IX. MANNERS AND CUSTOMS OF THE EGYPTIANS
If I wished to characterise in one word the peculiar bearing and ruling element of the Egyptian mind--however unsatisfactory in other respects such general designations may be--I should say that the intellectual eminence of that people was in its scientific profundity--in an understanding that penetrated or sought to penetrate by magic into all the depths and mysteries of nature, even into their most hidden abyss. So thoroughly scientific was the whole leaning and character of the Egyptian mind, that even the architecture of this people had an astronomical import, even far more than that of the other nations of early antiquity. I have already had occasion to speak of the deep and mysterious signification of their treatment of the dead. In all the natural sciences, in mathematics, astronomy, and even in medicine, they were the masters of the Greeks; and even the profoundest thinkers among the latter, the Pythagoreans, and afterwards the great Plato himself, derived from them the first elements of their doctrines, or, caught at least the first outline of their mighty speculations. Here, too, in the birthplace of hieroglyphics, was the chief seat of the mysteries; and Egypt has at all times been the native country of many true, as well as of many false, secrets.--SCHLEGEL.
Customs that differ from our own always seem strange customs. So the Egyptians, viewed from a latter-day European or American standpoint, seem a very strange people. And it being easy to generalise from insufficient data, many notions regarding the Egyptians have become current which appear not to represent that people as they really were. The more the monuments are studied, and the closer we get to the real life of the peoples of antiquity, the less strange these peoples appear.
Indeed, when we come to appreciate their life as it really was, it is surprising how “natural” and human it all appears. Certain peculiarities there were, to be sure, with each people and with each successive age; but in the broad view the peoples of the most remote antiquity are best understood if we think of them as very similar to ourselves in the general sweep of their feelings, desires, and thoughts. Thus, for example, we have seen that the modern Egyptologist has quite dispelled the notion, once prevalent, that the Egyptians were a solemn, morose people, thinking only of the life to come. The truer view, on the other hand, appears to be that they were a peculiarly social, pleasure-loving people. The observance of certain religious rites, which make such an impression upon us because they differ from our own customs in this regard, doubtless did not appear to them to have at all the significance we ascribe to them.
Even in matters which seem to be most strikingly borne out by the records of the monuments, it is easy to entertain a misconception if one presses too closely the idea that the traits thus discovered belong exclusively to a particular people. Thus in the matter of that conservatism which is commonly spoken of as the predominant trait of the national character of the Egyptians. Conservative they surely were. But so is every other living creature that remains long in a single unvarying habitat. The basis of civilisation is the conservatism which leads each generation to cling fast to the customs it had inherited. The history of customs, of language, of religions, in short of all culture, shows how tenaciously every people, after a certain stage, has held to the traditions of its past.
It seems as if a people, like an individual species of animal, reaches sooner or later a state of equilibrium in regard to its environment, and will change no further, except as the environment changes. Now in Egypt the physical environment appears to have changed but little within historic times, and the geographical conditions were such that the people there were afforded a high degree of isolation from outside influences. Hence the observed slowness of change in the customs of this “strange” people.
Yet, even admitting all this, one must not, as we have suggested, press the point of Egyptian conservatism too far. The most casual glance along the line of their history shows many notable changes in their radical customs from age to age, even in the relatively short period open to our inspection. There were times when great pyramids and temples were all the vogue; other times when they were quite ignored.
Even the custom of embalming the dead, so striking a peculiarity, was more or less subject to fluctuating fashions.
One must bear in mind that the period of Egyptian history open to our inspection, from the beginning of secure records till the final overthrow and disappearance of old Egypt as a nation, was, according to an average chronology, only about twenty-five hundred, or three thousand years. Now it is an open question whether, for every Egyptian idea or custom that remained even relatively fixed throughout this period, one could not find current to-day among the most progressive nations of the world an analogous idea or custom, that could prove at least as long a pedigree. To cite but a single illustration, every civilised nation on the globe to-day has its whole being as closely bound up with religious observances as was the being of the Egyptian commonwealth. And with a single exception the religious systems in question have held sway over their subjects, substantially unchanged, for a period as long as the entire sweep of Egyptian history under consideration. Confucianism, Brahminism, Buddhism, Zoroastrianism, Judaism,--each is hoary with the weight of something like thirty centuries; each had its origin in an age of superstition which we are prone to think far inferior to our own “enlightened” time; yet each holds its millions of devotees as rigidly and as inexorably as ever Egyptian was held by the cult of Osiris. Bearing this single illustration in mind, we shall be able to view the Egyptian “conservatism” more truly, as an example of a universal human trait, rather than as the peculiarity of a “strange” people.
Although we have emphasised the view that the Egyptians were very much like other peoples in their fundamental traits of character and habits, it must not be overlooked that there is a pretty sharp line of demarcation to be drawn between the customs of Oriental and Western nations, and that the Egyptians were essentially Orientals.
THE POSITION OF THE KING
One of the most typical characteristics of the Oriental mind is a deference to authority signalised in the ready acceptance of an autocratic government. Doubtless it never occurred to any Egyptian that he might do away with kings altogether. The conception of the king as the head of the state was so deeply impressed on the mind of the people, that the very possibility of a state without an autocratic head could scarcely be conceived.
But in reading of the extreme deference shown to the kings of Egypt, one is likely to gain a misconception of their actual status. We have been taught traditionally to regard the Egyptians as a meek, peace-loving people, profoundly imbued with religious sentiments, and accustomed to look upon their king as almost a god, and to pay him divine honours. Such indeed was doubtless the fact as regards external and tangible conditions, and no doubt the average Egyptian conceived the kingly authority as something altogether sacred. But beneath the surface of court life everywhere there is a counter current which the monarch himself can never disregard, however little its existence is recognised by the generality of his subjects. Professor Erman has emphasised with great astuteness the effect of these hidden influences upon the real life of the Egyptian monarch. He contends that the conditions surrounding the Egyptian court were not different from those about the thrones of other Oriental monarchs, and he points out with great vividness the distinction between the theoretical and the real position of the sovereign. Theoretically, the king is absolutely supreme; his will is law, all the property is his; even the lives of his subjects are at his mercy. But practically, the situation is quite different. Old counsellors of the king’s father are at hand whose bidding is obeyed by the clerks and officials; old rich families must be pandered to; the generals of the troops have a real power that must be respected; and the priests are an ever present restriction upon royal authority. Then there are always relatives who aspire to the throne. Among the large families of Oriental despots it is always something of a lottery as to which child succeeds to power, and there are sure to be mothers who feel that their offspring have been slighted. The familiar stories of the mothers of Solomon and of Cyrus the Younger illustrate the point.
“Even the very potent rulers,” says Professor Erman, “were constantly in dread of their own relatives, as was shown by the protocol of a trial for high treason. The reign of Ramses III was certainly brilliant; the country finally at peace, and the priesthood had been won over by enormous gifts and by temple-building. The aspect of his reign was as bright as could be. And yet there reigned also under him the fearful powers that wrecked each of these dynasties, and it was perhaps due only to a happy chance that he himself escaped. In his own harem treason rose, headed by a distinguished woman of the name of Thi, who was undoubtedly of royal blood, if indeed she were not either his mother or his stepmother. Which prince had been chosen as pretender for the crown, we do not know (a pseudonym is given in the papyrus), but we see how far the matter had gone before discovery; twice the women of the harem wrote to their mothers and brothers, ‘Arouse the people, and bestir the hostile spirits to begin hostilities against the king.’ One of the women wrote then to her brother, who commanded the troops in Ethiopia, and definitely bade him come and fight the king. When one sees how many high officials shared in the treason or knew of it, one appreciates the danger overhanging such an oriental kingdom.”
It will be well to bear this corrective view in mind in considering the position of the Egyptian king as suggested by the monumental inscriptions and pictures. But this view does not at all alter the fact that the people at large were absolutely subservient to the idea of kingship. Certain individuals might strive to overthrow any particular monarch, but it was only that they might set up another. The idea of doing away with monarchy itself never entered their heads. That idea was born upon European soil, long after the power of ancient Egypt had departed.
It is an easy step from monarchs to armies and war methods, although in Egypt the relationship was not so close and intimate as in the case of many other nations. We have seen all along that the Egyptians were not pre-eminently a warlike people, yet, first and last, war entered very largely into their life history as with every other nation, and there was one period under the New Kingdom when, as we have seen, the Egyptians became a conquering people. As the chief monarch of this epoch, Ramses II was greatly given to recording his own deeds in monumental fashion, very full data are at hand for interpreting the war methods of the people during this epoch. There is nothing particularly unique about these methods. The Egyptian army consisted principally of militia armed with bows and javelins. The cavalry, consisting of companies of charioteers, was led by the king himself. Equestrianship had not yet entered into warfare. In sieges, scaling-ladders and battering-rams were used. The monuments show us that the soldiers were drilled to the sound of bugles quite in the modern fashion. In a word, there was nothing particularly to distinguish the war customs of the Egyptians of the XVIIIth and XIXth Dynasties from those of other nations of their time, and these methods, as we shall have occasion to see, were not greatly improved upon until about a thousand years later, when the Macedonian phalanx, as trained by Philip and Alexander along lines first laid out by the great Theban Epaminondas, introduced a new element into warfare.[a]
The king was the representative of the deity, and his royal authority was directly derived from the gods. He was the head of the religion and of the state; he was the judge and law-giver; and he commanded the army and led it to war. It was his right and his office to preside over the sacrifices, and pour out libations to the gods; and, whenever he was present, he had the privilege of being the officiating high priest.
The sceptre was hereditary; but, in the event of a direct heir failing, the claims for succession were determined by proximity of parentage, or by right of marriage. The king was always either of the military or priestly class, and the princes also belonged to one of them.
The army or the priesthood were the two professions followed by all men of rank, the navy not being an exclusive service; and the “long ships of Sesostris” and other kings were commanded by generals and officers taken from the army, as was the custom of the Turks, and some others in modern Europe to a very recent time. The law, too, was in the hands of the priests; so that there were only two professions. Most of the kings, as might be expected, were of the military class, and during the glorious days of Egyptian history, the younger princes generally adopted the same profession. Many held offices also in the royal household, some of the most honourable of which were fan-bearers on the right of their father, royal scribes, superintendents of the granaries, or of the land, and treasurers of the king; and they were generals of the cavalry, archers, and other corps, or admirals of the fleet.
Princes were distinguished by a badge hanging from the side of the head, which inclosed, or represented, the lock of hair emblematic of a “son”; in imitation of the youthful god “Horus, the son of Isis and Osiris,” who was held forth as the model for all princes, and the type of royal virtue. For though the Egyptians shaved the head, and wore wigs or other coverings to the head, children were permitted to leave certain locks of hair; and if the sons of kings, long before they arrived at the age of manhood, had abandoned this youthful custom, the badge was attached to their head-dress as a mark of their rank as princes; or to show that they had not, during the lifetime of their father, arrived at kinghood; on the same principle that a Spanish prince, of whatever age, continues to be styled an “infant.”
And it is a curious fact that this ancient people had already adopted the principle, that the king “could do no wrong”: and while he was exonerated from blame, every curse and evil were denounced against his ministers, and those advisers who had given him injurious counsel. The idea, too, of the king “never dying” was contained in their common formula of “life having been given him forever.”
Love and respect were not merely shown to the sovereign during his lifetime, but were continued to his memory after his death; and the manner in which his funeral obsequies were celebrated tended to show, that, though their benefactor was no more, they retained a grateful sense of his goodness, and admiration for his virtues.
The Egyptians are said to have been divided into castes, similar to those of India; but though a marked line of distinction was maintained between the different ranks of society, they appear rather to have been classes than castes, and a man did not necessarily follow the precise occupation of his father. Sons, it is true, usually adopted the same profession or trade as their parent, and the rank of each depended on his occupation; but the children of a priest frequently chose the army for their profession, and those of a military man could belong to the priesthood.
The priests and military men held the highest position in the country after the family of the king, and from them were chosen his ministers and confidential advisers, “the wise counsellors of Pharaoh,” and all the principal officers of state.
The priests consisted of various grades--as the chief priests, or pontiffs; the prophets; judges; sacred scribes; the sphragistæ, who examined the victims for sacrifice; the stolistæ, dressers, or keepers of the sacred robes; the bearers of the shrines, banners, and other holy emblems; the sacred sculptors, draughtsmen, and masons; the embalmers; the keepers of sacred animals; and various officers employed in the processions and other religious ceremonies; under whom were the beadles, and inferior functionaries of the temple. There was also the king’s own priest; and the royal scribes were chosen either from the sacerdotal or the military class. Women were not excluded from certain offices in the temple; they were priestesses of the gods, of the kings and queens, and they had many employments connected with religion.
The long duration of their system, and the feeling with which it was regarded by the people, may also plead some excuse for it; and while the function of judges and the administration of the laws gave them unusual power, they had an apparent claim to those offices, from having been the framers of the codes of morality, and of the laws they superintended. Instead of setting themselves above the king, and making him succumb to their power, like the unprincipled Ethiopian pontiffs, they acknowledged him as the head of the religion and the state; nor were they above the law; no one of them, nor even the king himself, could govern according to his own arbitrary will; his conduct was amenable to an ordeal of his subjects at his death, the people being allowed to accuse him of misgovernment, and to prevent his being buried in his tomb on the day of his funeral.
But though the regulations of the priesthood may have suited the Egyptians in early times, certain institutions being adapted to men in particular states of society, they erred in encouraging a belief in legends they knew to be untrue, instead of purifying and elevating the religious views of the people, and committed the fault of considering their unbending system perfect, and suited to all times. Abuses therefore crept in; credulity, already shamefully encouraged, increased to such an extent that it enslaved the mind, and paralysed men’s reasoning powers; and the result was that the Egyptians gave way to the grossest superstitions, which at length excited universal ridicule and contempt.
Next in rank to the priests were the military. To them was assigned one of the three portions into which the land of Egypt was divided by an edict of Sesostris [Ramses II], in order, says Diodorus, “that those who exposed themselves to danger in the field might be more ready to undergo the hazards of war, from the interest they felt in the country as occupiers of the soil; for it would be absurd to commit the safety of the community to those who possessed nothing which they were interested in preserving.” Each soldier, whether on duty or no, was allowed twelve aruræ of land (a little more than eight English acres), free from all charge; and another important privilege was, that no soldier could be cast into prison for debt; Bocchoris [Bakenranf] the framer of this law, considering that it would be dangerous to allow the civil power the right of arresting those who were the chief defence of the state. They were instructed from their youth in the duties and requirements of soldiers, and trained in all the exercises that fitted them for an active career; and a sort of military school appears to have been established for the purpose.
Each man was obliged to provide himself with the necessary arms, offensive and defensive, and everything requisite for a campaign; and he was expected to hold himself in readiness for taking the field when required, or for garrison duty. The principal garrisons were posted in the fortified towns of Pelusium, Marea, Eileithyia, Heracleopolis, Syene, Elephantine, and other intermediate places; and a large portion of the army was frequently called upon, by the warlike monarchs, to invade a foreign country, or to suppress those rebellions which occasionally broke out in the conquered provinces.
The whole military force, consisting of 410,000, was divided into two corps, the Calasiries and Hermotybies. They furnished a body of men to do the duty of royal guards, 1000 of each being annually selected for that purpose; and each soldier had an additional allowance of “five minæ of bread, with two of beef, and four arusters of wine,” as daily rations, during the period of his service.
The Calasiries (Klashr) were the most numerous, and amounted to 250,000 men, at the time that Egypt was most populous. They inhabited the nomes of Thebes, Bubastis, Aphthis, Tanis, Mendes, Sebennytus, Athribis, Pharbæthus, Thmuis, Onuphis, Anysis, and the Isle of Myecphoris, which was opposite Bubastis; and the Hermotybies, who lived in those of Busiris, Saïs, Chemmis, Papremis, the Isle of Prosopitis, and the half of Natho, made up the remaining 160,000. It was here that they abode while retired from military service, and in these nomes their farms or portions of land were situated, which tended to encourage habits of industry, and keep up a taste for active employment.
Besides the native corps they had mercenary troops, who were enrolled either from the nations in alliance with the Egyptians, or from those who had been conquered by them. They were divided into regiments, sometimes disciplined in the same manner as the Egyptians, though allowed to retain their arms and costume; but they were not on the same footing as the native troops; they had no land, and merely received pay, like other hire soldiers. Strabo speaks of them as mercenaries; and the million of men he mentions must have included these foreign auxiliaries. When formally enrolled in the army, they were considered a part of it, and accompanied the victorious legions on their return from foreign conquest; and they sometimes assisted in performing garrison duty in Egypt, in the place of those Egyptian troops which were left to guard the conquered provinces.
The strength of the army consisted in archers, whose skill contributed mainly to the success of the Egyptians, as of our own ancestors; and their importance is shown by the Egyptian “soldier” being represented as an archer kneeling, often preceded by the word Klashr, converted by Herodotus into Calasiris. They fought either on foot or in chariots, and may therefore be classed under the separate heads of a mounted and unmounted corps; and they constituted a great part of both wings. Several bodies of heavy infantry, divided into regiments, each distinguished by its peculiar arms, formed the centre; and the cavalry [in the later periods] covered and supported the foot.
WEAPONS OF WAR
The offensive weapons of the Egyptians were the bow, spear, two species of javelin, sling, a short and straight sword, dagger, knife, falchion or ensis falcatus, axe or hatchet, battle-axe, pole-axe, mace or club, and the lisan--a curved stick similar to that still in use among the modern Ethiopians. Their defensive arms consisted of a helmet of metal or a quilted head-piece; a cuirass, or coat of armour, made of metal plates, or quilted with metal bands, and an ample shield. The soldier’s chief defence was his shield, which, in length, was equal to about half his height, and generally double its own breadth. It was most commonly covered with bull’s hide having the hair outward, sometimes strengthened by one or more rims of metal, and studded with nails or metal pins, the inner part being a wooden frame.
The Egyptian bow was a round piece of wood, from five to five and a half feet in length, tapering to a point at both ends. Their arrows varied from twenty-two to thirty-four inches in length; some were of wood, others of reed; frequently tipped with a metal head; and winged with three feathers, glued longitudinally, and at equal distances, upon the other end of the shaft, as on our own arrows. Sometimes, instead of the metal head, a piece of hard wood was inserted into the reed, which terminated in a long tapering point.
The spear, or pike, was of wood, between five and six feet in length, with a metal head, into which the shaft was inserted and fixed with nails. The head was of bronze or iron, often very large, and with a double edge. The javelin, lighter and shorter than the spear, was also of wood, and similarly armed with a strong two-edged metal head, of an elongated diamond, or leaf shape, either flat or increasing in thickness at the centre, and sometimes tapering to a very long point.
The sling was a thong of leather, or string plaited; broad in the middle, and having a loop at one end, by which it was fixed upon and firmly held with the hand; the other extremity terminating in a lash, which escaped from the finger as the stone was thrown. The Egyptian sword was straight and short, from two and a half to three feet in length, having generally a double edge, and tapering to a sharp point. It was used for cut and thrust. They had also a dagger.
The axe, or hatchet, was small and simple, seldom exceeding two, or two and a half feet, in length: it had a single blade, and no instance is met with of a double axe resembling the bipennis of the Romans. The blade of the battle-axe was, in form, not unlike the Parthian shield; a segment of a circle, divided at the back into two smaller segments, whose three points were fastened to the handle with metal pins. It was of bronze, and sometimes (as the colour of those in the paintings shows) of steel; and the length of the handle was equal to, or more than double that of, the blade. The pole-axe was about three feet in length, but apparently more difficult to wield than the preceding, owing to the great weight of a metal ball to which the blade was fixed; and required, like the mace, a powerful as well as a skilful arm.
The mace was very similar to the pole-axe, without a blade. It was of wood, bound with bronze, about two feet and a half in length, and furnished with an angular piece of metal, projecting from the handle, which may have been intended as a guard, though in many instances they represent the hand placed above it, while the blow was given. In ancient times, when the fate of a battle was frequently decided by personal valour, the dexterous management of such arms was of great importance; and a band of resolute veterans, headed by a gallant chief, spread dismay among the ranks of an enemy. The curved stick, or club (called lisan, “tongue”), was used by heavy and light-armed troops as well as by archers; and if it does not appear a formidable arm, yet the experience of modern times bears ample testimony to its efficacy in close combat.
The helmet was usually quilted; and though bronze helmets are said to have been worn by the Egyptians, they generally adopted the former, which being thick, and well padded, served as an excellent protection to the head, without the inconvenience of metal in so hot a climate. Some of them descended to the shoulder, others only a short distance below the level of the ear, and the summit, terminating in an obtuse point, was ornamented with two tassels. They were of a green, red, or black colour; and a longer one, which fitted less closely to the back of the head, was fringed at the lower edge with a broad border, and in some instances consisted of two parts, or an upper and under fold. Another, worn by the spearmen, and many corps of infantry and charioteers, was also quilted, and descended to the shoulder with a fringe; but it had no tassels, and, fitting close to the top of the head, it widened towards the base, the front, which covered the forehead, being made of a separate piece, attached to the other part. There is no representation of an Egyptian helmet with a crest, but that of the Shardana, once enemies and afterwards allies of the Pharaohs, shows they were used long before the Trojan war.
