Manual of Egyptian Archaeology and Guide to the Study of Antiquities in Egypt Part 2

It answered two purposes, firstly, as a means of storing the water of the inundation for the use of the workmen in the neighbouring quarries; and, secondly, as a barrier to break the force of the torrents which rush down from the desert after the heavy rains of springtime and winter. The ravine measures about 240 feet in width, the sides being on an average from 40 to 50 feet in height. The dam, which is 143 feet in thickness, consists of three layers of material; at the bottom, a bed of clay and rubble; next, a piled ma.s.s of limestone blocks (A); lastly, a wall of cut stone built in retreating stages, like an enormous flight of steps (B). Thirty-two of the original thirty-five stages are yet _in situ_, and about one-fourth part of the dam remains piled up against the sides of the ravine to right and left; but the middle part has been swept away by the force of the torrent (fig.

48). A similar dike transformed the end of Wady Genneh into a little lake which supplied the Sinaitic miners with water.

Most of the localities from which the Egyptians derived their metals and choicest materials in hard stone, were difficult of access, and would have been useless had roads not been made, and works of this kind carried out, so as to make life somewhat less insupportable there.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 48.--Section of dike at Wady Gerraweh.]

In order to reach the diorite and grey granite quarries of the Hammamat Valley, the Pharaohs caused a series of rock-cut cisterns to be constructed along the line of route. Some few insignificant springs, skilfully conducted into these reservoirs, made it possible to plant workmen's villages in the neighbourhood of the quarries, and also near the emerald mines on the borders of the Red Sea. Hundreds of hired labourers, slaves, and condemned criminals here led a wretched existence under the rule of some eight or ten overseers, and the brutal surveillance of a company of Libyan or negro mercenary troops. The least political disturbance in Egypt, an unsuccessful campaign, or any untoward incident of a troubled reign, sufficed to break up the precarious stability of these remote establishments. The Bedawin at once attacked the colony; the workmen deserted; the guards, weary of exile, hastened back to the valley of the Nile, and all was at a standstill.

The choicest materials, as diorite, basalt, black granite, porphyry, and red and yellow breccia, which are only found in the desert, were rarely used for architectural purposes. In order to procure them, it was necessary to organise regular expeditions of soldiers and workmen; therefore they were reserved for sarcophagi and important works of art. Those quarries which supplied building materials for temples and funerary monuments, such as limestone, sandstone, alabaster, and red granite, were all found in the Nile valley, and were, therefore, easy of access. When the vein which it was intended to work traversed the lower strata of the rock, the miners excavated chambers and pa.s.sages, which were often prolonged to a considerable distance. Square pillars, left standing at intervals, supported the superinc.u.mbent ma.s.s, while tablets sculptured in the most conspicuous places commemorated the kings and engineers who began or continued the work. Several exhausted or abandoned quarries have been transformed into votive chapels; as, for instance, the Speos Artemidos, which was consecrated by Hatshepsut, Thothmes III. and Seti I. to the local G.o.ddess Pakhet.[9]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 49.--Quarries of Silsilis.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 50.--Draught of Hathor capital in quarry of Gebel Abfeydeh.]

The most important limestone quarries are at Trah and Ma.s.sarah, nearly opposite Memphis. This stone lends itself admirably to the most delicate touches of the chisel, hardens when exposed to the air, and acquires a creamy tone most restful to the eye. Hence it was much in request by architects and sculptors. The most extensive sandstone formations are at Silsilis (fig. 49). Here the cliffs were quarried from above, and under the open sky. Clean cut and absolutely vertical, they rise to a height of from forty to fifty feet, sometimes presenting a smooth surface from top to bottom, and sometimes cut in stages accessible by means of steps scarcely large enough for one man at a time. The walls of these cuttings are covered with parallel striae, sometimes horizontal, sometimes slanting to the left, and sometimes to the right, so forming lines of serried chevrons framed, as it were, between grooves an inch, or an inch and a half, in width, by nine or ten feet in length. These are the scars left upon the surface by the tools of the ancient workmen, and they show the method employed in detaching the blocks. The size was outlined in red ink, and this outline sometimes indicated the form which the stone was to take in the projected building. The members of the French Commission, when they visited the quarries of Gebel Abfeydeh, copied the diagrams and squared designs of several capitals, one being of the campaniform pattern, and others prepared for the Hathor-head pattern (fig. 50).[10] The outline made, the vertical faces of the block were divided by means of a long iron chisel, which was driven in perpendicularly or obliquely by heavy blows of the mallet. In order to detach the horizontal faces, they made use of wooden or bronze wedges, inserted the way of the natural strata of the stone. Very frequently the stone was roughly blocked out before being actually extracted from the bed. Thus at Syene (Asan) we see a couchant obelisk of granite, the under side of which is one with the rock itself; and at Tehneh there are drums of columns but half disengaged. The transport of quarried stone was effected in various ways. At Syene, at Silsilis, at Gebel Sheikh Herideh, and at Gebel Abfeydeh, the quarries are literally washed by the waters of the Nile, so that the stone was lowered at once into the barges.

At Kasr es Said,[11] at Trah, and other localities situate at some distance from the river, ca.n.a.ls dug expressly for the purpose conveyed the transport boats to the foot of the cliffs. When water transit was out of the question, the stone was placed on sledges drawn by oxen (fig. 51), or dragged to its destination by gangs of labourers, and by the help of rollers.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 51.--Bas-relief from one of the stelae of Ahmes, at Trrah, Eighteenth Dynasty.]

