Manual of Egyptian Archaeology and Guide to the Study of Antiquities in Egypt Part 10

The Renaissance did not dawn till near the end of the Ethiopian Dynasty, some three hundred years later. The over-praised statue of Queen Ameniritis[50] (fig. 202) already manifests some noteworthy qualities. The limbs, somewhat long and fragile, are delicately treated; but the head is heavy, being over-weighted by the wig peculiar to G.o.ddesses. Psammetichus I., when his victories had established him upon the throne, busied himself in the restoration of the temples. Under his auspices, the valley of the Nile became one vast studio of painting and sculpture. The art of engraving hieroglyphs attained a high degree of excellence, fine statues and bas- reliefs were everywhere multiplied, and a new school arose. A marvellous command of material, a profound knowledge of detail, and a certain elegance tempered by severity, are the leading characteristics of this new school.

The Memphites preferred limestone; the Thebans selected red or grey granite; but the Sates especially attacked basalt, breccia, and serpentine, and with these fine-grained and almost h.o.m.ogeneous substances, they achieved extraordinary results. They seem to have sought difficulties for the mere pleasure of triumphing over them; and we have proof of the way in which artists of real merit bestowed years and years on the chasing of sarcophagus lids and the carving of statues in blocks of the hardest material. The Theris, and the four monuments from the tomb of Psammetichus[51] in the Gizeh Museum, are the most remarkable objects. .h.i.therto discovered in this cla.s.s of work. Theris[52] (fig. 203) was the especial protectress of maternity, and presided over childbirth. Her portrait was discovered by some native sebakh diggers[53] in the midst of the mounds of the ancient city of Thebes. She was found standing upright in a little chapel of white limestone which had been dedicated to her by one Pibesa, a priest, in the name of Queen Nitocris, daughter of Psammetichus I. This charming hippopotamus, whose figure is perhaps more plump than graceful, is a fine example of difficulties overcome; but I do not know that she has any other merit. The group belonging to Psammetichus has at all events some artistic value. It consists of four pieces of green basalt; namely, a table of offerings, a statue of Osiris, a statue of Nephthys, and a Hathor-cow supporting a statuette of the deceased (fig. 204). All four are somewhat flaccid, somewhat artificial; but the faces of the divinities and the deceased are not wanting in sweetness; the action of the cow is good; and the little figure under her protection falls naturally into its place. Certain other pieces, less known than these, are however far superior. The Sate style is easy of recognition. It lacks the breadth and learning of the first Memphite school; it also lacks the grand, and sometimes rude, manner of the great Theban school. The proportions of the human body are reduced and elongated, and the limbs lose in vigour what they gain in elegance. A noteworthy change in the choice of att.i.tudes will also be remarked. Orientals find repose in postures which would be inexpressibly fatiguing to ourselves. For hours together they will kneel; or sit tailor-wise, with the legs crossed and laid down flat to the ground; or squat, sitting upon their heels, with no other support than is afforded by that part of the sole of the foot which rests upon the ground; or they will sit upon the floor with their legs close together, and their arms crossed upon their knees. These four att.i.tudes were customary among the people from the time of the ancient empire.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 204.--Hathor-cow in green basalt. Sate work.]

This we know from the bas-reliefs. But the Memphite sculptors, deeming the two last ungraceful, excluded them from the domain of art, and rarely, if ever, reproduced them. The "Cross-legged Scribe" of the Louvre and the "Kneeling Scribe" of Gizeh show with what success they could employ the two first. The third was neglected (doubtless for the same reason) by the Theban sculptors. The fourth began to be currently adopted about the time of the Eighteenth Dynasty.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 205.--Squatting statue of Pedishas.h.i.+. Sate work.]