The outer surface of the corselet of mail, or coat of scale-armour, consisted of about eleven horizontal rows of metal plates, well secured by bronze pins; and at the hollow of the throat a narrower range of plates was introduced, above which were two more, completing the collar or covering of the neck. The breadth of each plate or scale was little more than an inch, eleven or twelve of them sufficing to cover the front of the body; and the sleeves, which were sometimes so short as to extend less than halfway to the elbow, consisted of two rows of similar plates. Many, indeed most, of the corselets were without collars; in some the sleeves were rather longer, reaching nearly to the elbow, and they were worn both by heavy infantry and bowmen. The ordinary corselet may have been little less than two feet and a half in length; it sometimes covered the thighs nearly to the knee; and in order to prevent its pressing heavily upon the shoulder, they bound their girdle over it, and tightened it at the waist. But the thighs, and that part of the body below the girdle, were usually covered by a kilt, or other robe, detached from the corselet; and many of the light and heavy infantry were clad in a quilted vest of the same form as the coat of armour, for which it was a substitute; and some wore corselets, reaching only from the waist to the upper part of the breast, and supported by straps over the shoulder, which were faced with bronze plates.
Heavy-armed troops were furnished with a shield and spear; some with a shield and mace; and others, though rarely, with a battle-axe, or a pole-axe, and shield. They also carried a sword, falchion, curved stick or lisan, simple mace, or hatchet; which may be looked upon as their side-arms. The light troops had nearly the same weapons, but their defensive armour was lighter; and the slingers and some others fought, like the archers, without shields.
The chariot corps constituted a very large and effective portion of the Egyptian army. Each car contained two persons, like the diphros (δίφρος) of the Greeks. On some occasions it carried three, the charioteer or driver and two chiefs; but this was rarely the case, except in triumphal processions, when two of the princes accompanied the king in their chariot, bearing the regal sceptre, or the flabella, and required a third person to manage the reins. In the field each had his own car, with a charioteer; and the insignia of his office being attached behind him by a broad belt, his hands were free for the use of the bow and other arms. The driver generally stood on the off-side, in order to have the whip-hand free; and this interfered less with the use of the bow than the Greek custom of driving on the near-side; which last was adopted in Greece as being more convenient for throwing the spear. When on an excursion for pleasure, or on a visit to a friend, an Egyptian gentleman mounted alone, and drove himself, footmen and other attendants running before and behind the car; and sometimes an archer used his bow and acted as his own charioteer.
In the battle scenes of the Egyptian temples, the king is represented alone in his car, unattended by any charioteer; with the reins fastened round his body, while engaged in bending his bow against the enemy; though it is possible that the driver was omitted, in order not to interfere with the principal figure. The king had always a “second chariot,” in order to provide against accidents; as Josiah is stated to have had when defeated by Neku; and the same was in attendance on state occasions. The cars of the whole chariot corps contained each two warriors, comrades of equal rank; and the charioteer who accompanied a chief was a person of confidence, as we see from the familiar manner in which one of them is represented conversing with a son of the great Ramses.
In driving, the Egyptians used a whip, like the heroes and charioteers of Homer; and this, or a short stick, was generally employed even for beasts of burden, and for oxen at the plough, in preference to the goad. The whip consisted of a smooth, round wooden handle, and a single or double thong: it sometimes had a lash of leather, or string, about two feet in length, either twisted or plaited; and a loop being attached to the lower end, the archer was enabled to use the bow, while it hung suspended from his wrist.
When a hero encountered a hostile chief, he sometimes dismounted from his car, and substituting for his bow and quiver the spear, battle-axe, or falchion, he closed with him hand to hand, like the Greeks and Trojans described by Homer; and the lifeless body of the foe being left upon the field, was stripped of its arms by his companions. Sometimes a wounded adversary, incapable of further resistance, having claimed and obtained the mercy of the victor, was carried from the field in his chariot; and the ordinary captives, who laid down their arms and yielded to the Egyptians, were treated as prisoners of war, and were sent bound to the rear under an escort, to be presented to the monarch, and to grace his triumph, after the termination of the conflict. The hands of the slain were then counted before him; and this return of the enemy’s killed was duly registered, to commemorate his success, and the glories of his reign.
The Egyptian chariots had no seat; but the bottom part consisted of a frame interlaced with thongs or rope, forming a species of network, in order, by its elasticity, to render the motion of the carriage without springs more easy: and this was also provided for by placing the wheels as far back as possible, and resting much of the weight on the horses, which supported the pole. That the chariot was of wood is sufficiently proved by the sculptures, wherever workmen are seen employed in making it; and the fact of their having more than three thousand years ago already invented and commonly used a form of pole, only introduced into our own country in the nineteenth century, is an instance of the truth of Solomon’s assertion, “there is no new thing under the sun,” and shows the skill of their workmen at that remote time.
BATTLE METHODS
When an expedition was resolved upon against a foreign nation, each province furnished its quotum of men. The troops were generally commanded by the king in person; but in some instances a general was appointed to that post, and intrusted with the sole conduct of the war. A place of rendezvous was fixed, in early times generally at Thebes, Memphis, or Pelusium; and the troops having assembled in the vicinity, remained encamped there, awaiting the leader of the expedition. As soon as he arrived, the necessary preparations were made; a sacrifice was performed to the gods whose assistance was invoked in the approaching conflict; and orders having been issued for their march, a signal was given by sound of trumpet; the troops fell in, and with a profound bow each soldier in the ranks saluted the royal general, and prepared to follow him to the field. The march then commenced, as Clemens and the sculptures inform us, to the sound of the drum; the chariots led the van; and the king, mounted in his car of war, and attended by his chief officers carrying flabella, took his post in the centre, preceded and followed by bodies of infantry armed with bows, spears, or other weapons, according to their respective corps.
On commencing the attack in the open field, a signal was again made by sound of trumpet. The archers drawn up in line first discharged a shower of arrows on the enemy’s front, and a considerable mass of chariots advanced to the charge; the heavy infantry, armed with spears or clubs, and covered with their shields, moved forward at the same time in close array, flanked by chariots and cavalry, and pressed upon the centre and wings of the enemy, the archers still galling the hostile columns with their arrows, and endeavouring to create disorder in their ranks.
Their mode of warfare was not like that of nations in their infancy, or in a state of barbarism; and it is evident, from the number of prisoners they took, that they spared the prostrate who asked for quarter: and the representations of persons slaughtered by the Egyptians, who have overtaken them, are intended to allude to what happened in the heat of action, and not to any wanton cruelty on the part of the victors. Indeed, in the naval fight of Ramses III, the Egyptians, both in the ships and on the shore, are seen rescuing the enemy, whose galley has been sunk, from a watery grave; and the humanity of that people is strongly argued, whose artists deem it a virtue worthy of being recorded among the glorious actions of their countrymen.
Those who sued for mercy and laid down their arms, were spared and sent bound from the field; and the hands of the slain being cut off, and placed in heaps before the king, immediately after the action, were counted by the military secretaries in his presence, who thus ascertained and reported to him the account of the enemy’s slain. Sometimes their tongues, and occasionally other members, were laid before him in the same manner; in all instances being intended as authentic returns of the loss of the foe: for which the soldiers received a proportionate reward, divided among the whole army, the capture of prisoners probably claiming a higher premium, exclusively enjoyed by the captor.
The arms, horses, chariots, and booty, taken in the field or in camp, were also collected, and the same officers wrote an account of them, and presented it to the monarch. The booty was sometimes collected in an open space, surrounded by a temporary wall, indicated in the sculptures by the representation of shields placed erect, with a wicker gate, on the inner and outer face of which a strong guard was posted, the sentries walking to and fro with drawn swords. It was forbidden to the Spartan soldier, when on guard, to have his shield, in order that, being deprived of this defence, he might be more cautious not to fall asleep; and the same appears to have been a custom of the Egyptians, as the watch here on duty at the camp-gates are only armed with swords and maces, though belonging to the heavy-armed corps, who, on other occasions, were in the habit of carrying a shield.
A system of regular fortification was adopted in the earliest times. The form of the fortresses was quadrangular; the walls of crude brick fifteen feet thick, and often fifty feet high, with square towers at intervals along each face. But though some were kept up after the accession of the XVIIIth Dynasty, the practice of fortifying towns seems to have been discontinued, and fortresses or walled towns were not then used, except on the edge of the desert, and on the frontiers where large garrisons were required. To supply their place, the temples were provided with lofty pyramidal stone towers, which, projecting beyond the walls, enabled the besieged to command and rake them, while the parapet-wall over the gateway shielded the soldiers who defended the entrance; and the whole plan of an outer wall of circumvallation was carried out by the large crude brick enclosure of the temenos, within which the temple stood. Each temple was thus a detached fort, and was thought as sufficient a protection for itself and for the town as a continuous wall, which required a large garrison to defend it; and neither Thebes nor Memphis, the two capitals, were walled cities.
The field encampment was either a square, or a parallelogram, with a principal entrance in one of the faces; and near the centre were the general’s tent, and those of the principal officers. The general’s tent was sometimes surrounded by a double rampart or fosse, enclosing two distinct areas, the outer one containing three tents, probably of the next in command, or of the officers on the staff; and the guards slept or watched in the open air. Other tents were pitched outside these enclosures; and near the external circuit, a space was set apart for feeding horses and beasts of burden, and another for ranging the chariots and baggage. It was near the general’s tent, and within the same area, that the altars of the gods, or whatever related to religious matters, the standards, and the military chest, were kept; and the sacred emblems were deposited beneath a canopy, with an enclosure similar to that of the general’s tent.
In attacking a fortified town, they advanced under cover of the arrows of the bowmen; and either instantly applied the scaling-ladder to the ramparts, or undertook the routine of a regular siege: in which case, having advanced to the walls, they posted themselves under cover of testudos, and shook and dislodged the stones of the parapet with a species of battering-ram, directed and impelled by a body of men expressly chosen for this service: but when the place held out against these attacks, and neither a coup de main, the ladder, nor the ram, was found to succeed, they used the testudo for concealing and protecting the sappers, while they mined the place; and certainly, of all people, the Egyptians were the most likely to have recourse to this stratagem of war, from the great practice they had in underground excavations, and in directing shafts through the solid rock.[b]
SOCIAL CUSTOMS
The subject of manners and customs of the Egyptians has had a peculiar fascination for almost all students of Egyptian history. It is difficult to get away from the feeling that there is something mysterious and occult about Egyptian life, and thousands of people have gazed with mingled admiration and awe upon the monumental remains of this people without caring in the least for the strange-sounding names of the monarchs or for the details of their political history.
From the time of the explorations of the French under Napoleon, which led to the monumental publication edited by Champollion[c] and his associates, some inklings of the Egyptian life passed into common knowledge. Additional light was thrown upon the subject by the publication of the elaborate “Denkmäler” of Lepsius.[h] But the first full exposition of the social conditions of ancient Egypt was due to the investigations of Wilkinson, who devoted the best years of his life to the subject, and whose publications are still standard authority. Wilkinson’s elaborate investigation of the monuments and his astute inferences drawn from what he saw enabled him to produce a picture of Egyptian life which the work of more recent investigators has seldom supplanted as to essentials.
Of the more recent Egyptologists few have failed to show an interest in this phase of Egyptian history. Birch,[i] Maspero,[m] Mariette,[n] Chabas,[f] Budge,[g] Petrie,[o] Renouf[d]--all have dealt with various phases of Egyptian life. Amelia B. Edwards[e] popularised the knowledge of the specialists in widely read publications, and Georg Ebers,[k] himself a specialist of the highest standing, gave even wider currency to the most interesting phases of the subject through the medium of his novels. In recent years the field that Wilkinson made his own has been invaded with great success by Professor Adolf Erman of the Berlin University, the worthy successor of Lepsius. Professor Erman has profited by the widest and most critical studies of the Egyptian writings, and through this means he has been enabled to supplement the work of Wilkinson in certain important directions, notably in reference to questions of judicial procedure and the details of governmental administration--subjects into which, unfortunately, a lack of space does not permit us to enter fully here. In his work, Aegypten und Aegyptisches Leben im Altertum, Professor Erman has summarised the sources to which the Egyptologist must go for information as to the life of this people. The writings of the Hebrews, he tells us, have come down to us so much re-edited in later times that they must be accepted with caution as representing Egyptian life of an early period.
The writings of the Greeks, chief among whom in this field is Herodotus, are important as to certain features of the later Egyptian life. Such things as a tourist sees who, “ignorant of the language, travels for a few months in a foreign country,” Herodotus tells us; but very naturally he is unable to supply us with adequate or reliable information regarding those earlier periods of Egyptian history, which have chief interest now because they represent the Egyptian in his time of might and prosperity.
For what we can hope to learn of these earlier times we must turn to the Egyptian monuments themselves. These monumental remains are of four types, namely:
(1) The inscriptions on temple walls and on monuments.
(2) The royal tombs.
(3) Inscribed papyri representing the literature of the country, and
(4) Papyri of another class representing letters, deeds, and other business documents.
As to the inscriptions, which form numerically so large a proportion of the Egyptian mementos, and which, naturally enough, were first attractive to the investigator, it may be said that as a whole they are most disappointing since their “inscriptions and representations refer almost solely to the worship of the gods, to sacrifices and processions, or they give us bombastic hymns to the gods, or they may perhaps contain the information that such and such a king built this sanctuary of eternal stones for his father the god, who rewarded him for this pious act by granting him a life of millions of years. If, as an exception, we find an inscription telling us of the warlike feats of a ruler, these are related in such official style and stereotyped formula, that little can be gained towards the knowledge of Egyptian life.”
The tombs are much more satisfactory for the present purpose since they contain representations of events in the home life of the deceased, and also various implements, utensils, and trinkets such as he might have used while living. But, unfortunately, it is only the early period of Egyptian life that is depicted in this manner. Moreover, the relics found in the tombs are sometimes misleading, since it apparently became the custom to supply articles ready made for this purpose, rather than to utilise objects of actual utility such as the deceased might really have employed while living.
The papyri which represent the literary remains of ancient Egypt are much less illuminative than might be expected; the greater number of them are magical or religious in character, the most conspicuous example being the Book of the Dead, numberless recensions of which are extant in whole or in part. These supply valuable glimpses of the moral nature of the Egyptians and are of high value to the student of religion and philosophy, but they naturally tell us little of the everyday life of the people.
Of the secular manuscripts the chief portion are school books, intended to incite youthful students at once to virtue and to knowledge, quite after the manner of the modern books, particularly of the last generation. These also fail to give more than incidental glimpses into the real life of the people. As to the value for this purpose of the romances which make up so important a part of the literary remains of the Egyptians, scarcely more can be said. They are romances in the modern acceptance of the term. No school of realists had come to urge the writer to go to contemporary nature for his models; hence, as Erman aptly says, the country described in these writings “is not Egypt, but Fairyland.”
It is always surprising in studying the literature of a past time, to note the facility with which the details of everyday life are omitted. Such a writer as Herodotus tells many interesting things about the manners and customs of Babylonians, Egyptians, Persians, Scythians even, but he scarcely tells us a word except inferentially, or by way of pointing a contrast, of the everyday life of his own people, the Greeks themselves. Similarly the Egyptian writers, had they visited Greece, would doubtless have had much to say of the strange customs of that “barbaric people”; but it never occurs to them to enter into any details as to the everyday life of their own race.
The reason for this is sufficiently obvious. One writes chiefly for a contemporary audience, and it would be tedious and absurd to fill one’s pages with details regarding things that constitute part of the most elementary knowledge of every reader. What Greek would have cared to listen to Herodotus, had he chosen to fill his pages with prosy dissertations upon the way in which his hearers and readers built their houses, attired themselves, ate their meals, and pursued their everyday vocations? Every line of such a disquisition would have been filled with fascinating interest for posterity, but posterity was but little in the mind of the writer himself. It is precisely the same with the writings of to-day.
If one will consider in this light the first novel that comes to hand, he will be astonished to note how much is taken for granted, and how little even the most realistic story would tell to a person utterly ignorant of our manners and customs about the precise details of our everyday life. Even the newspapers, which seem to thresh out the veriest chaff of life, are mostly guiltless of specific reference to any of those everyday commonplaces, the lack of which in ancient writings fills us with such regret. It is not surprising then, though none the less to be deplored, that the relatively abundant stores of Egyptian literature give after all only an incomplete and imperfect picture of the manners and customs of the people.
To the remaining source of information--the papyri inscribed with letters and business documents--the investigator is able to turn with greater confidence. Here we see the people no longer posing consciously for inspection, but acting their real life and expressing their true sentiments. Just as the modern biographer feels that he is giving the most intimate insight into the character of his subject when he quotes from his personal letters, so these letters and allied documents of the old Egyptians give us perhaps the clearest insight obtainable into the true character of the people, and it is those who have studied these documents most closely who have been most strongly impressed with the similarity between the true characteristics of ancient and modern peoples. What, for example, could seem more modern than the account of the police investigation into the alleged robbery of the tombs of the kings at Memphis, which was held in the time of Ramses IX, of the XXth Dynasty, about the year 1100 B.C.?
Professor Erman’s account, transcribed from the papyri, telling of this investigation, reads for all the world like the police columns of a modern newspaper. It appears that bands of thieves, tempted by the rich spoils always buried with ancient kings, had attempted to force their way into various pyramids where the bodies of these monarchs reposed, and that in some cases they had been successful. Rumours of this sacrilege coming to the attention of the governor of the city, the investigation in question was set on foot, and the divergent opinions expressed by the various authorities, the bickerings and jealousies that are evidenced, and the net result in a verdict which leaves us somewhat in doubt as to the real facts of the case,--all these features have an aspect of modernity that is positively startling. As an interesting sequel to this investigation it may be added that the police were finally obliged to admit themselves no match for the thieves, and that the authorities, despairing of being able to protect the tombs of their ancestors, resorted finally to the strange expedient of removing the royal effigies to a secret cave in the distant mountain of Deir-el-Bahari. In this cave were placed the mummies of a distinguished line of monarchs, including Amenhotep I, Tehutimes II, Tehutimes III, and Seti I, and lastly the great Ramses II himself.
The humiliating step was taken so secretly, and the hiding-place was so carefully guarded from the knowledge of all but a few, that apparently when these died the secret died with them. At any rate, the resting-place of the greatest sovereigns of Egypt was quite unknown for about three thousand years, and it was revealed by accident in our own time. In the year 1881, as described in a preceding section, the authorities entered the crypt which a company of fellahs had discovered about ten years before, but the knowledge of which they had kept secret. Perhaps only once before in the history of archæological discovery had so startling a find been made, or one that aroused such enthusiastic interest in the minds both of specialists and of the general public as when these effigies of the great monarchs were dragged from their tomb. It is only the recent dead to whom sacredness attaches, and the archæologist has no scruples about making a museum exhibit of forms that had once ruled a great people, and which their immediate successors had reverenced as gods.
It will appear from this brief analysis that the remains of Egyptian writings give us in many ways an insight into the life of the people, but that nevertheless our knowledge of that life is much more restricted than could be wished. After the last line of extant writing has been scrutinised and analysed, it still remains true that the chief source of our information regarding the manners and customs of the Egyptians is not to be found in written words but in graphic pictures. Just as the illustrations of a modern magazine would tell posterity, if preserved, far more about our everyday life, than could be gleaned from the pages of text which they supplement, so the delineations of which the Egyptians were so fond, perform a like service. It was chiefly through study of these that Wilkinson was able to reconstruct the life of the people, and it is still to these that the modern investigator must turn.
The manuscripts give us important hints and suggestions, and throw here and there a ray of light into some dark corner, but the chief story is told, not by hieroglyphic or hieratic scrolls, but by actual pictures. These, as has been said, show us the people for a limited period, pursuing the ordinary vocations of life. They show us that the Egyptian gave heed to much the same manner of things that interest the modern. With the aid of these pictures we are able to go with the Egyptian, not merely into the fields and vineyards where he labours, but also into the private dwellings, where we may attend him as he feasts, plays upon musical instruments, dances, and indulges in various sports and games.
We shall be forced to believe that he was very human; very like ourselves in his aspirations and desires, even in his method of their attempted realisation; and yet so strangely do the archaic forms of those delineations impress themselves upon the mind, that we shall never quite free ourselves of the impression that here we have to do with the beings of another and very different world.
