytum, or Holy of Holies, is reached. The end of the temple at which the pylons are situated is open, the other is closed. These lofty pylons, and even the walls, are sometimes covered with the most wonderful drawings and hieroglyphic figures and records. Stretching in front of the pylons, extending sometimes very far in front, are rows of sphinxes. This principle is carried to such an extent that in some cases separate isolated gates have been built right in front and exactly in the alignment of the temple.

From one end of the temple to the other we find the axis marked out by narrow apertures in the various pylons, and many walls with doors crossing the axis.

In the temple of Amen-Rā there are 17 or 18 of these apertures, limiting the light which falls into the Holy of Holies or the Sanctuary. This construction gives one a very definite impression that every part of the temple was built to subserve a special object, viz., to limit the light which fell on its front into a narrow beam, and to carry it to the other extremity of the temple--into the sanctuary, so that once a year when the sun set at the solstice the light passed without interruption along the whole length of the temple, finally illuminating the Sanctuary in most resplendent fashion and striking the Sanctuary wall. The wall of the Sanctuary opposite to the entrance of the temple was always blocked. There is no case in which the beam of light can pass absolutely through the temple.

The point was to provide an axis open at one end and absolutely closed at the other, the open courts being only found towards that end towards which the temple opened, the other end being all but absolutely dark and quite blocked up at the extremity.

These sunlight effects were fully appreciated. Referring to the obelisks erected by Queen Hāt-shepset as a monument to her father Amen, an inscription at the base of one of these says, "They are seen an endless number of miles off: _it is a flood of shining splendour when the sun shines between the two_;"[27] and again, "The sun's disc shines between them as when it rises from the horizon of heaven."[28]

Passing from the temple at Karnak to others in a better state of preservation, we can gather that the part of the axis furthest from the entrance was covered, so that in the _penetralia_ there was only a dim religious light. The entrance is also, as it were, guarded by a massive exterior pylon, as in the more or less modern temple of Edfû. This, again, reduces the light in the interior.

It is easy to recognise that these arrangements bear out the idea of an astronomical use of the temple.

First of all we know that the temple was directed to the place of the sun's setting; and if the Egyptians wished to lead the narrow shaft of light which was bound to enter the temple, since it was directed to the sunset, they would have contrived the very system of gradually narrowing doors which we have found to be one of the special features of the temple.

The doors were considered as very important--and no wonder. In the account given of Thothmes III.'s restoration of the temple of Amen-Rā, we read that after the building had been constructed in a "position corresponding to the four quarters of heaven" the great stone gateways were erected.

"The first had doors of real acacia wood covered with plates of gold, fastened with black bronze and iron."

Then came a propylon (Bekhen) with three other gates connected with it covered with plates of copper, and the sacrifices were brought through these.[29]

This idea is strengthened by considering the construction of the astronomical telescope. Although the Egyptians knew nothing about telescopes, it would seem that they had the same problem before them which we solve by a special arrangement in the modern telescope--they wanted to keep the light pure, and to lead it into their sanctuary as we lead it to the eyepiece. To keep the light that passes into the eyepiece of a modern telescope pure, we have between the object-glass and the eyepiece a series of what are called diaphragms; that is, a series of rings right along the tube, the inner diameters of the rings being greatest close to the object-glass, and smallest close to the eyepiece; these diaphragms must so be made that all the light from the object-glass shall fall upon the eyepiece, without loss or reflection by the tube.

These apertures in the pylons and separating walls of Egyptian temples exactly represent the diaphragms in the modern telescope.

What then was the real use of these pylons and these diaphragms? It was to keep all stray light out of the carefully roofed and darkened Sanctuary; but why was the Sanctuary to be kept in darkness?

The first point that I wish to make is that these temples--whatever view may be entertained with regard to their worship or the ceremonial in them--were undoubtedly constructed among other reasons for the purpose of obtaining an exact observation of the precise time of the solstice. The priests having this power at their disposal, would not be likely to neglect it, for they ruled by knowledge. The temples were, then, astronomical observatories, and the first observatories that we know of in the world.

If we consider them as horizontal telescopes used for the purpose I have suggested, we at once understand the long axis, and the series of gradually narrowing diaphragms, for the longer the beam of light used the greater is the accuracy that can be obtained.