It may be that this position was not in fas.h.i.+on among the moneyed cla.s.ses, which alone could afford to order statues; or it may be that the artists themselves objected to an att.i.tude which caused their sitters to look like square parcels with a human head on the top. The sculptors of the Sate period did not inherit that repugnance. They have at all events combined the action of the limbs in such wise as may least offend the eye, and the position almost ceases to be ungraceful. The heads also are modelled to such perfection that they make up for many shortcomings. That of Pedishas.h.i.+ (fig. 205) has an expression of youth and intelligent gentleness such as we seldom meet with from an Egyptian hand. Other heads, on the contrary, are remarkable for their almost brutal frankness of treatment. In the small head of a scribe (fig. 206), lately purchased for the Louvre, and in another belonging to Prince Ibrahim at Cairo, the wrinkled brow, the crow's-feet at the corners of the eyes, the hard lines about the mouth, and the k.n.o.bs upon the skull, are brought out with scrupulous fidelity. The Sate school was, in fact, divided into two parties. One sought inspiration in the past, and, by a return to the methods of the old Memphite school, endeavoured to put fresh life into the effeminate style of the day. This it accomplished, and so successfully, that its works are sometimes mistaken for the best productions of the Fourth and Fifth Dynasties. The other, without too openly departing from established tradition, preferred to study from the life, and thus drew nearer to nature than in any previous age.

This school would, perhaps, have prevailed, had Egyptian art not been directed into a new channel by the Macedonian conquest, and by centuries of intercourse with the Greeks.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 206.--Head of a scribe. Sate work.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 207.--Colossus of Alexander II.]

The new departure was of slow development. Sculptors began by clothing the successors of Alexander in Egyptian garb and transforming them into Pharaohs, just as they had in olden time transformed the Hyksos and the Persians. Works dating from the reigns of the first Ptolemies scarcely differ from those of the best Sate period, and it is only here and there that we detect traces of Greek influence. Thus, the colossus of Alexander II., at Gizeh (fig. 207), wears a flowing head-dress, from beneath which his crisp curls have found their way. Soon, however, the sight of Greek masterpieces led the Egyptians of Alexandria, of Memphis, and of the cities of the Delta to modify their artistic methods. Then arose a mixed school, which combined certain elements of the national art with certain other elements borrowed from h.e.l.lenic art. The Alexandrian Isis of the Gizeh Museum is clad as the Isis of Pharaonic times; but she has lost the old slender shape and straitened bearing. A mutilated effigy of a Prince of Sit, also at Gizeh, would almost pa.s.s for an indifferent Greek statue.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 208.--Statue of Hor, Graeco-Egyptian.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 209.--Group from Naga.]

The most forcible work of this hybrid cla.s.s which has come down to us is the portrait-statue of one Hor (fig. 208), discovered in 1881 at the foot of Kom ed Damas, the site of the tomb of Alexander. The head is good, though in a somewhat dry style. The long, pinched nose, the close-set eyes, the small mouth with drawn-in corners, the square chin,--every feature, in short, contributes to give a hard and obstinate character to the face. The hair is closely cropped, yet not so closely as to prevent it from dividing naturally into thick, short curls. The body, clothed in the chlamys, is awkwardly shapen, and too narrow for the head. One arm hangs pendent; the other is brought round to the front; the feet are lost. All these monuments are the results of few excavations; and I do not doubt that the soil of Alexandria would yield many such, if it could be methodically explored. The school which produced them continued to draw nearer and nearer to the schools of Greece, and the stiff manner, which it never wholly lost, was scarcely regarded as a defect at an epoch when certain sculptors in the service of Rome especially affected the archaic style. I should not be surprised if those statues of priests and priestesses wearing divine insignia, with which Hadrian adorned the Egyptian rooms of his villa at Tibur, might not be attributed to the artists of this hybrid school. In those parts which were remote from the Delta, native art, being left to its own resources, languished, and slowly perished. Nor was this because Greek models, or even Greek artists, were lacking. In the Thebaid, in the Faym, at Syene, I have both discovered and purchased statuettes and statues of h.e.l.lenic style, and of correct and careful execution. One of these, from Coptos, is apparently a miniature replica of a Venus a.n.a.logous to the Venus of Milo. But the provincial sculptors were too dull, or too ignorant, to take such advantage of these models as was taken by their Alexandrian brethren. When they sought to render the Greek suppleness of figure and fulness of limb, they only succeeded in missing the rigid but learned precision of their former masters. In place of the fine, delicate, low relief of the old school, they adopted a relief which, though very prominent, was soft, round, and feebly modelled. The eyes of their personages have a foolish leer; the nostrils slant upwards; the corners of the mouth, the chin, and indeed all the features, are drawn up as if converging towards a central point, which is stationed in the middle of the ear. Two schools, each independent of the other, have bequeathed their works to us. The least known flourished in Ethiopia, at the court of the half-civilised kings who resided at Meroe. A group brought from Naga in 1882, and now in the Gizeh collection, shows the work of this school during the first century of our era (fig. 209). A G.o.d and a queen, standing side by side, are roughly cut in a block of grey granite. The work is coa.r.s.e and heavy, but not without energy. Isolated and lost in the midst of savage tribes, the school which produced it sank rapidly into barbarism, and expired towards the end of the age of the Antonines. The Egyptian school, sheltered by the power of Rome, survived a little longer. As sagacious as the Ptolemies, the Caesars knew that by flattering the religious prejudices of their Egyptian subjects they consolidated their own rule in the valley of the Nile. At an enormous cost, they restored and rebuilt the temples of the national G.o.ds, working after the old plans and in the old spirit of Pharaonic times. The great earthquake of B.C. 22 had destroyed Thebes, which now became a mere place of pilgrimage, whither devotees repaired to listen to the voice of Memnon at the rising of Aurora. But at Denderah and Ombos, Tiberius and Claudius finished the decoration of the great temples.