Something of mystery, something of the occult, clings to the Egyptian, however we may try to dispel the illusion. This power the residents of contemporary Egypt had over the old Greek, and this power they still retain. They work a spell upon the mind of whoever contemplates them, which no reasoning can quite exorcise. We know and we believe that these were ordinary mortals like ourselves; and yet, in spite of this knowledge, we feel that there was something quite different about them. And this superstitious feeling perhaps lies at the foundation of the mysterious charm that the Egyptians have exercised upon all succeeding generations.[a]
THE EGYPTIANS AS SEEN BY HERODOTUS
How the classical world regarded the Egyptians is made clear to us through the pages of Herodotus, who speaks as an eye-witness. It is the Egyptians of the later epoch of whom he speaks, to be sure; but his comments would probably apply with little change to the customs of much earlier periods.
Those Egyptians who live in the cultivated parts of the country, are of all whom I have seen the most ingenious, being attentive to the improvement of the memory beyond the rest of mankind. To give some idea of their mode of life: for three days successively in every month they use purges, vomits, and clysters; this they do out of attention to their health, being persuaded that the diseases of the body are occasioned by the different elements received as food. Besides this, we may venture to assert, that after the Africans there is no people in health and constitution to be compared with the Egyptians. To this advantage the climate, which is here subject to no variation, may essentially contribute: changes of all kinds, and those in particular of the seasons, promote and occasion the maladies of the body. To their bread, which they make with spelt, they give the name of cyllestis; they have no vines in the country, but they drink a liquor fermented from barley; they live principally upon fish, either salted or dried in the sun; they eat also quails, ducks, and some smaller birds, without other preparation than first salting them; but they roast and boil such other birds and fishes as they have, excepting those which are preserved for sacred purposes.
At the entertainments of the rich, just as the company is about to rise from the repast, a small coffin is carried round, containing a perfect representation of a dead body: it is in size sometimes of one but never of more than two cubits, and as it is shown to the guests in rotation, the bearer exclaims, “Cast your eyes on this figure, after death you yourself will resemble it; drink then, and be happy.” Such are the customs they observe at entertainments.
They contentedly adhere to the customs of their ancestors, and are averse to foreign manners. Among other things which claim our approbation, they have a song, which is also used in Phœnicia, Cyprus, and other places, where it is differently named. Of all the things which astonished me in Egypt, nothing more perplexed me than my curiosity to know whence the Egyptians learned this song, so entirely resembling the Linus of the Greeks: it is of the remotest antiquity among them, and they call it Maneros. They have a tradition that Maneros was the only son of their first monarch; and that having prematurely died, they instituted these melancholy strains in his honour, constituting their first, and in earlier times, their only song.
The Egyptians surpass all the Greeks, the Lacedæmonians excepted, in the reverence which they pay to age: if a young person meet his senior, he instantly aside to make way for him; if a senior enter an apartment, the youth always rise from their seats; this ceremony is observed by no other of the Greeks. When the Egyptians meet they do not speak, but make a profound reverence, bowing with the hand down to the knee.
Their habit, which they call calasiris, is made of linen, and fringed at the bottom; over this they throw a kind of shawl made of white wool, but in these vests of wool they are forbidden by their religion either to be buried or to enter any sacred edifice; this is a peculiarity of those ceremonies which are called Orphic and Pythagorean: whoever has been initiated in these mysteries can never be interred in a vest of wool, for which a sacred reason is assigned.
Of the Egyptians it is further memorable that they first imagined what month or day was to be consecrated to each deity; they also, from observing the days of nativity, venture to predict the particular circumstances of a man’s life and death: this is done by the poets of Greece, but the Egyptians have certainly discovered more things that are wonderful than all the rest of mankind. Whenever any prodigy occurs, they commit the particulars to writing and mark the events which follow it: if they afterward observe any similar incident, they conclude that the result will be similar also. The art of divination in Egypt is confined to certain of their deities. There are in this country oracles of Hercules, of Apollo, of Minerva and Diana, of Mars, and of Jupiter; but the oracle of Latona at Buto is held in greater estimation than any of the rest: the oracular communication is regulated by no fixed system, but is differently obtained in different places.
The art of medicine in Egypt is thus exercised: one physician is confined to one disease; there are of course a great number who practise this art; some attend to disorders of the eyes; others to those of the head; some take care of the teeth, others are conversant with all diseases of the bowels; whilst many attend to the cure of maladies which are less conspicuous.
With respect to their funerals and ceremonies of mourning; whenever a man of any importance dies, the females of his family, disfiguring their heads and faces with dirt, leave the corpse in the house and run publicly about, accompanied by their female relations, with their garments in disorder, their breasts exposed, and beating themselves severely: the men on their parts do the same, after which the body is carried to the embalmers.
If an Egyptian or a foreigner be found, either destroyed by a crocodile or drowned in the water, the city nearest which the body is discovered, is obliged to embalm and pay it every respectful attention, and afterward deposit it in some consecrated place: no friend or relation is suffered to interfere; the whole process is conducted by the priests of the Nile, who bury it themselves with a respect to which a lifeless corpse would hardly seem entitled.
To the customs of Greece they express aversion, and, to say the truth, to those of all other nations. This remark applies, with only one exception, to every part of Egypt. Chemmis is a place of considerable note in the Thebaid, it is near Neapolis, and remarkable for a temple of Perseus the son of Danæ. This temple is of a square figure, and surrounded with palm trees. The vestibule, which is very spacious, is constructed of stone, and on the summit are placed two large marble statues. Within the consecrated enclosure stand the shrine and statue of Perseus, who, as the inhabitants affirm, often appears in the country and the temple. They sometimes find one of his sandals, which are of the length of two cubits, and whenever this happens, fertility reigns throughout Egypt. Public games, after the manner of the Greeks, are celebrated in his honour. Upon this occasion they have every variety of gymnastic exercise. The rewards of the conquerors are cattle, vests, and skins. I was once induced to inquire why Perseus made his appearance to them alone, and why they were distinguished from the rest of Egypt by the celebration of gymnastic exercises. They informed me in return, that Perseus was a native of their country, as were also Danaus and Lynceus, who made a voyage into Greece, and from whom, in regular succession, they related that Perseus was descended. This hero visited Egypt for the purpose, as the Greeks also affirm, of carrying from Africa the Gorgon’s head. Happening to come among them, he saw and was known to his relations. The name of Chemmis he had previously known from his mother, and he himself instituted the games which they continued to celebrate.
These which I have described are the manners of those Egyptians who live in the higher parts of the country. They who inhabit the marshy grounds differ in no material instance.
Like the Greeks, they confine themselves to one wife. To procure themselves the means of sustenance more easily, they make use of the following expedient: when the waters have risen to their extremest height, and all their fields are overflowed, there appears above the surface an immense quantity of plants of the lily species, which the Egyptians call the lotus: having cut down these, they dry them in the sun. The seed of the flower, which resembles that of the poppy, they bake and make into a kind of bread; they also eat the root of this plant, which is round, of an agreeable flavour, and about the size of an apple. There is a second species of the lotus, which grows in the Nile, and which is not unlike a rose. The fruit, which grows from the bottom of the root, is like a wasp’s nest: it is found to contain a number of kernels of the size of an olive-stone, which are very grateful, either fresh or dried. Of the byblus, which is an annual plant, after taking it from a marshy place, where it grows, they cut off the tops, and apply them to various uses. They eat or sell what remains, which is nearly a cubit in length. To make this a still greater delicacy, there are many who previously roast it. With a considerable part of this people fish constitutes the principal article of food; they dry it in the sun, and eat it without other preparation.
The inhabitants in the marshy grounds make use of an oil, which they term the kiki, expressed from the Sillicyprian plant. In Greece this plant springs spontaneously without any cultivation, but the Egyptians sow it on the banks of the river, and of the canals; it there produces fruit in great abundance, but of a very strong odour: when gathered, they obtain from it, either by friction or pressure, an unctuous liquid, which diffuses an offensive smell, but for burning it is equal in quality to the oil of olives.
The Egyptians are provided with a remedy against gnats, of which there are a surprising number. As the wind will not suffer these insects to rise far from the ground, the inhabitants of the higher part of the country usually sleep in turrets. They who live in the marshy grounds use this substitute: each person has a net, with which they fish by day, and which they render useful by night. They cover their beds with their nets, and sleep securely beneath them. If they slept in their common habits, or under linen, the gnats would not fail to torment them, which they do not even attempt through a net.
Their vessels of burden are constructed of a species of thorn, which resembles the lotos of Cyrene, and which distils a gum. From this thorn they cut planks, about two cubits square: after disposing these in the form of bricks, and securing them strongly together, they place from side to side benches for the rowers. They do not use timber artificially carved, but bend the planks together with the bark of the byblus made into ropes. They have one rudder, which goes through the keel of the vessel; their mast is made of the same thorn, and the sails are formed from the byblus. These vessels are haled along by land, for unless the wind be very favourable they can make no way against the stream. When they go with the current, they throw from the head of the vessel a hurdle made of tamarisk, fastened together with reeds; they have also a perforated stone of the weight of two talents; this is let fall at the stern, secured by a rope. The name of this kind of bark is baris, which the above hurdle, impelled by the tide, draws swiftly along. The stone at the stern regulates its motion. They have immense numbers of these vessels, and some of them of the burden of many thousand talents.
During the inundation of the Nile, the cities only are left conspicuous, appearing above the waters like the islands of the Ægean Sea. As long as the flood continues, vessels do not confine themselves to the channel of the river, but traverse the fields and the plains. They who then go from Naucratis to Memphis, pass by the pyramids; this, however, is not the usual course, which lies through the point of the Delta, and the city of Cercasorus. If from the sea and the town of Canopus, the traveller desires to go by the plains to Naucratis, he must pass by Anthilla and Archandros.
Of these places Anthilla is the most considerable: whoever may be sovereign of Egypt, it is assigned perpetually as part of the revenues of the queen, and appropriated to the particular purpose of providing her with sandals; this has been observed ever since Egypt was tributary to Persia. I should suppose that the other city derives its name from Archander, the son of Pthius, son-in-law of Danaus, and grandson of Achæus. There may probably have been some other Archander, for the name is certainly not Egyptian.[j]
So much for the customs of the Egyptians as Herodotus saw them. Abandoning now the contemporary point of view, let us seek a modern interpretation.
HOMES OF THE PEOPLE
Of the various institutions of the ancient Egyptians, says the greatest interpreter of Egyptian customs, none are more interesting than those which relate to their social life; and when we consider the condition of other countries in the early ages when they flourished, from the tenth to the twentieth century before our era, we may look with respect on the advancement they had then made in civilisation, and acknowledge the benefits they conferred upon mankind during their career. For, like other people, they have had their part in the great scheme of the world’s development, and their share of usefulness in the destined progress of the human race; for countries, like individuals, have certain qualities given them, which, differing from those of their predecessors and contemporaries, are intended in due season to perform their requisite duties. The interest felt in the Egyptians is from their having led the way, or having been the first people we know of who made any great progress, in the arts and manners of civilisation; which, for the period when they lived, was very creditable, and far beyond that of other kingdoms of the world. Nor can we fail to remark the difference between them and their Asiatic rivals, the Assyrians, who, even at a much later period, had the great defects of Asiatic cruelty--flaying alive, impaling, and torturing their prisoners; as the Persians, Turks, and other Orientals have done to the present century; the reproach of which cannot be extended to the ancient Egyptians. Being the dominant race of that age, they necessarily had an influence on others with whom they came in contact; and it is by these means that civilisation is advanced through its various stages; each people striving to improve on the lessons derived from a neighbour whose institutions they appreciate, or consider beneficial to themselves. It was thus that the active mind of the talented Greeks sought and improved on the lessons derived from other countries, especially from Egypt; and though the latter, at the late period of the seventh century B.C., had lost its greatness and the prestige of superiority among the nations of the world, it was still the seat of learning and the resort of studious philosophers; and the abuses consequent on the fall of an empire had not yet brought about the demoralisation of after times.
In the treatment of women they seem to have been very far advanced beyond other wealthy communities of the same era, having usages very similar to those of modern Europe; and such was the respect shown to women that precedence was given to them over men, and the wives and daughters of kings succeeded to the throne like the male branches of the royal family. Nor was this privilege rescinded, even though it had more than once entailed upon them the troubles of a contested succession: foreign kings often having claimed a right to the throne through marriage with an Egyptian princess. It was not a mere influence that they possessed, which women often acquire in the most arbitrary Eastern communities; nor a political importance accorded to a particular individual, like that of the Sultana Valideh, the Queen Mother, at Constantinople; it was a right acknowledged by law, both in private and public life.
As in all warm climates, the poorer classes of Egyptians lived much in the open air; and the houses of the rich were constructed to be cool throughout the summer; currents of refreshing air being made to circulate freely through them by the judicious arrangement of the passages and courts.
The houses were built of crude brick, stuccoed and painted with all the combination of bright colour, in which the Egyptians delighted; and a highly decorated mansion had numerous courts, and architectural details derived from the temples. Poor people were satisfied with very simple tenements; their wants being easily supplied, both as to lodging and food; and their house consisted of four walls, with a flat roof of palm branches laid across a split date tree as a beam, and covered with mats plastered over with a thick coating of mud. It had one door, and a few small windows closed by wooden shutters. As it scarcely ever rained, the mud roof was not washed into the sitting-room; and this cottage rather answered as a shelter from the sun, and as a closet for their goods, than for the ordinary purpose of a house in other countries. Indeed, at night the owners slept on the roof, during the greater part of the year; and as most of their work was done out of doors, they might easily be persuaded that a house was far less necessary for them than a tomb.
In their plans the houses of towns, like the villas in the country, varied according to the caprice of the builders. The ground plan, in some of the former, consisted of a number of chambers on three sides of a court, which was often planted with trees. Others consisted of two rows of rooms on either side of a long passage, with an entrance court from the street; and others were laid out in chambers round a central area, similar to the Roman impluvium, and paved with stone, or containing a few trees, a tank, or a fountain, in its centre. Sometimes, though rarely, a flight of steps led to the front door from the street.
Houses of small size were often connected together, and formed the continuous sides of streets; and a courtyard was common to several dwellings. Others of a humbler kind consisted merely of rooms opening on a narrow passage, or directly on the street. These had only a basement story, or ground floor; and few houses exceeded two stories above it. They mostly consisted of one upper floor; and though Diodorus speaks of the lofty houses in Thebes four and five stories high, the paintings show that few had three, and the largest seldom four, including as he does the basement story.[b]
X. THE EGYPTIAN RELIGION
This country is so thickly peopled with divinities that it is easier to find a god than a man.--PETRONIUS.
Few things are so hard to understand as the religion of an alien race. Indeed, we have but too many illustrations before us constantly that even among the same people, and where ideas are based upon the same authorities, a great divergence of opinion is possible. It is little to be expected, then, that any people should fully understand the religious faith of another people. To add to the difficulty, all the great religions are of Oriental origin and date from a pre-scientific era. Now the essential characteristic both of Oriental and of non-scientific thinking is its vagueness. The Arabic historian, even of the present day, loves to indulge in absurd flights of rhetoric. He sprinkles his pages with grotesque metaphors; he uses the most hyperbolic exaggerations; nor is he particular to avoid the most glaring contradictions; and over it all he throws the veil of hazy mysticism.
If this be true of the Oriental style of composition when applied to staid matter-of-fact recitals, certainly one could expect nothing more definite when the theme is religion. It is no matter for surprise, then, that the sacred books of all great religions are couched in phraseology well calculated to befog the mind of any one who approaches them in any other spirit than that of preconceived faith. This applies no more and no less to the Egyptian than to all other Oriental religions. On the other hand, the data supplied us for the interpretation of the Egyptian faith are far more abundant than are accessible in the case of most other of the great religions of antiquity.
Despite the confusion and vagueness and seeming contradiction that pertain to the Egyptian records, it is probably true that a reasonably correct idea may be formed, at least in general terms, of the evolution and development, no less than of the final status, of the faith which was dominant with the people of the Nile for at least three thousand years. Certainly at least a rough outline of the development of that faith is accessible, and it is the more worthy of presentation because it may be taken at the same time as illustrative of the probable evolution of the faith of other peoples.
The most obvious and striking fact that appeals to the investigator of the Egyptian religion is that enormous numbers of gods hold sway: Ra, Horus, Osiris, Isis, Tmu, Amen, Set,--the list extends itself almost endlessly. Moreover, there is no little confusion as to the precise status of the various gods thus named. To casual inspection it would seem as if the Egyptian of the later time had no very clear idea himself as to how many gods were really included in the hierarchy, or as to the precise identity of the more important ones. And, indeed, such was probably the fact.
The only rational explanation of this confusion appears to be the alleged fact that in an early prehistoric day the various communities of Egypt, not yet consolidated under a single government, had each its own special deity. This local deity, presiding jealously over the interests of its own people, came naturally to have greater or less importance in proportion to the growth or decay of the community over which it presided. Moreover, there must have been a constant tendency, through a shifting of portions of the population from one community to another, to confuse the attributes of the various gods even from the earliest time; since the person who removed from one village to another could not well be expected quite to forget the local god who had formerly been the chief object of his worship. Then as one community or another became dominant after the government was centralised, there must have been a tendency in successive ages to emphasise the importance of one local god or another.
Thus it is clear that in the time of the New Kingdom, when Thebes became the capital and chief centre of the empire, Amen, the local god of Thebes, came to assume an importance hitherto denied him. At last it was even customary to identify Amen with Ra, the greatest god of all, or king of the gods, and the compound name, Amen-Ra, came into use. Various other names were compounded through a similar confusion of attributes, chiefly perhaps through the natural tendency to identify one’s local god with a god of more widely recognised authority. A moment’s reflection makes it clear that the tendency of all this was towards the recognition of a most important central god, who, to a certain extent, ruled over and controlled the hierarchy of the lesser deities. But indeed, it seems clear that from the earliest times the existence of such a supremely powerful god had been everywhere recognised.
It may be doubted even whether it is possible for any religion worthy of the name to fail of an analysis leading to this result. The human mind naturally reaches back from effect to cause, and while it cannot quite clearly grasp the idea of an ultimate single cause, yet neither can it escape the analysis that leads to that idea.
In this view it might be contended that the Egyptian religion, and indeed, every other religion, is monotheistic; certainly its trend was towards monotheism, and certainly this conception best accords with the natural cast of the Oriental mind. It is natural to attempt to visualise, in the spiritual world, a state of things not widely different from the conditions of the actual world, and a people who had no higher conception of the body politic than the thought of an autocracy presided over by a single supreme monarch, would have been strangely untrue to their psychological prejudices had they failed to conceive a like state of things existing in the hierarchy of the gods.
Side by side with this tendency towards monotheism, however, exists always the counter tendency towards a multiplication of deities. The founding of a new city or colony would imply, sooner or later, the creation of a god to preside over the new community. If at first an old god were transplanted for the purpose, local jealousy would be sure to demand a deity whose sole interests in the local community could be expected. Again, the deification of kings and perhaps the other departed notables must of necessity lead to a perpetual enhancement of the list of gods. But this multiplicity of minor deities must not be supposed to be necessarily antagonistic to the essential monotheistic idea in the case of the Egyptian, any more than the multiplication of saints affects the status of the Christian religion.
Over and above all other gods, from first to last, there seems always to have been a conception of Ra, the Uncreated, the autocrat of the heavens. Horus the sun-god, who fought each day in the interest of mankind against the malicious demon Set, or Sutekh, and who was overcome each night only to revive again and renew the combat with each succeeding morning, was a god of great and widely recognised power. Yet it appears that he was not quite identified, as has sometimes been supposed, with the supreme god Ra. To the latter attached a certain intangibility, a certain vagueness inconsistent with the obvious visual reality of the sun-god, or with the being of any other god whose qualities could be explicitly defined. In the very nature of the case the conception of Ra was vague. He represented the last analysis of thought, from which the mind recoils dazed and acknowledging itself baffled.
While we can hardly doubt that this must have been the status of the supreme god Ra in the minds of the most philosophical thinkers of Egypt, yet it is no less certain that there was a constant tendency to associate the qualities of various other gods with the qualities of the supreme deity; in other words, to elevate a lesser deity to the kingship of the gods, somewhat as an important subject might now and again be elevated to the earthly kingship.
The most tangible effort in this direction was made late in the XVIIIth Dynasty by Amenhotep IV, who came afterwards to be known as Khun-aten, “the splendour of the sun-disk,” and whom later generations characterised as the heretic king. This monarch strove to subordinate, if not indeed to eliminate, all the hosts of minor gods by instituting the kingship of the sun-god alone as the supreme, perhaps as the only, deity. The effort was not successful, and the reaction that followed left the old religion more firmly fixed than ever, in its previous beliefs and observances. None the less, the attempt has great historic interest, partly because it shows that the idea of essential monotheism underlying a superficial plurality of gods was current in Egypt, and even attained official recognition at just about the time of the Egyptian captivity of the Children of Israel. It is aside from the present purpose to inquire to what extent the ideas of the latter may have been influenced by this strong current of Egyptian thought.