Independently of ceremonial reasons--there is a good deal to be said under that head--it is quite clear that the darker the sanctuary the more obvious will be the patch of light on the end wall, and the more easily can its position be located. It was important to do this on the two or three days near the solstice, in order to get an idea of the exact time at which the solstice took place. We find that a narrow beam of sunlight coming through a narrow entrance some 500 yards away from the door of the Holy of Holies would, provided the temple were properly orientated to the solstice, and provided the solstice occurred at the absolute moment of sunrise or sunset according to which the temple was being utilised, practically flash into the sanctuary and remain there for about a couple of minutes, and then pass away. The flash would be a crescendo and diminuendo, but the whole thing would not last above two minutes or thereabouts, and might be considerably reduced by an arrangement of curtains. Supposing the solstice did not occur at the precise moment of sunrise or sunset, and provided the Egyptians by any means whatever were able to divide the days and the nights into more or less equal intervals of time, two or three observations of the sun rising at the solstice on three different mornings, or of the sunset at the solstice on three different evenings, would enable a careful observer to say whether the solstice had occurred at the exact moment of sunrise or sunset, or at some interval between two successive sunrises or sunsets, and what that interval was.

We may conclude that there was some purpose of utility to be served, and the solar temples could have been used undoubtedly, among other things, for determining the exact length of the solar year.

I now come to my next point, which is that here we have the true origin of our present means of measuring time; that our year as we know it was first determined in these Egyptian temples and by the Egyptians. The magnificent burst of the light at sunset into the sanctuary would show that a new true solar year was beginning. It so happens that the summer solstice was the time when the Nile began, and still begins, to rise; so that in Egypt the priests were enabled to determine, year after year, not only the length of the year, but the exact time of its commencement. This, however, they apparently kept to themselves, for the year in use, called the vague year, began at different times of the true year through a long cycle, as I shall show in subsequent chapters.

If the Egyptians wished to use the temple for ceremonial purposes, the magnificent beam of light thrown into the temple at the sunset hour would give them opportunities and even suggestions for so doing; for instance, they might place an image of the god in the sanctuary and allow the light to Hash upon it. We should have a "manifestation of Rā" with a vengeance during the brief time the white flood of sunlight fell on it; be it remembered that in the dry and clear air of Egypt the sun casts a shadow five seconds after the first little point of it has been seen above the horizon. So that at sunrise and sunset in Egypt the light is very strong, and not tempered as with us. They did this: we not only find the exact allocation of words "the manifestation of Rā," but what happened is described. One of the inscriptions relating to the manifestation of Rā has been translated by De Rougé as follows:--

"Il vint en passant vers le temple de Rā; il entra dans le temple en adorant (deux fois). Le χer-heb [celebrant] invoqua (celui qui) repousse les plaies du roi; il remplit les rites de la porte; il prit le seteb, il se purifia par l'encens; il fit une libation; il apporta les fleurs de _Habenben_ [a part of the temple]; il apporta le parfum (?). Il monta les degrés vers l'adytum grand, pour voir Rā dans Habenben; lui-même se tint seul; il poussa le verrou; il ouvrit les portes; il vit son père Rā dans Habenben; il vénéra la barque de Rā et la barque de Tum. Il tira les portes, et posa la terre sigillaire (qu'il) scella avec le sceau du roi. Lui-même ordonne aux prêtres, 'J'ai placé le sceau; que n'entre pas quelqu'un dedans de tout roi qui se tiendra (là).'"[30]

In the quotation the apparatus of doors is referred to, and it is not difficult to understand that by a particular arrangement of them it would be easily possible to allow the hash which lighted up the image of the god to be of very brief duration. Remember that the sanctuary was dark, that the king stood with his back to the pylon (and therefore to the sun). Under these circumstances, to an excited imagination it would be the god himself and not his image which appeared. Maspero[31] adduces much evidence to show that the priests were not above pious frauds even in the worship connected with the Holy of Holies:--

"The shrines [in the sanctuary] are little chapels of wood or stone, in which the spirit of the deity was supposed at all times to dwell, and which on ceremonial occasions contained his image. The sacred barks were built after the model of the Bari, or boat in which the sun performed his daily course. The shrine was placed amidships of the boat and covered with a veil or curtain, to conceal its contents from all spectators.... We have not as yet discovered any of the statues employed in the ceremonial, but we know what they were like, what part they played, and of what materials they were made. They were animated.... They spoke, moved, acted--not metaphorically, but actually.... Interminable avenues of sphinxes, gigantic obelisks, massive pylons, halls of a hundred columns, mysterious chambers of perpetual night--in a word, the whole Egyptian Temple and its dependencies were built by way of a hiding-place for a performing puppet, of which the wires were worked by a priest."

In an inscription which covers, according to Brugsch, an entire wall near the Holy of Holies in the temple of Amen-Rā it is stated that a beautiful harp, inlaid with silver and gold and precious stones, on which to sing the praises of the god, statues of the god himself, and numerous gates (Selkhet) with locks of copper and dark bronze, to protect the Holy of Holies from intrusion, were among the gifts to the priests.[32]

Thothmes III., in his account of his embellishments at Karnak, says of the statues of the gods and of their secret place (possibly the Adytum) that they were "more glorious than what is created in heaven, more secret than the place of the abyss, and more [invisible] than what is in the ocean."[33]