Caligula worked at Coptos, and the Antonines enriched Esneh and Philae. The gangs of workmen employed in their names were still competent to cut thousands of bas-reliefs according to the rules of the olden time. Their work was feeble, ungraceful, absurd, inspired solely by routine; yet it was founded on antique tradition--tradition enfeebled and degenerate, but still alive. The troubles which convulsed the third century of our era, the incursions of barbarians, the progress and triumph of Christianity, caused the suspension of the latest works and the dispersion of the last craftsmen. With them died all that yet survived of the national art.[54]

[42] The cla.s.sic Syene, from all time the southernmost portion of Egypt proper. The Sixth Dynasty is called the Elephantine, from the island immediately facing Syene which was the traditional seat of the Dynasty, and on which the temples stood. The tombs of Elephantine were discovered by General Sir F. Grenfell, K.C.B., in 1885, in the neighbouring cliffs of the Libyan Desert: see foot-note p. 149.-- A.B.E.

[43] For an explanation of the nature of the Double, see Chapter III., pp.

111-112, 121 _et seq._

[44] Known as the "Scribe accroupi," literally the "Squatting Scribe"; but in English, squatting, as applied to Egyptian art, is taken to mean the att.i.tude of sitting with the knees nearly touching the chin.

--A.B.E.

[45] "The Sheikh of the Village." This statue was best known in England as the "Wooden Man of Blak."--A.B.E.

[46] The Greek Chephren.

[47] I venture to think that the heads of Rahotep and Nefert, engraved from a brilliant photograph in _A Thousand Miles up the Nile_, give a truer and more spirited idea of the originals than the present ill.u.s.trations,--A.B.E.

[48] That is, the Eighteenth, Nineteenth, and Twentieth Dynasties.

--A.B.E.

[49] According to the measurements given by Mr. Petrie, who discovered the remains of the Tanite colossus, it must have stood ninety feet high without, and one hundred and twenty feet high with, its pedestal. See _Tanis_, Part I., by W.M.F. Petrie, published by the Egypt Exploration Fund, 1885.--A.B.E.

[50] Ameniritis, daughter of an Ethiopian king named Kashta, was the sister and successor of her brother Shabaka, and wife of Piankhi II., Twenty- fifth Dynasty. The statue is in alabaster.--A.B.E.

[51] A Memphite scribe of the Thirtieth Dynasty.--A.B.E.

[52] In Egyptian _Ta-rt_, or "the Great;" also called _Apet_.

This G.o.ddess is always represented as a hippopotamus walking. She carries in each hand the emblem of protection, called "_Sa_." The statuette of the ill.u.s.tration is in green serpentine.--A.B.E.