It has just been said that the reaction against the sun-worship heresy left the old faith more firmly established than before. Never again was a prominent and conspicuous effort made to depart from the ancient faith. Whatever details of variation may have been introduced, the religion as a whole remained unchanged throughout the remaining course of Egyptian history. But this fixity again, far from being peculiar to the Egyptians, is but the history of every great theological system. The very fulcrum of such a system is the reliance upon the authority of the past. The abiding support of a traditional faith is that conservatism which lies at the foundation of all civilisation, and indeed, paradoxical though it seems, of all progress. The conservative, his eye fixed on the past, plants himself firmly in the path of progress, crying “Halt!” to every innovation. Yet during the time of a nation’s vitality this attempted damming up of the stream of progress results in, at most, a temporary stasis, since now and again the stress of new ideas suffices to burst the bonds. But there may come a time when the vitality of a nation is sapped, and when the power of conservatism may avail against all progressive movements.
Such a time came in Egypt at just about the era when the nations of Persia and of Greece were preparing to take hand in the world combat, and from that time on traditional theology, as represented by the priestcraft, was dominant in Egypt, and the once potent civilisation of the Nile Valley ceased to hold its own. The records that outside nations have given us of Egyptian conditions date solely from this later period, and must therefore always be taken with certain reservations. Nevertheless, as regards the more tangible things which they describe, they perhaps are not greatly different from what they would have been if written a thousand years earlier. They tell us of great pyramids that were the tombs of kings, of strange customs of mummifying the dead, and of the worship of animals, so crass in character as to be almost inconceivable to the modern mind. The pyramids, to be sure, dated from an ancient epoch; moreover, they still stand, defiant of time, to testify to the truth of the Greek recitals. The mummies have been preserved in countless numbers, and if animal worship died out with the incoming of a new religion after the Macedonian invasion, there is no reason to doubt the substantial accuracy, as regards mere externals, of the accounts of it which the Greeks preserve to us.
We shall do well, then, to turn to the pages of Herodotus and Diodorus for a description of the external observances practised by the Egyptians, remembering always that this is the testimony of alien, even though sympathetic, witnesses, but scarcely doubting that it is testimony at least as unprejudiced as any that a modern would-be interpreter can draw from the monumental records.
The aggregate impression which one gathers, from even a casual consideration of the subject, is that the religion of the Egyptians, despite its very striking peculiarities of external observances, differed singularly little from the other great religions in its essentials. It was polytheistic, but with an underlying conception of monotheism. Its chief observances implied an abiding faith in the immortality of the soul. Its fundamental teachings were essentially moral according to the best light of the time. And if, as viewed by an outsider, it seemed to develop a grotesque ritual and a jumble of vague theistic conceptions, in these regards, also, it can hardly claim to be unique among Oriental religions.[a]
RELIGIOUS FESTIVALS AND OFFERINGS
Herodotus gives an interesting description of certain religious observances as practised in his day. He says:
The priests of the gods, who in other places wear their hair long, in Egypt wear it short. It is elsewhere customary, in cases of death, for those who are most nearly related, to cut off their hair in testimony of sorrow; but the Egyptians, who at other times have their heads closely shorn, suffer the hair on this occasion to grow. Other nations will not suffer animals to approach the place of their repast; but in Egypt they live promiscuously with the people. Wheat and barley are common articles of food in other countries; but in Egypt they are thought mean and disgraceful; the diet here consists principally of spelt, a kind of corn which some call zea. Their dough they knead with their feet; whilst in the removal of mud and dung, they do not scruple to use their hands. Male children, except in those places which have borrowed the custom from hence, are left in other nations as nature formed them; in Egypt they are circumcised. The men have two vests, the women only one. In opposition to the customs of other nations, the Egyptians fix the ropes to their sails on the inside. The Greeks, when they write or reckon with counters, go from the left to the right, the Egyptians from right to left; notwithstanding which they persist in affirming that the Greeks write to the left, but they themselves always to the right. They have two sorts of letters, one of which is appropriated to sacred subjects, the other used on common occasions [the hieroglyphic and hieratic characters].
Their veneration of their deities is superstitious to an extreme: one of their customs is to drink out of brazen goblets, which it is the universal practice among them to cleanse every day. They are so regardful of neatness, that they wear only linen, and that always newly washed; and it is from the idea of cleanliness, which they regard much beyond comeliness, that they use circumcision. Their priests every third day shave every part of their bodies, to prevent vermin or any species of impurity from adhering to those who are engaged in the service of the gods: the priesthood is also confined to one particular mode of dress; they have one vest of linen and their shoes are made of the byblus [papyrus]; they wash themselves in cold water twice in the course of the day, and as often in the night; it would indeed be difficult to enumerate their religious ceremonies, all of which they practise with superstitious exactness. The sacred ministers possess in return many and great advantages: they are not obliged to consume any part of their domestic property; each has a portion of the sacred viands ready dressed, assigned him, besides a large and daily allowance of beef and of geese; they have also wine, but are not permitted to feed on fish.
Beans are sown in no part of Egypt, neither will the inhabitants eat them, either boiled or raw; the priests will not even look at this pulse, esteeming it exceedingly unclean. Every god has several attendant priests, and one of superior dignity, who presides over the rest; when any one dies he is succeeded by his son.
They esteem bulls as sacred to Epaphus, which previously to sacrifice, are thus carefully examined: if they can but discover a single black hair in his body, he is deemed impure; for this purpose a priest is particularly appointed, who examines the animal as it stands, and as reclined on its back: its tongue is also drawn out, and he observes whether it be free from those blemishes which are specified in their sacred books, and of which I shall speak hereafter. The tail also undergoes examination, every hair of which must grow in its natural and proper form: if in all these instances the bull appears to be unblemished, the priest fastens the byblus round his horns; he then applies a preparation of earth, which receives the impression of his seal, and the animal is led away; this seal is of so great importance, that to sacrifice a beast which has it not, is deemed a capital offence.
I proceed to describe their mode of sacrifice: Having led the animal destined and marked for the purpose, to the altar, they kindle a fire; a libation of wine is poured upon the altar; the god is solemnly invoked, and the victim then is killed; they afterwards cut off his head, and take the skin from the carcass; upon the head they heap many imprecations: such as have a market-place at hand carry it there, and sell it to the Grecian traders; if they have not this opportunity, they throw it into the river. They devote the head, by wishing that whatever evil menaces those who sacrifice, or Egypt in general, it may fall upon that head.[11] This ceremony respecting the head of the animal, and this mode of pouring a libation of wine upon the altar, is indiscriminately observed by all the Egyptians: in consequence of the above, no Egyptian will on any account eat of the head of a beast. As to the examination of the victims, and their ceremony of burning them, they have different methods, as their different occasions of sacrifice require.
Of that goddess whom they esteem the first of their deities, and in whose honour their greatest festival is celebrated, I shall now make more particular mention. After the previous ceremony of prayers, they sacrifice an ox; they then strip off the skin, and take out the intestines, leaving the fat and the paunch; they afterwards cut off the legs, the shoulders, the neck, and the extremities of the loin; the rest of the body is stuffed with fine bread, honey, raisins, figs, frankincense, and various aromatics; after this process they burn it, pouring upon the flame a large quantity of oil: whilst the victim is burning, the spectators flagellate themselves, having fasted before the ceremony; the whole is completed by their feasting on the residue of the sacrifice. All the Egyptians sacrifice bulls without blemish, and calves; the females are sacred to Isis, and may not be used for this purpose. This divinity is represented under the form of a woman, and, as the Greeks paint Io, with horns upon her head; for this reason the Egyptians venerate cows far beyond all other cattle. Neither will any man or woman among them kiss a Grecian, nor use a knife, or spit, or any domestic utensil belonging to a Greek, nor will they eat even the flesh of such beasts as by their law are pure, if it has been cut with a Grecian knife. If any of these cattle die, they thus dispose of their carcasses: the females are thrown into the river, the males they bury in the vicinity of the city, and by way of mark, one and sometimes both of the horns are left projecting from the ground: they remain thus a stated time, and till they begin to putrefy, when a vessel appointed for this particular purpose is dispatched from Prosopitis, an island of the Delta, nine schæni in extent, and containing several cities. Atarbechis, one of these cities, in which is a temple of Venus, provides the vessels for this purpose, which are sent to the different parts of Egypt: these collect and transport the bones of the animals, which are all buried in one appointed place. This law and custom extends to whatever cattle may happen to die, as the Egyptians themselves put none to death.
Those who worship in the temple of the Theban Jupiter, or belong to the district of Thebes, abstain from sheep, and sacrifice goats. The same deities receive in Egypt different forms of worship; the ceremonies of Isis and of Osiris, who they say is no other than the Grecian Bacchus, are alone unvaried; in the temple of Mendes, and in the whole Mendesian district, goats are preserved and sheep sacrificed. The veneration of the Mendesians for these animals, and for the males in particular, is equally great and universal: this is also extended to goat-herds. There is one he-goat more particularly honoured than the rest, whose death is seriously lamented by the whole district of the Mendesians. In the Egyptian language the word Mendes is used in common for Pan and for a goat.
The Egyptians regard the hog as an unclean animal, and if they casually touch one they immediately plunge themselves, clothes and all, into the water. This prejudice operates to the exclusion of all swine-herds, although natives of Egypt, from the temples: with people of this description, a connection by marriage is studiously avoided, and they are reduced to the necessity of intermarrying among those of their own profession. The only deities to whom the Egyptians offer swine, are Bacchus and Luna; to these they sacrifice them when the moon is at the full, after which they eat the flesh. Why they offer swine at this particular time, and at no other, the Egyptians have a tradition among themselves, which delicacy forbids me to explain. The following is the mode in which they sacrifice this animal to Luna: as soon as it is killed, they cut off the extremity of the tail, which, with the spleen and the fat, they enclose in the caul, and burn; upon the remainder, which at any other time they would disdain, they feast at the full moon, when the sacrifice is performed. They who are poor make figures of swine with meal, which having first baked, they offer on the altar.
On the day of the feast of Bacchus, at the hour of supper, every person, before the door of his house, offers a hog in sacrifice. The swine-herd of whom they purchased it, is afterwards at liberty to take it away. Except this sacrifice of the swine, the Egyptians celebrate the feast of Bacchus in the same manner as the Greeks.[b]
GIFTS AND RICHES OF TEMPLES
There are certain very practical features of the administration of the temples which Herodotus quite overlooked, but which have come to light through the efforts of modern scholarship. Some of these are admirably pointed out by Professor Erman:
Not the least of the circumstances which lent the priesthood of the New Kingdom that power which finally triumphed over royalty itself, was their wealth. For this they were indebted to gifts, and, indeed, so far as we can see, chiefly to gifts from the kings; it is only now and then that we find a private person making an endowment. From the earliest times all the rulers are busy in this fatal direction (some, like the pious kings of the Vth dynasty, were more so than others); even under the old kingdom many temples had attained such prosperity that they even possessed military forces of their own.
The golden age for the temples began with the Asiatic campaigns of the XVIIIth Dynasty. An approximate idea of the gifts which Tehutimes III made to Amen may be obtained from the remains of an inscription at Karnak; fields and gardens of the choicest of the South and North, landed property on high ground, with sweet trees growing on it, milch cows, and bullocks, and quantities of gold, silver, and lapis lazuli; then captive Asiatics and negroes,--there were at least 878 souls--men, women, and children,--who had to fill the god’s granaries, spin and weave, and till his fields for him. Finally he settled upon Amen three of the towns conquered by him, En-heugsa, Yenu-amu, and Hurenkhara, which had to pay an annual tribute to the god. Since almost every sovereign of the New Kingdom boasts in nearly the same words of having exhibited his piety in a practical fashion, one is first inclined to take this constant self-glorification of the Pharaohs, as so much in the Egyptian text has to be taken, for a conventional empty phrase. But in that case, our doubt would go too far, since at least some of the kings did make to the temples gifts which surpass all that might be considered probable. The lucky chance which has preserved for us the great Harris papyrus places us in a position to bring forward the evidence of figures. King Ramses III left behind after his death a comprehensive manifesto, in which he enumerates in detail all that he had done for the sanctuaries of his country during the thirty-one years of his reign. The numbers of these lists are evidently taken from the accounts of the state and of the different temples, and are consequently deserving of credit.
This great record, which fills a papyrus roll 1333 feet long, with seventy-nine pages of a large size, is divided into five sections, according to the recipients of the gifts. The first contains the gifts to the Theban temples, then follows the gifts to Heliopolis, those to Memphis, and those to the smaller sanctuaries of the country; finally, the fifth section contains the total of all the donations.
Taking together the similar items amongst the donations, tributes, and sacrificial offerings, we have then the chief items of the sum of the income of the Egyptian temples during one and thirty years, somewhat as follows: about 1 ton (1015 kg. 336. g.) of gold; about 3 tons (2993 kg. 964 g.) silver and the value of silver; 940 kg. 3 g. of black bronze; about 13 tons (13,059 kg. 865 g.) bronze; about 14 lbs. (7 kg. 124 g.) precious stones; 1,093,803 pieces of valuable stone; 169 towns, 1,071,780 plots of arable land; 514 vineyards and orchards; 178 ships; 133,433 slaves; 514,968 head of cattle (especially oxen); 680,714 geese; 494,800 fish; 2,382,605 fruits: 5,740,352 sacks of corn; 6,744,428 loaves of bread; 256,460 jars of wine; 466,303 jars of beer; 368,461 jars of incense, honey, oil, etc., 1,933,766 items.
In order to give the reader some idea of the large sums here dealt with, I may remark that even in our own time, when the value of the metals has so greatly decreased, the quantity of precious metals in question would be worth about four million marks (about $1,000,000, or £200,000). And it must not be forgotten that on those same six or seven millions of Egyptians who, in addition to the state taxes, had to produce these treasures “ad majorem dei gloriam,” there devolved at the same time the building of the temples of Medinet Habu, Karnak, Tel-el-Tehudeh, and others. Truly the forces of the little country were unduly strained for the unproductive purposes of worship.
But what made these conditions so completely unsound was the disproportionate division of the treasure expended. If the many temples of the country had participated equally in these gifts, no one of them would have attained to an extreme height of power and wealth. But, probably on political grounds, which we can now no longer determine, Ramses III favoured one temple in the most partial manner, and that the very one to which his predecessors had already conferred the richest endowments. This was the sanctuary of the Theban Amen, which carried off the lion’s share of all the gifts of the generous sovereign.
Thus, for example, of the total 113,433 slaves which Ramses gave away, no fewer than 86,486 fell to Amen; of the 493,386 head of cattle, 421,362; of the 1,071,780 divisions of land, 898,168; of the 514 vineyards, 433; and so on: the 2756 gold and silver images of the gods were destined exclusively for him, and so were the nine foreign towns; it must even here be regarded as an exceptionally mean gift, when he received only 56 of the 160 Egyptian towns. On the whole, it will scarcely be wrong to assume that of the total of the gifts, three-fourths found their way into Amen’s treasuries; of the 86,486 slaves, the god Khonsu and the goddess Mut received in all only 3908.
Since, then, the earlier sovereigns of the New Kingdom had also laboured to fill the treasury of their favourite god Amen, this god ended by possessing resources, beside which those of all the other gods shrank to nothing, and again it is the document of Ramses III which enables us to estimate it in figures.
If we compare these figures with one another, we cannot doubt that under the XXth Dynasty the Amen of Thebes possessed at least five times as much property as the sun-god of Heliopolis, and ten times (if not far more) as much as Ptah of Memphis. And yet these latter were the two gods who had formerly been the most distinguished, and certainly also the richest, in the whole country. The enormous magnitude of temple property like this, of course, demanded a much more complicated machinery for its administration than had been required for the modest possessions of the ancient sanctuaries. Even one of the larger temples of the middle kingdom could have its treasure, its granaries, and its affairs of writing carried on by certain members of its priestly college, for the labours which they entailed could be executed side by side; beyond the inferior servants there had been scarcely any regular officials in these temples. It is quite otherwise in the New Kingdom; the priests can no longer manage the administration unaided, and call in a host of officials to help. This is true of all the temples, but, of course, especially so of that of the Theban Amen. This god possessed a general administration of the house, i.e. the temple furniture; he has special departments for the treasure, for the lands, for the barns, for the oxen, and for the peasants, and every one of these departments has its overseer of princely rank, and its scribe. There is also a superior chief scribe for Amen, who keeps the roll of the sanctuary’s possessions. And since in a great temple of the New Kingdom the erection of new buildings and the works of restoration are never interrupted, he has also his own administration of construction, to which all works are subordinated; of course, provision is also made for the required number of labourers and craftsmen of all kinds, from the painter down to the stone-mason. To secure order in the temple and on the estates, the god keeps his own military forces with superior and inferior officers, and since amongst his dependents very secular proceedings often take place, he has also his own prison. Of the large staff of subordinate officials, who must have existed in such an administration, we, of course, know very little, as this class keeps out of sight. Still such people as the overseer of the sacrificial storehouses, doorkeepers of every description, and barbers have left us monuments, and must consequently have enjoyed a certain prosperity.
What we have here stated respecting the temple administration would be of still greater interest if we knew the mutual relations of all these offices, and how it came to pass that we find, now these, now those, united in the same hands. That the high priest arrogated to himself, at least nominally, now one, now another, especially important office, is comprehensible enough; but it remains unexplained how, for instance, the management of the constructions can be at one time handed over as a secondary function to the chief scribe, and another time to the superintendent of barns, the more since the former presided in addition over the god’s bulls, and the latter has the treasury under his protection, and “seals all contracts in Amen’s temple.” It is, moreover, a characteristic circumstance that these high temple officials are frequently also state functionaries; the gradual transformation of the old kingdom into the priestly state of the XXIst Dynasty, which is ruled by the high priests of Amen, already distinctly reveals itself in such dual officers. Still, the kingly power did not submit to the spiritual without resistance, and it may be that both the reformation of Khun-aten and the disturbances at the end of the XIXth Dynasty, when no sacrifices were brought into the temples, were in good part called forth by the effort to oppose a barrier to the individual and increasing power of the Amen priesthood. It must be owned that the latter issued from both trials stronger than ever.[c]
The opulence of the Egyptian temples is the more amazing for being lavished upon mere beasts. This animal-worship deeply impressed classical authors. The account of Diodorus is particularly full and vivid.
DIODORUS ON ANIMAL WORSHIP
The Adoration and Worshipping of Beasts among the Egyptians seems justly to many a most strange and unaccountable thing, and worthy Enquiry; for they worship some Creatures even above measure, when they are dead as well as when they are living; as Cats, Ichneumons, Dogs, Kites, the Bird Ibis, Wolves and Crocodiles, and many other such like. The Cause of which I shall endeavour to give, having first premis’d something briefly concerning them. And first of all, they dedicate a piece of Land to every kind of Creature they adore, assigning the Profits for feeding and taking care of them. To some of these Deities the Egyptians give Thanks for recovering their Children from Sickness, as by shaving their Heads, and weighing the Hair, with the like Weight of Gold or Silver, and then giving that Mony to them that have the Care of the Beasts. To the Kites, while they are flying they cry out with a loud Voice, and throw pieces of Flesh for them upon the Ground till such time as they take it. To the Cats and Ichneumons they give Bread soakt in Milk, stroaking and making much of them, or feed them with pieces of Fish taken in the River Nile. In the same manner they provide for the other Beasts Food according to their several kinds.
They are so far from not paying this Homage to their Creatures, or being asham’d of them, that on the contrary they glory in them, as in the highest Adoration of the Gods, and carry about special Marks and Ensigns of Honour for them through City and Country; upon which Account those that have the Care of the Beasts (being seen afar off) are honour’d and worshipp’d by all by falling down upon their Knees. When any one of them dye they wrap it in fine Linen, and with Howling beat upon their Breasts, and so carry it forth to be salted, and then after they have anointed it with the Oyl of Cedar and other things, which both give the Body a fragrant Smell and preserve it a long time from Putrefaction, they bury it in a secret place. He that wilfully kills any of these Beasts, is to suffer Death; but if any kill a Cat or the Bird Ibis, whether wilfully or otherwise, he’s certainly drag’d away to Death by the Multitude, and sometimes most cruelly without any formal Tryal or Judgment of Law. For fear of this, if any by chance find any of these Creatures dead, they stand aloof, and with lamentable Cries and Protestations tell every body that they found it dead.
And such is the religious Veneration imprest upon the Hearts of Men towards these Creatures, and so obstinately is every one bent to adore and worship them, that even at the time when the Romans were about making a League with Ptolemy, and all the People made it their great Business to caress and shew all Civility and Kindness imaginable to them that came out of Italy, and through Fear strove all they could that no Occasion might in the least be given to disoblige them or be the Cause of a War, yet it so happ’ned that upon a Cat being kill’d by a Roman, the People in a Tumult ran to his Lodging, and neither the Princes sent by the King to dissuade them, nor the Fear of the Romans could deliver the Person from the Rage of the People, tho’ he did it against his Will; and this I relate not by Hear-say, but was myself an Eye-witness of it at the time of my Travels into Egypt. If these things seem incredible and like to Fables, those that we shall hereafter relate will look more strange. For it’s reported, that at a time when there was a Famine in Egypt, many were driven to that strait, that by turns they fed one upon another; but not a Man was accused to have in the least tasted of any of these sacred Creatures. Nay, if a Dog be found dead in a House, the whole Family shave their Bodies all over, and make great Lamentation; and that which is most wonderful, is, That if any Wine, Bread or any other Victuals be in the House where any of these Creatures die, it’s a part of their Superstition, not to make use of any of them for any purpose whatsoever. And when they have been abroad in the Wars in foreign Countries, they have with great Lamentation brought with them dead Cats and Kites into Egypt, when in the mean time they have been ready to starve for want of Provision.
Moreover what Acts of Religious Worship they perform’d towards Apis in Memphis, Mnevis in Heliopolis, the Goat in Mendes, the Crocodile in the Lake of Mœris, and the Lyon kept in Leontopolis, and many other such like, is easie to describe, but very difficult to believe, except a Man saw it. For these Creatures are kept and fed in consecrated Ground inclos’d, and many great Men provide Food for them at great Cost and Charge; for they constantly give them fine Wheat-Flower, Frumenty, Sweet-meats of all sorts made up with Honey, and Geese sometimes rosted, and sometimes boyl’d; and for such as fed upon raw Flesh, they provide Birds. To say no more, they are excessive in their Costs and Charges in feeding of these Creatures; and forbear not to wash them in hot Baths, to anoint them with the most precious Unguents, and perfume them with the sweetest Odours. They provide likewise for them most rich Beds to lye upon, with decent Furniture, and are extraordinary careful about their generating one with another, according to the Law of Nature. They breed up for every one of the Males (according to their Kinds) the most beautiful She-mate, and call them their Concubines or Sweet-hearts, and are at great Costs in looking to them.
When any of them dye, they are as much concern’d as at the Deaths of their own Children, and lay out in Burying of them as much as all their Goods are worth, and far more. For when Apis through Old Age dy’d at Memphis after the Death of Alexander, and in the Reign of Ptolemy Lagus, his Keeper not only spent all that vast Provision he had made, in burying of him, but borrow’d of Ptolemy Fifty Talents of Silver for the same purpose. And in our time some of the Keepers of these Creatures have lavisht away no less than a Hundred Talents in the maintaining of them. To this may be further added, what is in use among them concerning the sacred Ox, which they call Apis. After the splendid Funeral of Apis is over, those Priests that have the Charge of the Business, seek out another Calf, as like the former as possibly they can find; and when they have found one, an end is put to all further Mourning and Lamentation; and such Priests as are appointed for that purpose, lead the young Ox [or Bull] through the City of Nile, and feed him Forty Days. Then they put him into a Barge, wherein is a Golden Cabbin, and so transport him as a God to Memphis, and place him in Vulcan’s Grove. During the Forty Days before mention’d, none but Women are admitted to see him, who being plac’d full in his view, pluck up their Coats. After, they are forbad to come into Sight of this New God. For the Adoration of this Ox, they give this Reason. They say that the Soul of Osiris pass’d into an Ox; and therefore whenever the Ox is Dedicated, to this very Day the Spirit of Osiris is infus’d into one Ox after another to Posterity. But some say, that the Members of Osiris (who was kill’d by Typhon) were thrown by Isis into an Ox made of Wood, cover’d with Ox-Hides, and from thence the City Busiris was so call’d. Many other things they fabulously report of Apis, which would be too tedious particularly to relate. But in as much as all that relate to this Adoration of Beasts are wonderful and indeed incredible, it’s very difficult to find out the true Causes and Grounds of this Superstition.
We have before related, that the Priests have a private and secret account of these things in the History of the Gods; but the Common People give these Three Reasons for what they do. The First of which is altogether Fabulous, and agrees with the old Dotage: For they say, that the First Gods were so very few, and Men so many above them in number, and so wicked and impious, that they were too weak for them, and therefore transform’d themselves into Beasts, and by that means avoided their Assaults and Cruelty. But afterwards they say that the Kings and Princes of the Earth (in gratitude to them that were the first Authors of their well-being) directed how carefully those Creatures whose shapes they had assum’d should be fed while they were alive, and how they were to be Buried when they were dead.
Another Reason they give is this: The antient Egyptians, they say, being often defeated by the Neighbouring Nations, by reason of the disorder and confusion that was among them in drawing up of their Battalions, found out at last the way of Carrying Standards or Ensigns before their Several Regiments; and therefore they painted the Images of these Beasts, which now they adore, and fixt ’em at the end of a Spear, which the Officers carry’d before them, and by this means every Man perfectly knew the Regiment he belong’d unto; and being that by the Observation of this good Order and Discipline, they were often Victorious, they ascrib’d their Deliverance to these Creatures; and to make to them a grateful Return, it was ordain’d for a Law, that none of these Creatures, whose Representations were formerly thus carry’d, should be kill’d, but religiously and carefully ador’d, as is before related.
The Third Reason alledg’d by them, is the Profit and Advantage these Creatures bring to the common support and maintenance of Humane Life. For the Cow is both serviceable to the Plow, and for breeding others for the same use. The Sheep yeans twice a Year, and yields Wool for Cloathing and Ornament, and of her Milk and Cream are made large and pleasant Cheeses. The Dog is useful both for the Guard of the House, and the pleasure of Hunting in the Field, and therefore their God whom they call Anubis, they represent with a Dog’s Head, signifying thereby that a Dog was the Guard both to Osiris and Isis. Others say, that when they fought for Osiris, Dogs guided Isis, and by their barking and yelling (as kind and faithful Associates with the Inquisitors) drove away the wild Beasts, and diverted others that were in their way; and therefore in celebrating the Feast of Isis, Dogs lead the way in the Procession. Those that first instituted this Custom, signifying thereby the ancient kindness and good Service of this Creature. The Cat likewise is very serviceable against the Venemous Stings of Serpents, and the deadly Bite of the Asp.
The Ichneumon secretly watches where the Crocodile lays her Eggs, and breaks them in pieces, and that he does with a great deal of eagerness, by natural instinct, without any necessity for his own support; and if this Creature were not thus serviceable, Crocodiles would abound to that degree, that there were no Sailing in Nile: Yea, the Crocodiles themselves are destroy’d by this Creature in a wonderful and incredible manner. For the Ichneumon rouls himself in the Mud, and then observing the Crocodile sleeping upon the Bank of the River with his Mouth wide open, suddenly whips down through his Throat into his very Bowels, and presently gnaws his way through his Belly, and so escapes himself, with the Death of his Enemy.
Among the Birds, the Ibis is serviceable for the destroying of Snakes, Locusts and the Palmer Worm. The Kite is an Enemy to the Scorpions, horn’d Serpents, and other little Creatures, that both bite and sting Men to Death. Others say, that this Bird is Deify’d, because the Augurs make use of the swift flight of these Birds in their Divinations. Others say, that in ancient Time, a Book bound about with a Scarlet Thred (wherein were written all the Rites and Customs of Worshipping of the Gods) was carry’d by a Kite, and brought to the Priests at Thebes: For which Reason the Sacred Scribes wore a red Cap with a Kite’s Feather in it. The Thebans worship the Eagle, because she seems to be a Royal Bird, and to deserve the Adoration due to Jupiter himself. They say, the Goat was accounted amongst the number of the Gods as Priapus is honour’d among the Grecians: For this Creature is exceeding Lustful, and therefore is to be highly honour’d. By this Representation they would signify their Gratitude to the Gods, for the Populousness of their Country.
The Sacred Bulls Apis and Mnevis (they say) they honour as Gods by the Command of Osiris, both for their Usefulness in Husbandry, and likewise to keep up an honourable and lasting Memory of those that first found out Bread-corn and other Fruits of the Earth. But however, it’s lawful to sacrifice red Oxen, because Typhon seem’d to be of that Colour, who treacherously murder’d Osiris, and was himself put to Death by Isis for the Murther of her Husband. They report likewise, that anciently Men that had red Hair, like Typhon, were sacrifis’d by the Kings at the Sepulcher of Osiris. And indeed, there are very few Egyptians that are red, but many that are Strangers: And hence arose the Fable of Busiris his Cruelty towards Strangers amongst the Greeks, not that there ever was any King call’d Busiris; but Osiris his Sepulcher was so call’d in the Egyptian Language. They say they pay divine Honour to Wolves, because they come so near in their Nature to Dogs, for they are very little different, and mutually ingender and bring forth Whelps.
They give likewise another reason for their Adoration, but most fabulous of all other; for they say, that when Isis and her Son Orus were ready to joyn Battle with Typhon, Osiris came up from the Shades below in the form of a Wolf, and assisted them, and therefore when Typhon was kill’d the Conquerors commanded that Beast to be worshipp’d, because the Day was won presently upon his Appearing. Some affirm, that at the time of the Irruption of the Ethiopians into Egypt, a great Number of Wolves flockt together, and drove the invading Enemy beyond the City Elaphantina, and therefore that Province is call’d Lycopolitana; and for these Reasons came these Beasts before mention’d, to be thus ador’d and worshipped.
Now it remains, that we speak of Deifying the Crocodile, of which many have inquir’d what might be the Reason; being that these Beasts devour Men, and yet are ador’d as Gods, who in the mean time are pernicious Instruments of many cruel Accidents. To this they answer, that their Country is not only defended by the River, but much more by the Crocodiles; and therefore the Theeves out of Arabia and Africa being affraid of the great number of these Creatures, dare not pass over the River Nile, which protection they should be depriv’d of, if the Beasts should be fallen upon, and utterly destroy’d by the Hunters.
But there’s another Account given of these Things: For one of the Ancient Kings, called Menes, being set upon and pursu’d by his own Dogs, was forc’d into the Lake of Mœris, where a Crocodile (a Wonder to be told) took him up and carri’d him over to the other side, where in Gratitude to the Beast he built a City, and call’d it Crocodile; and commanded Crocodiles to be Ador’d as Gods, and Dedicated the Lake to them for a place to Feed and Breed in. Where he built a Sepulcher for himself with a foursquare Pyramid, and a Labyrinth greatly admir’d by every Body. In the same manner they relate Stories of other Things, which would be too tedious here to recite. For some conceive it to be very clear and evident (by several of them not Eating many of the Fruits of the Earth) that Gain and Profit by sparing has infected them with this Superstition: for some never Taste Lentils, nor other Beans; and some never eat either Cheese or Onions or such like Food, although Egypt abounds with these Things. Thereby signifying that all should learn to be temperate; and whatsoever any feed upon, they should not give themselves to Gluttony. But others give another Reason; for they say that in the Time of the Ancient Kings, the People being Prone to Sedition, and Plotting to Rebel, one of their wise and prudent Princes divided Egypt into several Parts, and appointed the Worship of some Beast or other in every Part, or forbad some sort of Food, that by that means everyone Adoring their own Creature, and slighting that which was worshipped in another Province, the Egyptians might never agree among themselves.
But some give this Reason for Deifying of these Creatures: They say, that in the beginning, Men that were of a fierce and beastly Nature herded together and devoured one another; and being in perpetual War and Discord, the stronger always destroy’d the weaker. In process of time, those that were too weak for the other (taught at length by Experience) got in Bodies together, and had the Representation of those Beasts (which they afterwards worshipped) in their Standards, to which they ran together when they were in a Fright, upon every occasion, and so make up a considerable Force against them that attempted to assault them. This was imitated by the rest, and so the whole Multitude got into a Body; and hence it was that that Creature, which everyone suppos’d was the cause of his Safety, was honour’d as a God, as justly deserving that Adoration. And therefore at this day the People of Egypt differ in their Religion, everyone Worshipping that Beast which their Ancestors did in the beginning.[d]
A MODERN ACCOUNT OF THE WORSHIP OF APIS, THE SACRED BULL
Among the ceremonies connected with Osiris, the fête of Apis holds a conspicuous place.
For Osiris was also worshipped under the form of Apis, the Sacred Bull of Memphis, or as a human figure with a bull’s head, accompanied by the name “Apis-Osiris.” According to Plutarch, “Apis was a fair and beautiful image of the Soul of Osiris;” and the same author tells us that “Mnevis, the Sacred Ox of Heliopolis, was also dedicated to Osiris, and honoured by the Egyptians with a reverence next to that paid to Apis, whose sire some pretend him to be.” This agrees with the statement of Diodorus, who says, Apis and Mnevis were both sacred to Osiris, and worshipped as gods throughout the whole of Egypt; and Plutarch suggests that, from these well-known presentations of Osiris, the people of Elis and Argos derived the idea of Bacchus with an ox’s head; Bacchus being reputed to be the same as Osiris. Herodotus, in describing him, says, “Apis, also called Epaphus, is a young bull, whose mother can have no other offspring, and who is reported by the Egyptians to conceive from lightning sent from heaven, and thus to produce the god Apis. He is known by certain marks: his hair is black; on his forehead is a white triangular spot, on his back an eagle, and a beetle under his tongue and the hair of his tail is double.” Ovid represents him of various colours. Strabo says his forehead and some parts of his body are of a white colour, the rest being black; “by which signs they fix upon a new one to succeed the other, when he dies;” and Plutarch thinks that, “on account of the great resemblance they imagine between Osiris and the Moon, his more bright and shining parts being shadowed and obscured by those that are of a darker hue, they call the Apis the living image of Osiris, and suppose him begotten by a ray of generative light, flowing from the moon, and fixing upon his mother, at a time when she was strongly disposed for it.”
Pliny speaks of Apis “having a white spot in the form of a crescent upon his right side, and a lump under his tongue in the form of a beetle.” Ammianus Marcellinus says the white crescent on his right side was the principal sign, and Ælianus mentions twenty-nine marks, by which he was recognised, each referable to some mystic signification. But he pretends that the Egyptians did not allow those given by Herodotus and Aristagoras. Some suppose him entirely black; and others contend that certain marks, as the predominating black colour, and the beetle on his tongue, show him to be consecrated to the sun, as the crescent to the moon. Ammianus and others say that “Apis was sacred to the Moon, Mnevis to the Sun”; and most authors describe the latter of a black colour.
It is difficult to decide if Herodotus is correct respecting the peculiar marks of Apis. There is, however, evidence from the bronzes, found in Egypt, that the vulture (not eagle) on his back was one of his characteristics, supplied, no doubt, like many others, by the priests themselves; who probably put him to much inconvenience, and pain too, to make the marks and hairs conform to his description.
To Apis belonged all the clean oxen, chosen for sacrifice; the necessary requisite for which, according to Herodotus, was, that they should be entirely free from black spots, or even a single black hair; though, as I shall have occasion to remark in treating of the sacrifices, this statement of the historian is far from accurate. It may also be doubted if the name Epaphus, by which he says Apis was called by the Greeks in their language, was of Greek origin.
He is called in the hieroglyphic legends Hapi; and the bull, the demonstrative and figurative sign following his name, is accompanied by the crux ansata, or emblem of life. It has seldom any ornament on its head; but the figure of Apis- (or Hapi-) Osiris generally wears the globe of the sun, and the Asp, the symbol of divine majesty; which are also given to the bronze figures of this bull.
Memphis was the place where Apis was kept, and where his worship was particularly observed. He was not merely looked upon as an emblem, but, as Pliny and Cicero say, was deemed “a god by the Egyptians”: and Strabo calls “Apis the same as Osiris.” Psamthek I there erected a grand court (ornamented with figures in lieu of columns twelve cubits in height, forming an inner peristyle), in which he was kept when exhibited in public. Attached to it were the two stables (delubra, or thalami), mentioned by Pliny: and Strabo says “Before the enclosure where Apis is kept, is a vestibule, in which also the mother of the sacred bull is fed; and into this vestibule Apis is introduced, in order to be shown to strangers. After being brought out for a little while, he is again taken back; at other times he is only seen through a window.” “The temple of Apis is close to that of Vulcan; which last is remarkable for its architectural beauty, its extent, and the richness of its decoration.”
Festivals and Ceremonials of Apis Worship
The festival in honour of Apis lasted seven days; on which occasion a large concourse of people assembled at Memphis. The priests then led the sacred bull in solemn procession, all people coming forward from their houses to welcome him as he passed.
When the Apis died, certain priests, chosen for this duty, went in quest of another, who was known from the signs mentioned in the sacred books. As soon as he was found, they took him to the city of the Nile, preparatory to his removal to Memphis, where he was kept forty days; during which period women alone were permitted to see him. These forty days being completed, he was placed in a boat, with a golden cabin prepared to receive him, and he was conducted in state upon the Nile to Memphis.
Pliny and Ammianus, however, declare that they led the bull Apis to the fountain of the priests, and drowned him with much ceremony, as soon as the time prescribed in the sacred books was fulfilled. This Plutarch limits to twenty-five years (“the square of five, and the same number as the letters of the Egyptian alphabet”), beyond which it was forbidden that he should live; and having put him to death, they sought another to succeed him. His body was embalmed, and a grand funeral procession took place at Memphis, when his coffin, “placed on a sledge, was followed by the priests,” “dressed in the spotted skins of fawns (leopards), bearing the thyrsus in their hands, uttering the same cries, and making the same gesticulations as the votaries of Bacchus during the ceremonies in honour of that god.”
When the Apis died a natural death, his obsequies were celebrated on the most magnificent scale; and to such extravagance was this carried, that those who had the office of taking charge of him were often ruined by the heavy expenses entailed upon them. On one occasion, during the reign of the first Ptolemy, upwards of fifty talents were borrowed to defray the necessary cost of his funeral; “and in our time,” says Diodorus, “the curators of other sacred animals have expended a hundred talents in their burial.”
The Egyptians not only paid divine honours to the bull Apis, but, considering him the living image and representative of Osiris, they consulted him as an oracle, and drew from his actions good or bad omens. They were in the habit of offering him any kind of food with the hand: if he took it, the answer was considered favourable; if he refused, it was thought to be a sinister omen. Pliny and Ammianus observe that he refused what the unfortunate Germanicus presented to him; and the death of that prince, which happened shortly after, was thought to confirm most unequivocally the truth of those presages. The Egyptians also drew omens respecting the welfare of their country, according to the stable in which he happened to be. To these two stables he had free access; and when he spontaneously entered one, it foreboded benefits to Egypt, as the other the reverse; and many other tokens were derived from accidental circumstances connected with this sacred animal.
Pausanias says that those who wished to consult Apis first burnt incense on an altar, filling the lamps with oil which were lighted there, and depositing a piece of money on the altar to the right of the statue of the god. Then placing their mouth near his ear, in order to consult him, they asked whatever questions they wished. This done, they withdrew, covering their two ears until they were outside the sacred precincts of the temple; and there listening to the first expression any one uttered, they drew from it the desired omen.
Children, also, according to Pliny and Solinus, who attended in great numbers during the processions in honour of the divine bull, received the gift of foretelling future events; and the same authors mention a superstitious belief at Memphis, of the influence of Apis upon the Crocodile, during the seven days when his birth was celebrated. On this occasion, a gold and silver patera was annually thrown into the Nile, at a spot called from its form the “Bottle”; and while this festival was held, no one was in danger of being attacked by crocodiles, though bathing carelessly in the river. But it could no longer be done with impunity after the sixth hour of the eighth day. The hostility of that animal to man was then observed invariably to return, as if permitted by the deity to resume its habits.
Apis was usually kept in one or other of the two stables--seldom going out, except into the court attached to them, where strangers came to visit him. But on certain occasions he was conducted through the town with great pomp. He was then escorted by numerous guards, who made a way amidst the crowd, and prevented the approach of the profane; and a chorus of children singing hymns in his honour headed the procession.
The greatest attention was paid to the health of Apis; they took care to obtain for him the most wholesome food; and they rejoiced if they could preserve his life to the full extent prescribed by law. Plutarch also notices his being forbidden to drink the water of the Nile, in consequence of its having a peculiarly fattening property. “For,” he adds, “they endeavour to prevent fatness, as well in Apis, as in themselves: always studious that their bodies may sit as light about their souls as possible, in order that their mortal part may not oppress and weigh down the more divine and immortal.”
Many fêtes were held at different seasons of the year; for, as Herodotus observes, far from being contented with one festival, the Egyptians celebrate annually a very great number: of which that of Diana (Pakht), kept at the city of Bubastis, holds the first rank, and is performed with the greatest pomp. Next to it is that of Isis, at Busiris, a city situated in the middle of the Delta, with a very large temple, consecrated to that Goddess, the Ceres of the Greeks. The third in importance is the fête of Minerva (Nit), held at Saïs; the fourth, of the Sun, at Heliopolis; the fifth, of Latona, in the city of Buto; and the sixth is that performed at Papreims, in honour of Mars.[e]
Strabo, the famous geographer of antiquity, visited Egypt in 24 B.C., and ascended the Nile. Among other records of his trip, he has left us a picturesque account of his peep at the sacred bull.