[53] _Sebakh_, signifying "salt," or "saltpetre," is the general term for that saline dust which acc.u.mulates wherever there are mounds of brick or limestone ruins. This dust is much valued as a manure, or "top-dressing," and is so constantly dug out and carried away by the natives, that the mounds of ancient towns and villages are rapidly undergoing destruction in all parts of Egypt.--A.B.E.

[54] For an example of Graeco-Egyptian portrait painting, _tempo_ Hadrian, see p. 291.

CHAPTER V.

_THE INDUSTRIAL ARTS._

I have treated briefly of the n.o.ble Arts; it remains to say something of the Industrial Arts. All cla.s.ses of society in Egypt were, from an early period, imbued with the love of luxury, and with a taste for the beautiful.

Living or dead, the Egyptian desired to have jewels and costly amulets upon his person, and to be surrounded by choice furniture and elegant utensils.

The objects of his daily use must be distinguished, if not by richness of material, at least by grace of form; and in order to satisfy his requirements, the clay, the stone, the metals, the woods, and other products of distant lands were laid under contribution.

I.--STONE, CLAY, AND GLa.s.s.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 210.--The _Ta_, or girdle-buckle of Isis.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 211.--Frog amulet.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 212.--The _at_, or lotus-column amulet.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 213.--An _ta_, or sacred eye.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 214.--A scarabaeus.]

It is impossible to pa.s.s through a gallery of Egyptian antiquities without being surprised by the prodigious number of small objects in _pietra dura_ which have survived till the present time. As yet we have found neither the diamond, the ruby, nor the sapphire; but with these exceptions, the domain of the lapidary was almost as extensive as at the present day. That domain included the amethyst, the emerald, the garnet, the aquamarine, the chrysoprase, the innumerable varieties of agate and jasper, lapis lazuli, felspar, obsidian; also various rocks, such as granite, serpentine, and porphyry; certain fossils, as yellow amber and some kinds of turquoise; organic remains, as coral, mother-of-pearl, and pearls; metallic ores and carbonates, such as hemat.i.te and malachite, and the calaite, or Oriental turquoise. These substances were for the most part cut in the shape of round, square, oval, spindle-shaped, pear-shaped, or lozenge-shaped beads.

Strung and arranged row above row, these beads were made into necklaces, and are picked up by myriads in the sands of the great cemeteries at Memphis, Erment, Ekhmim, and Abydos. The perfection with which many are cut, the deftness with which they are pierced, and the beauty of the polish, do honour to the craftsmen who made them. But their skill did not end here. With the point, saw, drill, and grindstone, they fas.h.i.+oned these materials into an infinity of shapes--hearts, human fingers, serpents, animals, images of divinities. All these were amulets; and they were probably less valued for the charm of the workmans.h.i.+p than for the supernatural virtues which they were supposed to possess. The girdle-buckle in carnelian (fig. 210) symbolised the blood of Isis, and washed away the sins of the wearer. The frog (fig. 211) was emblematic of renewed birth.

The little lotus-flower column in green felspar (fig. 212) typified the divine gift of eternal youth. The "at," or sacred eye (fig. 213), tied to the wrist or the arm by a slender string, protected against the evil eye, against words spoken in envy or anger, and against the bites of serpents.

Commerce dispersed these objects throughout all parts of the ancient world, and many of them, especially those which represented the sacred beetle, were imitated abroad by the Phoenicians and Syrians, and by the craftsmen of Greece, Asia Minor, Etruria, and Sardinia. This insect was called _kheper_ in Egyptian, and its name was supposed to be derived from the root _khepra_, "to become." By an obvious play upon words, the beetle was made the emblem of terrestrial life, and of the successive "becomings" or developments of man in the life to come. The scarabaeus amulet (fig. 214) is therefore a symbol of duration, present or future; and to wear one was to provide against annihilation. A thousand mystic meanings were evolved from this first idea, each in some subtle sense connected with one or other of the daily acts or usages of life, so that scarabaei were multiplied _ad infinitum_. They are found in all materials and sizes; some having hawks'