At Heliopolis, he says, we saw large buildings in which the priests lived. For it is said that anciently this was the principal residence of the priests, who studied philosophy and astronomy. But there are no longer either such a body of persons or such pursuits. No one was pointed out to us on the spot, as presiding over these studies, but only persons who perform sacred rites, and who explained to strangers (the peculiarities of) the temples.
In sailing up the river we meet with Babylon, a strong fortress, built by some Babylonians who had taken refuge there, and had obtained permission from the kings to establish a settlement in that place. At present it is an encampment for one of the three legions which garrison Egypt. There is a mountainous ridge, which extends from the encampment as far as the Nile. At this ridge are wheels and screws, by which water is raised from the river, and one hundred and fifty prisoners are (thus) employed.
The pyramids on the other side (of the river) at Memphis may be clearly discerned from this place, for they are not far off.
Memphis itself also, the residence of the kings of Egypt, is near, being only three schœni distant from the Delta. It contains temples, among which is that of Apis, who is the same as Osiris. Here the ox Apis is kept in a sort of sanctuary, and is held, as I have said, to be a god. The forehead and some other small parts of the body are white; the other parts are black. By these marks the fitness of the successor is always determined, when the animal to which they pay these honours dies. In front of the sanctuary is a court, in which there is another sanctuary for the dam of Apis. Into this court the Apis is let loose at times, particularly for the purpose of exhibiting him to strangers. He is seen through a door in the sanctuary, and he is permitted to be seen also out of it. After he has frisked about a little in the court, he is taken back to his own stall. The temple of Apis is near the Hephæsteum (or temple of Vulcan); the Hephæsteum itself is very sumptuously constructed, both as regards the size of the naos and in other respects. In front of the Dromos is a colossal figure consisting of a single stone. It is usual to celebrate bull-fights in this Dromos; the bulls are bred expressly for this purpose, like horses. They are let loose, and fight with one another, the conqueror receiving a prize.[f]
THE METHODS OF EMBALMING THE DEAD
Even more striking than the worship of Apis was the custom of embalming the dead, which was in vogue uninterruptedly for some thousands of years. Herodotus tells us of the exact method of procedure:
There are certain persons appointed by law to the exercise of the profession of embalming. When a dead body is brought to them, they exhibit to the friends of the deceased, different models highly finished in wood. The most perfect of these they say resembles one whom I do not think it religious to name in such a matter; the second is of less price, and inferior in point of execution; another is still more mean; they then inquire after which model the deceased shall be represented: when the price is determined, the relations retire, and the embalmers thus proceed: In the most perfect specimens of their art, they draw the brain through the nostrils, partly with a piece of crooked iron, and partly by the infusion of drugs; they then with an Ethiopian stone make an incision in the side, through which they extract the intestines; these they cleanse thoroughly, washing them with palm-wine, and afterwards covering them with pounded aromatics: they then fill the body with powder of pure myrrh, cassia, and all other perfumes, except frankincense. Having sown up the body, it is covered with nitre for the space of seventy days, which time they may not exceed; at the end of this period it is washed, closely wrapped in bandages of cotton, dipped in a gum which the Egyptians use as glue: it is then returned to the relations, who enclose the body in a case of wood, made to resemble a human figure, and place it against the wall in the repository of their dead. The above is the most costly mode of embalming. They who wish to be less expensive, adopt the following method: they neither draw out the intestines, nor make any incision in the dead body, but inject an unguent made from the cedar; after taking proper means to secure the injected oil within the body, it is covered with nitre for the time above specified: on the last day they withdraw the liquor before introduced, which brings with it all the bowels and intestines; the nitre eats away the flesh, and the skin and bones only remain: the body is returned in this state, and no further care taken concerning it. There is a third mode of embalming appropriated to the poor. A particular kind of ablution is made to pass through the body, which is afterwards left in nitre for the above seventy days, and then returned. The wives of men of rank, and such females as have been distinguished by their beauty or importance, are not immediately on their decease delivered to the embalmers: they are usually kept for three or four days, which is done to prevent any indignity being offered to their persons. An instance of this once occurred.[b]
Diodorus gives a slightly different account of the methods of the embalmer, adding certain most instructive details as to burial customs:
“Now tho’ we have said perhaps more than is needful of their sacred Creatures, yet with this we have set forth the Laws of the Egyptians, which are very remarkable. But when a Man comes to understand their Rites and Ceremonies in Burying their Dead, he’ll be struck with much greater Admiration.
“For after the Death of any of them, all the Friends and Kindred of the deceased throw Dirt upon their Heads, and run about through the City; mourning and lamenting till such time as the Body be interr’d, and abstain from Baths, Wine and all pleasants Meats in the mean time; and forbear to cloath themselves with any rich Attire. They have three sorts of Funerals: The Stately and Magnificent, the Moderate, and the Meanest. In the first they spend a Talent of Silver, in the second twenty Minas [about £62 10_s._ or $300], in the last they are at very small Charges. They that have the Charge of wrapping up and burying the Body, are such as have been taught the Art by their Ancestors. These give in a Writing to the Family of every thing that is to be laid out in the Funeral, and inquire of them after what Manner they would have the Body interr’d. When every thing is agreed upon, they take up the Body and deliver it to them whose Office it is to take Care of it. Then the Chief among them (who is call’d the Scribe) having the Body laid upon the Ground, marks out how much of the left Side towards the Bowels is to be incis’d and open’d, upon which the Paraschistes (so by them call’d) with an Ethiopian Stone dissects so much of the Flesh as by the Law is justifiable, and having done it, he forthwith runs away might and main, and all there present pursue him with Execrations, and pelt him with Stones, as if he were guilty of some horrid Offence, for they look upon him as an hateful Person, who wounds and offers Violence to the Body in that kind, or does it any Predjudice whatsoever.
“But as for those whom they call the Taricheutæ [the Embalmers], they highly honour them, for they are the Priests Companions, and as Sacred Persons are admitted into the Temple. As soon as they come to the dissected Body, one of the Taricheutæ thrusts up his Hand through the Wound, into the Breast of the Dead, and draws out all the Intestins, but the Reins and the Heart. Another cleanses all the Bowels, and washes them in Phœnician Wine mixt with diverse Aromatick Spices. Having at last wash’d the Body, they first anoint it all over with the Oyl of Cedar and other precious Ointments for the space of forty days together; that done, they rub it well with Myrrhe, Cinnamon, and such like things, not only apt and effectual for long Preservation, but for sweet scenting of the Body also, and so deliver it to the Kindred of the Dead, with every Member so whole and intire, that no Part of the Body seems to be alter’d till it come to the very Hairs of the Eyelids and the Eye-brows, insomuch as the Beauty and Shape of the Face seems just as it was before. By which Means many of the Egyptians laying up the Bodies of their Ancestors in stately Monuments, perfectly see the true Visage and Countenance of those that were buried, many Ages before they themselves were born. So that in viewing the Proportion of every one of their Bodies and the Lineaments of their Faces, they take exceeding great Delight, even as much as if they were still living among them.
“Moreover, the Friends and nearest Relations of the Dead acquaint the Judges and the rest of their Friends with the Time prefixt for the Funeral of such an one by Name, declaring that such a day he is to pass the Lake. At which Time forty Judges appear and sit together in a Semicircle, in a Place beyond the Lake; where a Ship (before provided by such as have the Care of the Business) is hal’d up to the Shoar, govern’d by a Pilot, whom the Egyptians call Charon. And therefore they say, that Orpheus seeing this Ceremony when he was in Egypt, invented the Fable of Hell, partly imitating them in Egypt, and partly adding something of his own; of which we shall speak particularly hereafter.
“The Ship being now in the Lake, every one is at Liberty by the Law to accuse the Dead before the Coffin be put aboard; and if any Accuser appears and makes good his Accusation, that he liv’d an ill Life, then the Judges give Sentence, and the Body is debarr’d from being buried after the usual Manner; but if the Informer be convicted of a scandalous and malicious Accusation, he’s very severely punish’d. If no Informer appear, or that the Information prove false, all the Kindred of the Deceased leave off Mourning, and begin to set forth his Praises; but say nothing of his Birth (as is the Custom among the Greeks) because they account all in Egypt to be equally noble. But they recount how the deceased was educated from a Child, his Breeding till he came to Man’s Estate, his Piety towards the Gods and his Justice towards Men, his Chastity and other Virtues, wherein he excell’d; and they pray and call upon the infernal Deities to receive the deceas’d into the Society of the Just. The common People take it from the other, and approve of all that is said in his Praise with a loud Shout, and set forth likewise his Vertues with the highest Praises and Strains of Commendation, as he that is to live for ever with the just in the Kingdom of Jove.
“Then they (that have Tombs of their own) interr the Corps in Places appointed for that Purpose; they that have none of their own, build a small Apartment in their own Houses, and rear up the Coffin to the Sides of the strongest Wall of the Building. Such as are deny’d common Burial, either because they are in Debt, or convicted of some horrid Crime, they bury in their own Houses; and in After-times it often happens that some of their Kindred growing rich, pay off the Debts of the deceas’d, or get him absolv’d, and then bury their Ancestor with State and Splendour. For amongst the Egyptians it’s a Sacred Constitution, that they should at their greatest Costs honour their Parents and Ancestors who are translated to an Eternal Habitation.
“It’s a Custom likewise among them to give the Bodies of their Parents in Pawn to their Creditors, and they that do not presently redeem them, fall under the greatest Disgrace imaginable, and are deny’d Burial after their Deaths. One may justly wonder at the Authors of this excellent Constitution, who both by what we see practis’d among the living, and by the decent Burial of the dead, did (as much as possibly lay within the Power of Men) endeavour to promote Honesty and faithful Dealing one with another. For the Greeks (as to what concern’d the Rewards of the Just and the Punishment of the Impious) had nothing amongst them but invented Fables and Poetical Fictions, which never wrought upon Men for the Amendment of their Lives, but on the contrary, were despis’d and laught at by the lewder Sort.
“But among the Egyptians, the Punishment of the bad and the Rewards of the good being not told as idle Tales, but every day seen with their own Eyes, all Sorts were warn’d of their Duties, and by this Means was wrought and continu’d a most exact Reformation of Manners and orderly Conversation among them. For those certainly are the best Laws that advance Virtue and Honesty, and instruct Men in a prudent Converse in the World, rather than those that tend only to the heaping up of Wealth, and teach Men to be rich.”[d]
FOOTNOTES
[11] See Leviticus, chap. xvi. 21. “And Aaron shall lay both his hands upon the head of the live goat, and confess over him all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their transgressions in all their sins, putting them upon the head of the goat.”--TRANSLATOR.
XI. EGYPTIAN CULTURE
Egypt remains a light-house in the profound darkness of remote antiquity.--RENAN.
By far the greater number of the remains of Egyptian civilisation that have come down to us, are monuments that may be classed as works of art. Indeed, when one speaks of ancient Egypt, one thinks instinctively of her art remains; her pyramids, temples, and sphinxes, her obelisks and colossal sculptures. As one wanders through the halls of such great collections as those of the British Museum, or of the Louvre, it seems to him as if art must have been the very life of Egypt, and as if a considerable proportion of her people must have been engaged in producing the multitude of monuments that are here preserved. But there is, of course, a certain illusion in this thought.
The number of art monuments preserved in Egypt is, indeed, very large in the aggregate, but it must be remembered that they represent the accumulated treasures of many centuries. Thanks to the climate of Egypt, a vastly larger proportion of her monuments have been preserved than have come down to us from any other people of antiquity, and this fact should be borne constantly in mind when one endeavours to estimate the real status of art in that country. Now that the results of many centuries of labour are gathered into a comparatively few collections, the impression made upon the observer is naturally somewhat different from what it would have been could he have seen the same monuments in their original locations scattered throughout the kingdom.
Nevertheless, after making all deductions for the perverted historical perspective thus induced, the fact remains that we are quite justified in speaking of the Egyptians as a singularly artistic race. Indeed, it would be absurd to deny this position to the people who, first of any on the earth so far as known, created a truly great and truly individual art.
It has been held a matter for surprise that the Greeks, who so fully appreciated, and, indeed, so greatly overestimated, the learning and the occult wisdom of the Egyptians, should have failed to be impressed by their works of art. But, rightly considered, there is nothing at all remarkable in this. It must be remembered that Herodotus, who gives us our earliest glimpses of Egypt through Grecian eyes, lived in the age of Pericles, when the masterpieces of Phidias and his contemporaries were constantly before the eyes of the Greek traveller as the criterion by which other works of art were to be judged. It can hardly be wondered at that, judged by this test, the Egyptian sculptures did not seem remarkable. Herodotus had not the spirit of the antiquarian nor of the modern scientific historian, and he therefore made no allowance for the fact that the major part of the sculptures visible had been made almost a thousand years before the age of Phidias; but it is that fact which the modern investigator should bear constantly in mind.
It would be absurd to claim for the Egyptian statues that they compare for a moment as finished works of art with the Grecian productions of the Golden Age. But when one reflects that it was the Egyptians who led the way and first pointed out the possibility of modelling in stone; when one reflects that, so far as extant remains can give us any clew, there were no forerunners of the Egyptians who even remotely approached their standard; when, in a word, one remembers that this art was an indigenous product, as nearly independent of outside influences as any human creations ever can be--then, and then only, is one prepared to appreciate the real merit of the Egyptian sculptor.
To one who approaches this work merely in the cold spirit of the modern critic, untouched by the enthusiasm of the antiquarian, the sculpture of the Egyptians may well be characterised as crude in the extreme. In the first instance it is cold, rigid, immobile, lacking utterly the plasticity and action of the Greek product. Secondly, it is but crudely modelled. No Egyptian artist ever learned to draw in the modern acceptance of that word, or to model in more than the most elementary fashion. These, indeed, taken by themselves, are radical defects, and at first sight they render the Egyptian monuments grotesque, rather than pleasing, to the trained artistic eye. But when one has lived long enough among these statues to enter more fully into their spirit, when one has learned to put away the classical traditions and to relax somewhat his standards of technique, he will see this work in quite another light. He will recognise it as the titanic effort of a constructive genius in that earlier and more truly creative period when technique has not been mastered, but when a true artistic impulse is impelling the aspirant towards new and beautiful ideals which he himself will never quite attain, but to which his work points the way. It is large work in the fullest sense of the word, this art of the Egyptians, and he who can get no farther than to note its often faulty drawing, its imperfect modelling, is forever shut out from a true appreciation of its merits. But, on the other hand, the dreamer who sees, as some antiquarians are wont to do, matchless perfections in its very crudities, and intentional artistic effects in the mere faults of its technique--this enthusiast misses the true lessons of Egyptian art as widely as the overcritical and unsympathetic carper.
However much the various schools of critics may differ in their estimates, the task of the historian at least is clear. He must think of Egyptian art in its relations of time and place. To him it is important because of its position in the scale of the evolution of art in the world. And in this view, putting aside at once hypercriticism and overfervid enthusiasm, Egyptian art can hardly fail to impress the observer as one of the most marvellous of human creations.[a]
While Greece was still in its infancy, Egypt had long been the leading nation of the world; she was noted for her magnificence, her wealth, and power, and all acknowledged her pre-eminence in wisdom and civilisation. It is not, therefore, surprising that the Greeks should have admitted into their early art some of the forms then most in vogue; and though the wonderful taste of that gifted people speedily raised them to a point of excellence never attained by the Egyptians or any others, the rise and first germs of art and architecture must be sought in the valley of the Nile. In the oldest monuments of Greece, the sloping or pyramidal line constantly predominates; the columns in the oldest Greek order are almost purely Egyptian, in the proportions of the shaft, and in the form of its shallow flutes without fillets; and it is a remarkable fact that the oldest Egyptian columns are those which bear the closest resemblance to the Greek Doric.
Though great variety was permitted in objects of luxury, as furniture, vases, and other things depending on caprice, the Egyptians were forbidden to introduce any material innovations into the human figure, such as would alter its general character; and all subjects connected with religion retained to the last the same conventional type. A god in the latest temple was of the same form as when represented on monuments of the earliest date; and King Menes would have recognised Amen, or Osiris, in a Ptolemaic or a Roman sanctuary. In sacred subjects the law was inflexible; and religion, which has frequently done so much for the development and direction of taste in sculpture, had the effect of fettering the genius of Egyptian artists. No improvements, resulting from experience and observation, were admitted in the mode of drawing the human figure; to copy nature was not allowed; it was therefore useless to study it, and no attempt was made to give the proper action to the limbs. Certain rules, certain models, had been established by the priesthood; and the faulty conceptions of ignorant times were copied and perpetuated by every successive artist. For, as Plato and Synesius say, the Egyptian sculptors were not suffered to attempt anything contrary to the regulations laid down regarding the figures of the gods; they were forbidden to introduce any change, or to invent new subjects and habits; and thus the art, and the rules which bound it, always remained the same.
Egyptian bas-relief appears to have been, in its origin, a mere copy of painting, its predecessor. The first attempt to represent the figures of gods, sacred emblems, and other subjects consisted in drawing, or painting, simple outlines of them on a flat surface, the details being afterwards put in with colour; but in process of time these forms were traced on stone with a tool, and the intermediate space between the various figures being afterwards cut away, the once level surface assumed the appearance of a bas-relief. It was, in fact, a pictorial representation on stone, which is evidently the character of all the bas-reliefs on Egyptian monuments; and which readily accounts for the imperfect arrangement of their figures.
Deficient in conception, and above all in a proper knowledge of grouping, they were unable to form those combinations which give true expression; every picture was made up of isolated parts, put together according to some general notions, but without harmony, or preconceived effect. The human face, the whole body, and everything they introduced, were composed in the same manner of separate members placed together one by one according to their relative situations: the eye, the nose, and other features composed a face, but the expression of feelings and passions was entirely wanting; and the countenance of the king, whether charging an enemy’s phalanx in the heat of battle, or peaceably offering incense in a sombre temple, presented the same outline and the same inanimate look. The peculiarity of the front view of an eye, introduced in a profile, is thus accounted for: it was the ordinary representation of that feature added to a profile, and no allowance was made for any change in the position of the head.
It was the same with drapery: the figure was first drawn, and the drapery then added, not as part of the whole, but as an accessory; they had no general conception, no previous idea of the effect required to distinguish the warrior or the priest, beyond the impressions received from costume, or from the subject of which they formed a part; and the same figure was dressed according to the character it was intended to perform. Every portion of a picture was conceived by itself, and inserted as it was wanted to complete the scene; and when the walls of the building, where a subject was to be drawn, had been accurately ruled with squares, the figures were introduced, and fitted to this mechanical arrangement. The members were appended to the body, and these squares regulated their form and distribution, in whatever posture they might be placed.
The proportions of the human figure did not continue always the same. During the IVth and other early dynasties it differed from that of the Augustan age of the XVIIIth and XIXth; and another change took place under the Ptolemies. The chief alteration was in the height of the knee from the ground, which was higher during the XVIIIth and XIXth than in the ancient and later periods. The whole height of the figure in bas-reliefs and paintings was then divided into nineteen parts; and the wall having been ruled in squares, according to its intended size, all the parts of it were put in according to their established positions; the knee, for instance, falling on the sixth line. But the length of the foot was not, as in Greece, the standard from which they reckoned; for being equal to 3 spaces, it could not be taken as the base of 19; though the height of the foot being 1 might answer for the unit.
In the paintings of the tombs greater license was allowed in the representation of subjects relating to private life, the trades, or the manners and occupations of the people; and some indication of perspective in the position of the figures may occasionally be observed: but the attempt was imperfect, and, probably, to an Egyptian eye, unpleasing; for such is the force of habit, that even where nature is copied, a conventional style is sometimes preferred to a more accurate representation.
In the representation of animals, they appear not to have been restricted to the same rigid style; but genius once cramped can scarcely be expected to make any great effort to rise, or to succeed in the attempt; and the same union of parts into a whole, the same preference for profile, and the same stiff action, are observable in these as in the human figure. Seldom did they attempt to draw the face in front, either of men or animals; and when this was done, it fell far short of the profile, and was composed of the same juxtaposition of parts. It must, however, be allowed, that in general the character and form of animals were admirably portrayed; the parts were put together with greater truth; and the same conventionality was not maintained, as in the shoulders and other portions of the human body.
The mode of representing men and animals in profile is primitive, and characteristic of the commencement of art: the first attempts made by an uncivilised people are confined to it; and until the genius of artists bursts forth, this style continues to hold its ground. From its simplicity it is readily understood; the most inexperienced perceive the object intended to be represented, and no effort is required to comprehend it. Hence it is that, though few combinations can be made under such restrictions, those few are perfectly intelligible.
As the wish to record events gave the first, religion gave the second, impulse to sculpture. The simple pillar of wood or stone, which was originally chosen to represent the deity, afterwards assumed the human form, the noblest image of the power that created it; though the Hermæ of Greece were not, as some have thought, the origin of statues, but were borrowed from the mummy-shaped gods of Egypt.
Pausanias thinks that “all statues were in ancient times of wood, particularly those made in Egypt”; but this must have been at a period so remote as to be far beyond the known history of that country; though it is probable that when the arts were in their infancy, the Egyptians were confined to statues of that kind; and they occasionally erected wooden figures in their temples, even till the times of the latter Pharaohs.
Long after men had attempted to make out the parts of the figure, statues continued to be very rude; the arms were placed directly down the sides to the thighs, and the legs were united together; nor did they pass beyond this imperfect state in Greece until the age of Dædalus. Fortunately for themselves and for the world, the Greeks were allowed to free themselves from old habits; while the Egyptians, at the latest periods, continued to follow the imperfect models of their early artists, and were forever prevented from arriving at excellence in sculpture: and though they made great progress in other branches of art, though they evinced considerable taste in the forms of their vases, their furniture, and even in some architectural details, they were forever deficient in ideal beauty, and in the mode of representing the natural positions of the human figure.
In Egypt, the prescribed automaton character of the figures effectually prevented all advancement in the statuary’s art, the limbs being straight, without any attempt at action, or, indeed, any indication of life: they were really statues of the person they represented, not the person “living in marble”; in which they differed entirely from those of Greece. No statue of a warrior was sculptured in the varied attitudes of attack and defence; no wrestler, no discobolus, no pugilist exhibited the grace, the vigour, or the muscular action of a man; nor were the beauties, the feeling, and the elegance of female forms displayed in stone: all was made to conform to the same invariable model, which confined the human figure to a few conventional postures.
A sitting statue, whether of a man or woman, was represented with the hands placed upon the knees, or held across the breast; a kneeling figure sometimes supported a small shrine or sacred emblem; and when standing, the arms were placed directly down the sides of the thighs, one foot (and that always the left) being advanced beyond the other, as if in the attitude of walking, but without any attempt to separate the legs.
The oldest Egyptian sculptures on all large monuments were in low relief, and, as usual at every period, painted (obelisks and everything carved in hard stone, some funereal tablets, and other small objects, being in intaglio); and this style continued in vogue until the time of Ramses II, who introduced intaglio very generally on large monuments; and even his battle scenes at Karnak and the Memnonium are executed in this manner. The reliefs were little raised above the level of the wall; they had generally a flat surface with the edges softly rounded off, far surpassing the intaglio in effect; and it is to be regretted that the best epoch of art, when design and execution were in their zenith, should have abandoned a style so superior; which, too, would have improved in proportion to the advancement of that period.
Intaglio continued to be generally employed, until the accession of the XXVIth Dynasty, when the low relief was again introduced; and in the monuments of Psamthek and Aahmes are numerous instances of the revival of the ancient style. This was afterwards universally adopted, and a return to intaglio on large monuments was only occasionally attempted, in the Ptolemaic and Roman periods.
After the accession of the XXVIth Dynasty some attempt was made to revive the arts, which had been long neglected; and independent of the patronage of government, the wealth of private individuals was liberally employed in their encouragement. Public buildings were erected in many parts of Egypt, and beautified with rich sculpture; the city of Saïs, the royal residence of the Pharaohs of that dynasty, was adorned with the utmost magnificence; and extensive additions were made to the temples of Memphis, and even to those of the distant Thebes.
The fresh impulse thus given to art was not without effect; the sculptures of that period exhibit an elegance and beauty which might even induce some to consider them equal to the productions of an earlier age; and in the tombs of Assassif, at Thebes, are many admirable specimens of Egyptian art. To those, however, who understand the true feeling of this peculiar school, it is evident that though in minuteness and finish they are deserving of the highest commendation, yet in grandeur of conception and in boldness of execution, they fall far short of the sculptures of Seti and the second Ramses.
The skill of the Egyptian artists in drawing bold and clear outlines is, perhaps, more worthy of admiration than anything connected with this branch of art; and in no place is the freedom of their drawing more conspicuous than in the figures in the unfinished part of Belzoni’s tomb at Thebes. It was in the drawing alone that they excelled, being totally ignorant of the correct mode of colouring a figure; and their painting was not an imitation of nature, but merely the harmonious combination of certain hues, which they well understood. Indeed, to this day, the harmony of positive colours is thoroughly felt in Egypt and the East; and it is strange to find the little perception of it in northern Europe, where theories take upon themselves to explain to the mind what the eye has not yet learned, as if a grammar could be written before the language is understood.
Egyptian architecture evidently derived much from the imitation of different natural productions, as palm trees and various plants of the country; but Egyptian columns were not borrowed from the wooden supports of the earliest buildings. Columns were not introduced into the interior of their houses until architecture had made very great progress; the small original temple and the primitive dwelling consisted merely of four walls; and neither the column nor its architrave were borrowed from wooden constructions nor from the house. And though the architrave was derived in Egypt, as elsewhere, from constructed buildings, that member originated in the stone beam, reaching from pillar to pillar in the temples. And if the square stone pillar was used in the quarry, the stone architrave was unknown to the Egyptians until they found reason to increase the size of, and add a portico to, their temples. And that the portico was neither a necessary nor an original part of their temples is plainly shown by the smaller sanctuaries being built, even at the latest times, without it. Some members of Egyptian architecture, it is true, were derived from the woodwork of the primitive house or temple, as the overhanging cornice and the torus that runs up the ends of the walls, which it separates from the cornice, the former being the projecting roof of palm branches, and the other the framework of reeds bound together, which secured the mud (or bricks) composing the walls.
As painted decoration preceded sculpture, the ornaments (in later times carved in stone) were at first represented in colour, and the mouldings of Egyptian monuments were then merely painted on the flat surfaces of the walls and pillars. The next step was to chisel them in relief. The lotus blossom, the papyrus head, water-plants, the palm tree, and the head of a goddess, were among the usual ornaments of a cornice, or a pillar; and these favourite devices of ancient days continued in after times to be repeated in relief, when an improved style of art had substituted sculpture for the mere painted representation. But when the square pillar had been gradually converted into a polygonal shape, the ornamental devices not having room enough upon its narrow facettes, led to the want and invention of another form of column; and from that time a round shaft was surmounted by the palm-tree capital, or by the blossom or the bud of the papyrus, which had hitherto only been painted, or represented in relief, upon the flat surfaces of a square pillar. Hence the origin of new orders differing so widely from the polygonal column.
For the capitals the Egyptians frequently selected objects which were favourites with them, as the lotus and other flowers, and these, as well as various animals or their heads, were adopted, to form a cornice, particularly in their houses and tombs, or to ornament fancy articles of furniture and of dress.
In this they committed an error, which the Greeks, with a finer perception of taste and adaptability, rightly avoided. These refined people knew that in architecture conventional devices had a much more pleasing effect than objects merely copied from nature; for, besides the incongruity of an actual representation of flowers to compose mouldings and other decorative parts of architecture, the imperfect imitation in an unsuitable material has a bad effect.
The ceilings of Egyptian temples were painted blue and studded with stars, to represent the firmament (as in early European churches); and on the part over the central passage, through which the king and the religious processions passed, were vultures and other emblems; the winged globe always having its place over the doorways. The whole building, as well as its sphinxes and other accessories, were richly painted; and though a person unaccustomed to see the walls of a large building so decorated, might suppose the effect to be far from pleasing, no one who understands the harmony of colours will fail to admit that they perfectly understood their distribution and proper combinations, and that an Egyptian temple was greatly improved by the addition of painted sculptures.
Gilding was employed in the decoration of some of the ornamental details of the building; and was laid on a purple ground, to give it greater richness; an instance of which may be seen in the larger temple at Kalabshi, in Nubia. It was sparingly employed, and not allowed to interfere, by an undue quantity, with the effect of the other colours; which they knew well how to introduce in their proper proportions; and such discords as light green and strawberry-and-cream were carefully avoided.
The Egyptians showed considerable taste in the judicious arrangement of colours for decorative purposes; they occasionally succeeded in form, as in the shapes of many of their vases, their furniture, and their ornaments; and they had still greater knowledge of proportion, so necessary for their gigantic monuments; but though they knew well how to give to their buildings the effect of grandeur, vastness, and durability, they had little idea of the beautiful; and were far behind the Greeks in the appreciation of form. It is, however, rare to find any people who combine colour, form, and proportion; and even the Greeks occasionally failed to attain perfection in their beautiful vases, some of which are faulty in the handles and the foot.
Among the peculiarities of Egyptian architecture, one of the most important is the studied avoidance of uniformity in the arrangement of the columns, and many of the details. Of these some are evident to the eye, others are only intended to have an influence on the general effect, and are not perceptible without careful examination. Thus the capitals of the columns in the great hall at Karnak are at different heights, some extending lower down the shaft than others; evidently with a view to correct the sameness of symmetrical repetition, and to avoid fatiguing the sight with too much regularity. This is not to be perceived until the eye is brought on a level with the lower part of the capitals; and its object was only effect, like that of many curved lines introduced in a Greek temple, as at the Parthenon.
But the Egyptians often carried their dislike of uniformity to an extreme, beyond even what is justified by the study of variety. Where they avoided that extreme their motive was legitimate; and it is remarkable that they were the first people whose monuments offer instances of that diversity so characteristic of Saracenic and Gothic architecture.
The arch was employed in Egypt at a very early period; and crude brick arches were in common use in roofing tombs at least as early as Amenhotep I, in the sixteenth century before our era. And since one was discovered at Thebes bearing his name, others have been found of the age of Tehutimes III (his fourth successor) and of Ramses V. It even seems to have been known in the time of the XIIth Dynasty, judging from what appear to be vaulted granaries at Beni-Hasan.[b]
Egyptian architecture was long a marvel to the later world, since it was so thoroughly overscrolled with strange designs of animals, and gods, and symbols that provoked a helpless curiosity. These figures, graceful as they were, were not of merely decorative import. They were less art than literature; less literature than chronicle: in a word, they were the characters of a strange system of writing.
THE HIEROGLYPHICS
It is extremely difficult to give in brief space, or, indeed, to give at all, a clear idea of the exact character of this Egyptian writing, which for so many centuries fascinated, while puzzling, the observers, utterly baffling all their efforts to decipher it. The Egyptians were the aristocrats of antiquity. It is true that the Greeks described all non-Hellenic nations as barbarians, but it should not be inferred from this that the Greeks applied to this term the exact significance it has come to have in more recent times. What the Greek really seems to have implied was that the speech of all other nations was barbarous or unintelligible; but he by no means regarded all other nations as less civilised than himself. To be sure, he did hold this attitude towards Romans, Persians, Scythians and various other contemporary nations, but he made an exception in the case of the Babylonians, and particularly in the case of the Egyptians. The latter people, indeed, he regarded with something akin to reverence, as a people who could claim an antiquity of civilisation to which Greece could not at all pretend.
The wise men of Greece, as we have seen, travelled in Egypt and sat at the feet of the Egyptian priests. There is nothing to show that they were not received courteously, but there are many evidences that they were given no more than a half-hearted welcome, and that what they gained of Egyptian lore was but a surface knowledge; for the Egyptians, like the Greeks, regarded all other nations as barbarians, and it would seem that they applied this term with the full weight of its modern meaning. To them the Greeks, no less than their other neighbours, were uninteresting parvenus, unworthy of the serious regard of an aristocratic people. It is believed that in the early days all commerce of outside nations with Egypt was as fully interdicted as could be done by Egyptian laws. At a later period the outsiders made forcible intrusion, and, in time, apparently the Egyptians became partially reconciled to this new order of things. But it was long before any scholars from the outer world were permitted to penetrate the Egyptian mysteries. In particular, we have no evidence that any Greek or Roman of the early day ever had the slightest comprehension of the true character of Egyptian writing.
Listen for example to the strange theories of Claudius Ælianus, the Roman historian of the third century, who solemnly explained the hieroglyphics as follows--to quote the quaint diction of a sixteenth century translation:[a]
“BY WHAT CHARACTERS, PICTURES, AND IMAGES, THE LEARNED EGIPTIANS EXPRESSED THE MYSTERIES OF THEIR MINDES
“When they would signifie wrathe and fury, they set downe the image of a Lyon. When they would signifie talke, they set downe the figure of a toung. When they would signifie fleshly pleasure, they set down the number of XVI. When they would signifie lerning, they set down the picture of Dew dropping from the clowdes. By a Kat they meane destruction. By a Flye, they meane shamelesnes. By the Ant running into the Corne, they meane provision. By a man walking in water without a hed, they meane a thing unpossible. By a swarme of Bees following the maister Bee, they signifie obedient subjects. By a man hiding his privy members with his hands, they meane Temperance. By the floures of Poppy, they signifie sicknes. By an armed man shooting in a Bowe of steele, they meane Rebellion. By an Eagle flying against the Sun, they meane windy weather. By an Owle standing uppon a tree, they signifie death. By a Lace tyed in many knots, they meane mutual Love. By Bookes and Scrowles, they meane Auncientnes. By a Ladder set against a Castle wall, they meane a seedge about a Town or a Fortresse. By a Mule, they signifie a Woman with a barrain wombe. By a Mole, they meane blindnesse. By a Lapwing sitting uppon a Cluster of Grapes, they meane a plentiful Vintage. By a Sceptre and an eye on the top thereof looking downwarde, they meane power and polisie. By a Spindle ful of thred broken of from the Distaf, they mean the shortnes of mans life.”[e]
This is very absurd, yet nothing more rational was known of the subject in classical times. The very name which the Greeks supplied to the strange Egyptian script shows their ignorance of it. They called it hieroglyphics, from ἱερός, sacred, γλύφειν, to carve, implying their belief that this writing was purely of a sacred character, which, it is now well known, is by no means the case. It would seem as if in the later day, when, after the death of Alexander, Egypt came under the rule of the Macedonian Ptolemies, there must have been Greeks who acquired a knowledge of the Egyptian writing, just as there were undoubtedly Egyptians who learned Greek. Yet the number of these was probably more limited than one might suppose, for the Greeks were the Frenchmen of antiquity; imbued with a reverential love of their own language, they were little given to acquiring any other. Even so, it would seem that there must have been, here and there, an inquiring mind, which would take up the study of the hieroglyphics and ferret out their secrets under the guidance of Egyptian tutors; but if such there were, few records of their accomplishments have come down to us, and none at all that can serve to give the slightest clew to the true character of the strange inscriptions.
About the beginning of our era, Egypt having become a Roman province, all its personal life was stamped out. The hieroglyphic language was no longer written or read. Long before that, the language of the people had been greatly modified from its ancient purity, and in the day of Egypt’s greatness it was only the scholarly few, chiefly the priests, who could read and write the language. Now the speech became still further modified, until finally, through the slow mutations of time, modern Coptic has developed as its lineal descendant. In the early days, however,--probably before the time of the oldest extant records,--the original picture writing, or hieroglyphics proper, had been modified into a sort of running script, which the Greeks called hieratic; and this again had undergone another modification some four or five centuries before our era, in the development of a script, called enchorial or demotic, which in the day of the Ptolemies represented the language of the Egyptian people. But after the complete disruption of Egypt under the Romans, the hieratic and demotic forms of the writing, as well as the hieroglyphics proper, ceased to be employed; and presently, as has been said, all three forms became quite unintelligible to any person living. From that time on, until the early days of the nineteenth century, the records of Egypt, preserved so numerously on their monuments, on the papyrus rolls and mummy-cases, were a closed book. No man lived, during this period, in Egypt or out of Egypt, who did more than effect the crudest guess at the meaning of this strange writing.
For something like two thousand years the Egyptian language was a dead language in the fullest sense of the term, and the records, locked imperishably in the hieroglyphics, seemed likely to hold their mysterious secret from the prying minds of all generations of men. But then, in the early days of the nineteenth century, the key was unexpectedly found, and, to the delight of the scholarly world, the Egyptian Pandora box was opened.[a]
THE RIDDLE OF THE SPHINX
This came about through a study of the famous Rosetta stone, an Egyptian monument now preserved in the British Museum. On this stone three sets of inscriptions are recorded. The upper one, occupying about a fourth of the surface, is a pictured scroll, made up of chains of those strange outlines of serpents, hawks, lions, and so on, which are recognised, even by the least initiated, as hieroglyphics. The middle inscription, made up of lines, angles, and half-pictures, one might suppose to be a sort of abbreviated or shorthand hieroglyphic. It is called the enchorial or demotic character. The third, or lower, inscription is manifestly Greek. It is now known that these three inscriptions are renderings of the same message, and that this message is a “decree of the Priests of Memphis conferring divine honours on Ptolemy V, Epiphanes, King of Egypt, B.C. 195.”
“This stone was found by the French in 1798 among the ruins of Fort St. Julian, near the Rosetta mouth of the Nile. It passed into the hands of the British by the treaty of Alexandria, and was deposited in the British Museum in the year 1801.”
The value of the Rosetta stone depended on the fact that it gave promise, even when originally inspected, of furnishing a key to the centuries-old mystery of the hieroglyphics. For two thousand years the secret of these strange markings had been forgotten. Nowhere in the world--quite as little in Egypt as elsewhere--had any man the slightest clew to their meaning; there were even those who doubted whether these droll picturings really had any specific meaning, questioning whether they were not merely vague symbols of esoteric religious import and nothing more. And it was the Rosetta stone that gave the answer to these doubters, and restored to the world a lost language and a forgotten literature.
The trustees of the British Museum recognised that the problem of the Rosetta stone was one on which the scientists of the world might well exhaust their ingenuity, and they promptly published to the world a carefully lithographed copy of the entire inscription, so that foreign scholarship had equal opportunity with British to try to solve the riddle. How difficult a riddle it was, even with this key in hand, is illustrated by the fact that, though scholars of all nations brought their ingenuity to bear upon it, nothing more was accomplished for a dozen years than to give authority to three or four guesses regarding the nature of the upper inscriptions, which, as it afterwards proved, were quite incorrect and altogether misleading. This in itself is sufficient to show that ordinary scholarship might have studied the Rosetta stone till the end of time without getting far on the track of its secrets. The key was there, but to apply it required the inspired insight--that is to say, the shrewd guessing power--of genius.
The man who undertook the task had perhaps the keenest scientific imagination and the most versatile profundity of knowledge of his generation--one is tempted to say, of all generations. For he was none other than the extraordinary Dr. Thomas Young, the demonstrator of the vibratory nature of light.
Young had his attention called to the Rosetta stone by accident, and his usual rapacity for knowledge at once led him to speculate as to the possible aid this trilingual inscription might give in the solution of Egyptian problems. Resolving at once to attempt the solution himself, he set to work to learn Coptic, which was rightly believed to represent the nearest existing approach to the ancient Egyptian language. His amazing facility in the acquisition of languages stood him in such good stead that within a year of his first efforts he had mastered Coptic, had assured himself that the ancient Egyptian language was really similar to it, and had even made a tentative attempt at the translation of the Egyptian scroll. His results were only tentative, to be sure. Yet they constituted the very beginnings of our knowledge regarding the meaning of hieroglyphics. Just how far they carried, has been a subject of ardent controversy ever since. Not that there is any doubt about the specific facts; what is questioned is the exact importance of these facts. For it is undeniable that Young did not complete and perfect the discovery, and, as always in such matters, there is opportunity for difference of opinion as to the share of credit due to each of the workers who entered into the discovery.
Young’s specific discoveries were these: (1) that many of the pictures of the hieroglyphics stand for the names of the objects actually delineated; (2) that other pictures are sometimes only symbolic; (3) that plural numbers are represented by repetition; (4) that numerals are represented by dashes; (5) that hieroglyphics may read either from the right or from the left, but always from the direction in which the animals and human figures face; (6) that proper names are surrounded by a graven oval ring, making what he called a cartouche; (7) that the cartouches of the preserved portion of the Rosetta stone stand for the name of Ptolemy alone; (8) that the presence of a female figure after such cartouches, in other inscriptions, always denotes the female sex; (9) that within the cartouches the hieroglyphic symbols have a positively phonetic value, either alphabetic or syllabic, and (10) that several different characters may have the same phonetic value.
Just what these phonetic values are, Dr. Young pointed out in the case of fourteen characters, representing nine sounds, six of which are accepted to-day as correctly representing the letters to which he ascribed them, and the three others as being correct regarding their essential or consonantal element. It is clear, therefore, that he was on the right track thus far, and on the very verge of complete discovery. But, unfortunately, he failed to take the next step, which would have been to realise that the phonetic values given to the characters within the cartouches were often ascribed to them also when used in the general text of an inscription; in other words, that the use of an alphabet was not confined to proper names. This was the great secret which Young missed, but which his French successor, Jean François Champollion, working on the foundation that Young had laid, was enabled to ferret out.