heads, some with rams' heads, some with heads of men or bulls. Some are wrought or inscribed on the underside; others are left flat and plain underneath; and others again but vaguely recall the form of the insect, and are called scarabaeoids. These amulets are pierced longwise, the hole being large enough to admit the pa.s.sage of a fine wire of bronze or silver, or of a thread, for suspension. The larger sort were regarded as images of the heart. These, having outspread wings attached, were fastened to the breast of the mummy, and are inscribed on the underside with a prayer adjuring the heart not to bear witness against the deceased at the day of judgment. In order to be still more efficacious, some scenes of adoration were occasionally added to the formula: _e.g._, the disc of the moon adorned by two apes upon the shoulder; two squatting figures of Amen upon the wing- sheaths; on the flat reverse, a representation of the boat of the Sun; and below the boat, Osiris mummified, squatting between Isis and Nephthys, who overshadow him with their wings. The small scarabs, having begun as phylacteries, ended by becoming mere ornaments without any kind of religious meaning, just as crosses are now worn without thought of significance by the women of our own day. They were set as rings, as necklace pendants, as earrings, and as bracelets. The underside is often plain, but is more commonly ornamented with incised designs which involve no kind of modelling. Relief-cutting, properly so called (as in cameo- cutting), was unknown to Egyptian lapidaries before the Greek period.

Scarabaei and the subjects engraved on them have not as yet been fully cla.s.sified and catalogued.[55] The subjects consist of simple combinations of lines; of scrolls; of interlacings without any precise signification; of symbols to which the owner attached a mysterious meaning, unknown to everyone but himself; of the names and t.i.tles of individuals; of royal ovals, which are historically interesting; of good wishes; of pious e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.ns; and of magic formulae. The earliest examples known date from the Fourth Dynasty, and are small and fine. Sometimes Sixth Dynasty scarabs are of obsidian and crystal, and early Middle Kingdom scarabs of amethyst, emerald, and even garnet. From the time of the Eighteenth Dynasty scarabs may be counted by millions, and the execution is more or less fine according to the hardness of the stone. This holds good for amulets of all kinds. The hippopotamus-heads, the hearts, the _Ba_ birds (p. 111), which one picks up at Tad, to the south of Thebes, are barely roughed out, the amethyst and green felspar of which they are made having presented an almost unconquerable resistance to the point, saw, drill, and wheel. The belt-buckles, angles, and head-rests in red jasper, carnelian, and hemat.i.te, are, on the contrary, finished to the minutest details, notwithstanding that carnelian and red jasper are even harder than green felspar. Lapis lazuli is insufficiently h.o.m.ogeneous, almost as hard as felspar, and seems as if it were incapable of being finely worked. Yet the Egyptians have used it for images of certain G.o.ddesses--Isis, Nephthys, Neith, Sekhet,--which are marvels of delicate cutting. The modelling of the forms is carried out as boldly as if the material were more trustworthy, and the features lose none of their excellence if examined under a magnifying gla.s.s. For the most part, however, a different treatment was adopted. Instead of lavis.h.i.+ng high finish upon the relief, it was obtained in a more summary way, the details of individual parts being sacrificed to the general effect. Those features of the face which project, and those which retire, are strongly accentuated. The thickness of the neck, the swell of the breast and shoulder, the slenderness of the waist, the fulness of the hips, are all exaggerated. The feet and hands are also slightly enlarged. This treatment is based upon a system, the results being boldly and yet judiciously calculated. When the object has to be sculptured in miniature, a mathematical reduction of the model is not so happy in its effect as might be supposed. The head loses character; the neck looks too weak; the bust is reduced to a cylinder with a slightly uneven surface; the feet do not look strong enough to support the weight of the body; the princ.i.p.al lines are not sufficiently distinct from the secondary lines. By suppressing most of the accessory forms and developing those most essential to the expression, the Egyptians steered clear of the danger of producing insignificant statuettes. The eye instinctively tones down whatever is too forcible, and supplies what is lacking. Thanks to these subtle devices of the ancient craftsman, a tiny statuette of this or that divinity measuring scarcely an inch and a quarter in height, has almost the breadth and dignity of a colossus.

The earthly goods of the G.o.ds and of the dead were mostly in solid stone. I have elsewhere described the little funerary obelisks, the altar bases, the statues, and the tables of offerings found in tombs of the ancient empire.