Young’s initial studies of the Rosetta stone were made in 1814; his later publications bore date of 1819. Champollion’s first announcement of results came in 1822; his second and more important one in 1824. By this time, through study of the cartouches of other inscriptions, he had made out almost the complete alphabet, and the “Riddle of the Sphinx” was practically solved. He proved that the Egyptians had developed a relatively complete alphabet (mostly neglecting the vowels, as early Semitic alphabets did also) centuries before the Phœnicians were heard of in history. What relation this alphabet bore to the Phœnician, we shall have occasion to ask in another connection; for the moment it suffices to know that these strange pictures of the Egyptian scroll are really letters.
Even this statement, however, must in a measure be modified. These pictures are letters and something more. Some of them are purely alphabetical in character, and some are symbolic in another way. Some characters represent syllables. Others stand sometimes as mere representatives of sounds, and again, in a more extended sense, as representatives of things, such as all hieroglyphics doubtless were in the beginning. In a word, this is an alphabet, but not a perfected alphabet such as modern nations are accustomed to; hence the enormous difficulties and complications it presented to the early investigators.
Champollion did not live to clear up all the mysteries of the hieroglyphics. His work was taken up and extended by his pupil Rosellini, and in particular by Richard Lepsius in Germany; followed by M. Renouf, and by Samuel Birch, of the British Museum, and more recently by such well-known Egyptologists as MM. Maspero, Mariette, and Chabas, in France; Drs. Brugsch, Meyer, and Erman in Germany; Dr. E. A. Wallis Budge, the present head of the Department of Oriental Antiquities at the British Museum, and Professor W. M. Flinders Petrie. But the work of later investigators has been largely one of exhumation and translation of records, rather than of finding methods.
Let us now turn more specifically to the writing itself. A glance shows that the objects delineated are, as might be expected, those which were familiar to the people that originated the writing. Here we see Egyptian hawks, serpents, ibises, and the like, and the human figure, depicted in the crude yet graphic way characteristic of Egyptian art. But in addition to these familiar figures there are numerous conventionalised designs. These also, there is reason to believe, were originally representations of familiar objects, but, for convenience of rendering, the pictures have been supplanted by conventionalised designs. It is now known that this writing of the Egyptians was of a most extraordinary compound character. Part of its pictures are used as direct representations of the objects presented. But let us examine some examples:
But, again, the picture of an object may stand for some idea symbolised by that object, thus becoming an ideograph, as in the following instances:
Here the sacred ibis or the sacred bull symbolises the soul. The bee stands for honey, the eyes for the verb “to see.”
Yet again the Egyptian pictures may stand neither as pictures of things, nor as ideographs, but as having the phonetic value of a syllable.
Such syllabic signs may be used either singly, as above, or in combination, as we shall see illustrated in a moment.
But one other stage of evolution is possible; namely, the use of signs with a purely alphabetical significance. The Egyptians made this step also, and their strangely conglomerate writing makes use of the following alphabet:
In a word, then, the Egyptian writing has passed through all the stages of development, from the purely pictorial to the alphabetical, but with this strange qualification--that while advancing to the later stages it retains the use of the crude earlier forms. As Canon Taylor has graphically phrased it, the Egyptian writing is a completed structure, but one from which the scaffolding has not been removed.
The next step would have been to remove the now useless scaffolding, leaving a purely alphabetical writing as the completed structure. Looking at the matter from the modern standpoint, it seems almost incredible that so intelligent a people as the Egyptians should have failed to make this advance. Yet the facts stand, that as early as the time of the Pyramid Builders, say 4000 years B.C., the Egyptians had made the wonderful analysis of sounds without which the invention of an alphabet would be impossible. They had set aside certain of their hieroglyphic symbols and given them alphabetical significance. They had learned to write their words with the use of this alphabet; and it would seem as if, in the course of a few generations, they must come to see how unnecessary was the cruder form of picture writing which this alphabet would naturally supplant; but in point of fact they never did come to a realisation of this seemingly simple proposition. Generation after generation, and century after century, they continued to use their same cumbersome, complex writing, and it remained for an outside nation to prove that an alphabet pure and simple was capable of fulfilling all the conditions of a written language.
Thus in practice there is found in the hieroglyphics the strangest combination of ideographs, syllabic signs, and alphabetical signs or true letters, used together indiscriminately.
It was, for example, not at all unusual after spelling a word syllabically or alphabetically to introduce a figure giving the idea of the thing intended, and then even to supplement this with a so-called determinative sign or figure:
Here qeften, monkey, is spelled out in full, but the picture of a monkey is added as a determinative; second, qenu, cavalry, after being spelled is made unequivocal by the introduction of a picture of a horse; third, temati, wings, though spelled elaborately, has pictures of wings added; and fourth, tatu, quadrupeds, after being spelled, has a picture of a quadruped, and then the picture of a hide, which is the usual determinative of a quadruped, followed by three dashes to indicate the plural number.
These determinatives are in themselves so interesting, as illustrations of the association of ideas, that it is worth while to add a few more examples. The word pet, which signifies “heaven,” and which has also the meaning “up” or “even,” is represented primarily by what may be supposed to be a conventionalised picture of the covering to the earth. But this picture used as a determinative is curiously modified in the expression of other ideas, as it symbolises “evening” when a closed flower is added, and “night” when a star hangs in the sky, and “rain or tempest” when a series of zigzag lines, which by themselves represent water, are appended.
As aids to memory such pictures are obviously of advantage, but this advantage, in the modern view, is outweighed by the cumbrousness of the system of writing as a whole.
Why was such a complex system retained? Chiefly, no doubt, because the Egyptians, like all other highly developed peoples, were conservatives. They held to their old method after a better one had been invented, just as half the Western world to-day holds to an antiquated system of weights and measures after a far simpler system of decimals has been introduced. But this inherent conservatism was enormously aided, no doubt, by the fact that the Egyptian language, like the Chinese, has many words that have a varied significance, making it seem necessary, or at least highly desirable, either to spell such words with different signs, or, having spelled them in the same way, to introduce the varied determinatives.
Here are some examples of discrimination between words of the same sound by the use of different signs:
Here, it will be observed, exactly the same expedient is adopted which we still retain when we discriminate between words of the same sound by different spelling, as, to, two, too; whole, hole; through, threw, etc.
But the more usual Egyptian method was to resort to determinatives; the results seem to us most extraordinary. After what has been said, the following examples will explain themselves:
It goes without saying that the great mass of people in Egypt were never able to write at all. Had they been accustomed to do so, the Egyptians would have been a nation of artists. Even as the case stands, a remarkable number of men must have had their artistic sense considerably developed, for the birds, animals, and human figures constantly presented on their hieroglyphic scrolls are drawn with a degree of fidelity which the average European of to-day would certainly find far beyond his skill.[d]
LITERATURE
The literary remains of Egypt have come to us through two channels, one of these being the inscriptions on walls and monuments, to which reference has just been made, and the other the papyrus rolls that constituted books proper. Of course the main body of the monumental inscriptions can only by courtesy be said to belong to the literature of the country. For the most part they are records of political and religious affairs such as hardly come within the domain of literature. On the other hand, there are certain examples of a more distinctly literary character.
One of the most important illustrations of this class of inscription is a poem which recounts certain of the deeds of Ramses the Great, in particular the great fight which this monarch made against the Kheta or Hittites. We have quoted it in the chapter devoted to Ramses II. There are other monumental inscriptions that have a purely historical character, inasmuch as they give lists of names of the kings of the various dynasties. Unfortunately, no one of these chronological inscriptions is complete. The same is true of the most important historical document on papyrus--a document known as the Turin papyrus because it is preserved in the museum in that city. It is worth noting, however, that these chronological lists, as far as they go, tend to support the list of Manetho, to which reference has previously been made. These lists of Manetho, it will be recalled, have come down to us only through certain excerpts made by Josephus and others, the original work having been lost in its entirety. But a comparison of these lists at second-hand with the original Egyptian documents has shown, as Professor Petrie remarks, what a real history the work of Manetho must have been, and how great a deprivation its loss is to the modern historian.
The papyrus rolls on which most of the literary remains of Egypt are inscribed are true books. The book of folded leaves is a comparatively modern invention. Throughout antiquity, including the classical times, the roll constituted the only form of book in use, unless, indeed, we include waxen tablets, which are hardly to be considered books in the proper sense of the word; at least it is not known that they were ever used for the transcription of lengthy works to be placed on sale, though it is probable that authors used them, at least for the rough drafts of their compositions. It is well known that in later classical times the parchment roll came to be substituted for the roll of papyrus, though the latter held its own for a long time, and was still employed exceptionally in the Middle Ages; but the old Egyptian parchment was unknown, and though inscriptions were sometimes made on pieces of linen, the regular material for book-making was papyrus.
The papyrus sheet was made by gluing together pieces of the outer rind or bark of the stem of the papyrus plant, these pieces being placed in two layers and dried under pressure. The sheets of papyrus were from six or eight to about fourteen inches in width, and were often many feet in length. The inscription, made with a reed pen, not altogether unlike a modern quill, was written in columns at right angles to the length of the papyrus sheet, these columns being of varying width, but usually of a size convenient for the scribe in writing and for the reader. If we may judge from a statue that has been preserved, the scribe at work sat with his feet crossed like a modern tailor. Papyrus is, of course, a very fragile and perishable substance; therefore it is only in the dry climate of Egypt that documents of this nature are likely to be preserved. Thanks to the unusual atmosphere of Egypt, however, large numbers of these documents have come down to us, some of them dating from the third millennium B.C. These documents represent various classes of literature. Of historical writings, the most important is the Turin papyrus, already referred to. A still more ancient document is known as the Prisse papyrus, being named after its discoverer, Prisse d’Avenne. Is is virtually a series of essays containing moral precepts and dissertations on the art of right living. Aside from its contents, this particular papyrus roll has unusual interest because it shows us the hieratic writing of the Egyptians in its oldest known form, the hieratic character being a much modified cursive form of hieroglyphic simplified in the interest of rapid writing. It was believed by the French philologist, De Rougé, that this hieratic character formed the basis of the Phœnician alphabet, and a large number of scholars have accepted this conclusion, which, however, is now seemingly about to be abandoned. Other essays of the Egyptians, on medical and mathematical subjects, have been preserved in considerable numbers.
There is yet another form of literary production that is abundantly represented among the papyrus documents. This is the religious work known as the Book of the Dead, a book that was substantially the Bible of the Egyptians, numerous copies of which in whole or in part are still in existence. An additional interest attaches to many copies of the Book of the Dead in the fact that pictures are introduced to illustrate the narrative. One is prone to think of book illustration as a relatively modern art; but in point of fact, as these documents prove, it is an art that was practised by the ancient Egyptians more than two thousand years before the Christian era.
From a purely literary standpoint, the most important remains preserved on papyrus are the various more or less perfect copies of romances and of poems. The romances are somewhat of the character of what we should call fairy tales, though elements of realism are not lacking in some of them; and the poems include love songs and other lyrics. It is extremely difficult to judge the artistic merits of productions in so alien a tongue, and it has been noted by Egyptologists that certain recitals were apparently very popular in Egypt, the merits of which are lost upon the modern interpreter, because even the greatest of modern students can hardly claim a degree of proficiency in the language that suffices for the appreciation of the niceties of usage. There are certain of the tales and poems, however, which in point of conception, thought, and construction must be admitted to have conspicuous merit, even when judged by modern standards.
As soon as the tales of ancient Egypt had been recovered in sufficient number to allow some idea of its popular literature, it was seen that stories of travel and adventure formed a considerable portion. But for a long time no tale of the sea came to light. In fact, it seemed doubtful that such a one existed. The Greek and Latin writings constantly reiterate the statement that the Egyptians regarded the sea as impure, and that none would venture on it of his own will, and upon this authority modern investigators had a well-formed theory that Egypt never had a navy or native sailors.
To them Queen Hatshepsu’s voyages of exploration and the naval victories of Ramses III were the deeds of hired Phœnicians. But the discovery of a tale at St. Petersburg--a tale which takes us far back to the XIIth Dynasty, before any Phœnicians had yet appeared on the shores of the Mediterranean, or Egypt had any thought of Syrian conquest--tends to upset these old ideas, and lead us to the belief that the sailors whom Pharaoh sent for the perfumes and goods of Arabia were native born Egyptians.
The tale of The Castaway was discovered in the Imperial Hermitage Museum at St. Petersburg by M. Golenischeff in 1880. No one knows where the papyrus was found, or how it got in Russia, or even came to be in the Hermitage Museum. It has taken its place as a classic of the XIIth Dynasty, as that of the Two Brothers is of the XIXth.
On reading it, one immediately thinks of Sindbad the Sailor, except that the serpents it was Sindbad’s fortune to meet were far from being the amiable creatures described by the Egyptian sailor. There is, indeed, no very good reason to consider the famous tale of the Thousand and One Nights as a modern version of the Egyptian narrative. The sailors’ love for the recital of marvellous adventure is too natural, too far-spread, for us to fasten the one upon the other.
The tale of The Castaway seems clearly to be a theological idea dressed up in romance form. The mysterious island is the Isle of the Double, i.e. the home of dead souls, and the serpent is its guardian. The voyage describes the long journey to the other world--that trip on the mysterious western sea, and the final reaching of the home of the soul. The basic conception of the whole thing is typically Egyptian. Perhaps our estimate of Egyptian literature cannot be completed better than by the presentation of the actual text of this romance. Our version is from G. Maspero’s rendering of M. Golenischeff’s translation of the original papyrus in the Imperial Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg.[a]
THE CASTAWAY: A TALE OF THE TWELFTH DYNASTY
The learned attendant said: “Rejoice thy heart, O my chief, for we have just reached the fatherland; after having manned the prow of the ship and worked the oars, the prow has grazed the sand. All our men are rejoicing and embracing each other, for if others beside ourselves have come safely home, not a man among us is missing, and, moreover, we have gone to the farthest limits of Uauat, and have crossed the regions of Senmut. Here we are returned in peace, and here we are back in our fatherland. Listen, O my chief, for if thou dost not uphold me, I have no support. Wash thee, pour water over thy hands, then go, address thyself to Pharaoh, and may thy heart preserve thy speech from confusion, for if a man’s mouth may save him, on the other hand, his words may cause his face to be covered over;[12] act according to the impulse of thy heart, and anything thou mayest say will put me at ease.
“Now I shall relate to thee what happened to me personally. I set out for the mines of Honhem, and went to sea in a ship one hundred and fifty cubits long and forty wide, with one hundred and fifty of the best sailors in the land of Egypt, men who had seen heaven and earth, and whose hearts were stouter than those of lions. They had foretold that the wind would not be unfavourable, or that we would have none at all; but a gust of wind sprang up as soon as we were on the deep, and as we approached the shore, the breeze freshened and stirred the waves to a height of eight cubits. As for myself, I seized a plank, but the rest perished, without one remaining. A wave of the sea threw me upon an island after I had spent three days with no other companion than my own heart. I lay down to rest in a thicket, and darkness enveloped me; then I employed my legs in search of something for my mouth. I found figs and grapes and many kinds of fine vegetables, berries, nuts, melons of all kinds, fish, birds,--nothing was lacking. I satisfied my hunger, and threw away the surplus of what I had gathered. I dug a ditch, lit a fire, and prepared a sacrifice to the gods.
“Suddenly I heard a voice like thunder, caused, as I believed, by a wave of the sea. The trees trembled, the earth shook; I uncovered my face, and saw that a serpent was approaching. He was thirty cubits long, with a beard that hung down for over two cubits; his body was as if incrusted with gold on a colour of lapis lazuli. He planted himself before me, opened his mouth, and while I remained dumbfounded before him, he said:
“‘What has brought thee, what has brought thee, little one, what has brought thee? If thou delayest to tell me what has brought thee to this isle, I will make thee know what thou art; either thou shalt disappear like a flame, or thou shalt tell me something I never before have heard, and which I knew not before.’ Then he seized me in his mouth, carried me to his lair, and laid me down unharmed; I was safe and sound and whole.
“Then he opened his mouth, and while I remained speechless before him, he said, ‘What has brought thee, what has brought thee, little one, to this isle which is in the sea and whose shores are in the midst of the waves?’
“I replied with arms hanging low before him.[13] I said: ‘I embarked for the mines, by Pharaoh’s order, in a ship one hundred and fifty cubits long and forty wide. It was manned by one hundred and fifty of the best sailors of the land of Egypt, who had seen heaven and earth, and whose hearts were stouter than those of the gods. They had declared that the wind would not be unfavourable, or even that there would be none at all, for each one of them surpassed his companions in the prudence of his heart and the strength of his arms, and I, I yielded to them in nothing; but a storm arose while we were on the deep, and as we approached the shore the gale still freshened and threw up the waves to a height of eight cubits. As for myself, I seized a plank, but the rest on the ship perished and not one remained with me during three days. And now here I am with thee, for I was cast on this isle by a wave of the sea.’
“Thereupon he said to me: ‘Fear not, fear not, little one, let not thy face show sorrow. If thou art here with me, it is because God has let thee live. ’Tis he who has brought thee to the Isle of the Double, where nothing is lacking, and which is filled with all good things. Behold; thou shalt pass month after month here until thou hast stayed four months in this isle, then a ship shall come from thy country with sailors; thou mayest then depart with them to thy country and thou shalt die in thy native city. Let us talk and be happy; whosoever enjoys chatting can support misfortune; let me tell thee what there is on this island. I am here surrounded by my brothers and children, together we are seventy-five serpents, children and retainers, without including a young girl whom Fortune sent me, on whom the fire of heaven fell and burnt to ashes. As for thee, if thou art strong and thy heart is patient thou shalt yet press thy children to thy heart and embrace thy wife; thou shalt again behold thy house, and best of all thou shalt reach thy country and be among thy people.’ Then he bowed to me and I touched the ground before him. ‘Now this is what I have to tell thee on this subject, I shall describe thee to Pharaoh and make thy greatness known to him. I shall send thee paint and offertory perfumes,[14] pomades, cinnamon, and incense employed in the temples, the kind that is offered to the gods. I shall also tell all that, thanks to thee, I was enabled to see, and the whole nation together shall give thee thanks. For thee I shall slay asses in sacrifice. I shall pluck birds for thee, and send ships to thee filled with all the marvels of Egypt, as if to a god, friend of men in a distant country which men know not.’
“He smiled at what I said on account of what was on his heart, and said: ‘Thou art not rich in essences, for all that thou hast enumerated unto me is naught after all but incense, while I, I am lord of the land of Punt, and there have I plenty of essences. But the offertory perfume of which thou speakest of sending me is not plentiful in this isle; but when once thou leavest it, never shalt thou see it again, for it shall be changed into waves.’
“And behold the ship appeared as he had predicted. I perched myself upon a high tree to try to distinguish who were on it. I hastened to tell him the news, but found that he knew it already; and he said to me, ‘Good journey, good journey home, little one, let thine eyes rest upon thy children, and may thy name remain fair in thy city--these are my wishes for thee.’ Then I bent before him with low-hanging arms, and he gave me presents of essences, offertory perfume, pomade, cinnamon, thuya, sapan wood, powdered antimony, cypress, ordinary incense in great quantity, elephants’ teeth, greyhounds, baboons, green monkeys, and all kinds of good and precious things. I put all on board the ship that had come, and prostrating myself, I offered him worship. He said to me, ‘Behold, thou shalt arrive in thy country after two months, thou shalt press thy children to thy heart and thou shalt lie in thy tomb.’ And after that I went down to the shore towards the ship and called to the sailors on board. I gave thanks on the shores to the lord of the isle as well as to those who lived upon it.
“When we had come, the second month, to the city of Pharaoh, just as the other had predicted, we drew near the palace. I entered unto Pharaoh, and gave him all the presents I had brought into the country from that island, and he thanked me before the assembled people. That is why he made an attendant of me, and let me join the king’s courtiers. Look upon me, now that I have reached the shore once more, and having seen and undergone so much. Hear my prayer, for it is good to listen to people. Some one said to me, ‘Become a learned man, my friend, thou wilt arrive at honours,’ and behold I have arrived.”
This is taken from beginning to end as it is found in the book. Who has written it is the scribe with nimble fingers. Ameni-Amen-aa, Life, Health, Strength.[c]
FOOTNOTES
[12] Possibly an allusion to the custom of covering the faces of criminals while they were being led to the scaffold. The order, “Cover his face,” was equivalent to a condemnation.--M. MASPERO.
[13] This is the attitude in which the monuments represent suppliants or inferiors before their masters.--MASPERO.
[14] Hakonu was one of the seven canonical oils which were offered to the gods and departed spirits during sacrifice.--MASPERO.