These tables were made of alabaster and limestone during the Pyramid period, of granite or red sandstone under the Theban kings, and of basalt or serpentine from the time of the Twenty-sixth Dynasty. But the fas.h.i.+ons were not canonical, all stones being found at all periods. Some offering- tables are mere flat discs, or discs very slightly hollowed. Others are rectangular, and are sculptured in relief with a service of loaves, vases, fruits, and quarters of beef and gazelle. In one instance--the offering- table of Sit--the libations, instead of running off, fell into a square basin which is marked off in divisions, showing the height of the Nile at the different seasons of the year in the reservoirs of Memphis; namely, twenty-five cubits in summer during the inundation, twenty-three in autumn and early winter, and twenty-two at the close of winter and in spring-time.

In these various patterns there was little beauty; yet one offering-table, found at Sakkarah, is a real work of art. It is of alabaster. Two lions, standing side by side, support a sloping, rectangular tablet, whence the libation ran off by a small channel into a vase placed between the tails of the lions. The alabaster geese found at Lisht are not without artistic merit. They are cut length-wise down the middle, and hollowed out, in the fas.h.i.+on of a box. Those which I have seen elsewhere, and, generally speaking, all simulacra of offerings, as loaves, cakes, heads of oxen or gazelles, bunches of black grapes, and the like, in carved and painted limestone, are of doubtful taste and clumsy execution. They are not very common, and I have met with them only in tombs of the Fifth and Twelfth Dynasties. "Canopic" vases, on the contrary, were always carefully wrought.

They were generally made in two kinds of stone, limestone and alabaster; but the heads which surmounted them were often of painted wood. The canopic vases of Pepi I. are of alabaster; and those of a king buried in the southernmost pyramid at Lisht are also of alabaster, as are the human heads upon the lids. One, indeed, is of such fine execution that I can only compare it with that of the statue of Khafra. The most ancient funerary statuettes yet found--those, namely, of the Eleventh Dynasty--are of alabaster, like the canopic vases; but from the time of the Thirteenth Dynasty, they were cut in compact limestone. The workmans.h.i.+p is very unequal in quality. Some are real _chefs-d'oeuvre_, and reproduce the physiognomy of the deceased as faithfully as a portrait statue. Lastly, there are the perfume vases, which complete the list of objects found in temples and tombs. The names of these vases are far from being satisfactorily established, and most of the special designations furnished in the texts remain as yet without equivalents in our language. The greater number were of alabaster, turned and polished. Some are heavy, and ugly (fig. 215), while others are distinguished by an elegance and diversity of form which do honour to the inventive talent of the craftsmen. Many are spindle-shaped and pointed at the end (fig. 216), or round in the body, narrow in the neck, and flat at the bottom (fig. 217).

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 215.--Perfume vase, alabaster.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 216.--Perfume vase, alabaster.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 217.--Perfume vase, alabaster.]

They are unornamented, except perhaps by two lotus-bud handles, or two lions' heads, or perhaps a little female head just at the rise of the neck (fig. 218). The smallest of these vases were not intended for liquids, but for pomades, medicinal ointments, and salves made with honey. Some of the more important series comprise large-bodied flasks, with an upright cylindrical neck and a flat cover (fig. 219). In these, the Egyptians kept the antimony powder with which they darkened their eyes and eyebrows. The Kohl-pot was a universal toilet requisite; perhaps the only one commonly used by all cla.s.ses of society. When designing it, the craftsman gave free play to his fancy, borrowing forms of men, plants, and animals for its adornment. Now it appears in the guise of a full-blown lotus; now it is a hedgehog; a hawk; a monkey clasping a column to his breast, or climbing up the side of a jar; a grotesque figure of the G.o.d Bes; a kneeling woman, whose scooped-out body contained the powder; a young girl carrying a wine- jar. Once started upon this path, the imagination of the artists knew no limits. As for materials, everything was made to serve in turn--granite, diorite, breccia, red jade, alabaster, and soft limestone, which lent itself more readily to caprices of form; finally, a still more plastic and facile substance--clay, painted and glazed.