[4] The bas-relief sculpture from which the ill.u.s.tration, fig. 42, is taken (outer wall of Hypostyle Hall, Karnak, north end) represents Seti I.

returning in triumph from one of his Syrian campaigns. He is met at Zar by the great officers of his court, who bring bouquets of lotus- blossoms in their hands. Pithom and other frontier forts are depicted in this tableau, and Pithom is apparently not very far from Zar.

Zar, Zalu, is the Selle of the Roman Itineraries.--A.B.E.

[5] See _The Store City of Pithom and the Route of the Exodus,_ by Ed.

Naville, with 13 Plates and 2 Maps; published by the Egypt Exploration Fund. First edition 1885, second edition 1885. Trubner & Co., London.

--A.B.E.

[6] For an account of the explorations at Daphnae (the "Tahpanhes" of the Bible, the _Tell Defenneh_ of the present day) see Mr. Petrie's memoir, ent.i.tled _Tanis, Part II, (including Nebesheh, Gemayemi, Defenneh, etc.)_, published by the Egypt Exploration Fund.--A.B.E.

[7] The remains of this gigantic work may yet be seen about two hours'

distance to the southward of Medm. See Herodotus, book II.; chap.

99.--A.B.E.

[8] See _The Faym and Lake Moeris_. Major R.H. Brown, R.E.

[9] Officially, this temple is attributed to Thothmes III., and the dedicatory inscription dates from the first year of his reign; but the work was really that of his aunt and predecessor, Queen Hatshepst.

[10] See also an exact reduction of this design, to scale, in Mr. Petrie's work _A Season in Egypt_, 1887, Plate XXV.

[11] Chen.o.boscion.--A.B.E.

CHAPTER II.

_RELIGIOUS ARCHITECTURE_.

In the civil and military architecture of Ancient Egypt brick played the princ.i.p.al part; but in the religious architecture of the nation it occupied a very secondary position. The Pharaohs were ambitious of building eternal dwellings for their deities, and stone was the only material which seemed sufficiently durable to withstand the ravages of time and man.

I.--MATERIALS AND PRINCIPLES OF CONSTRUCTION.

It is an error to suppose that the Egyptians employed only large blocks for building purposes. The size of their materials varied very considerably according to the uses for which they were destined. Architraves, drums of columns, lintel-stones, and door-jambs were sometimes of great size. The longest architraves known--those, namely, which bridge the nave of the hypostyle hall of Karnak--have a mean length of 30 feet. They each contain 40 cubic yards, and weigh about 65 tons. Ordinarily, however, the blocks are not much larger than those now used in Europe. They measure, that is to say, about 2-1/2 to 4 feet in height, from 3 to 8 feet in length, and from 2 to 6 feet in thickness.

Some temples are built of only one kind of stone; but more frequently materials of different kinds are put together in unequal proportions. Thus the main part of the temples of Abydos consists of very fine limestone; but in the temple of Seti I., the columns, architraves, jambs, and lintels,-- all parts, in short, where it might be feared that the limestone would not offer sufficient resistance,--the architect has had recourse to sandstone; while in that of Rameses II., sandstone, granite, and alabaster were used.

At Karnak, Luxor, Tanis, and Memphis, similar combinations may be seen. At the Ramesseum, and in some of the Nubian temples, the columns stand on ma.s.sive supports of crude brick. The stones were dressed more or less carefully, according to the positions they were to occupy. When the walls were of medium thickness, as in most part.i.tion walls, they are well wrought on all sides. When the wall was thick, the core blocks were roughed out as nearly cubic as might be, and piled together without much care, the hollows being filled up with smaller flakes, pebbles, or mortar. Casing stones were carefully wrought on the faces, and the joints dressed for two-thirds or three-quarters of the length, the rest being merely picked with a point (Note 6). The largest blocks were reserved for the lower parts of the building; and this precaution was the more necessary because the architects of Pharaonic times sank the foundations of their temples no deeper than those of their houses. At Karnak, they are not carried lower than from 7 to 10 feet; at Luxor, on the side anciently washed by the river, three courses of masonry, each measuring about 2-1/2 feet in depth, form a great platform on which the walls rest; while at the Ramesseum, the brickwork bed on which the colonnade stands does not seem to be more than 10 feet deep.

These are but slight depths for the foundations of such great buildings, but the experience of ages proves that they are sufficient. The hard and compact humus of which the soil of the Nile valley is composed, contracts every year after the subsidence of the inundation, and thus becomes almost incompressible. As the building progressed, the weight of the superinc.u.mbent masonry gradually became greater, till the maximum of pressure was attained, and a solid basis secured. Wherever I have bared the foundations of the walls, I can testify that they have not s.h.i.+fted.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 52.--Masonry in temple of Seti I. at Abydos.]

The system of construction in force among the ancient Egyptians resembles in many respects that of the Greeks. The stones are often placed together with dry joints, and without the employment of any binding contrivance, the masons relying on the mere weight of the materials to keep them in place.

Sometimes they are held together by metal cramps, or sometimes--as in the temple of Seti I., at Abydos--by dovetails of sycamore wood bearing the cartouche of the founder. Most commonly, they are united by a mortar-joint, more or less thick. All the mortars of which I have collected samples are thus far of three kinds: the first is white, and easily reduced to an impalpable powder, being of lime only; the others are grey, and rough to the touch, being mixtures of lime and sand; while some are of a reddish colour, owing to the pounded brick powder with which they are mixed. A judicious use of these various methods enabled the Egyptians to rival the Greeks in their treatment of regular courses, equal blocks, and upright joints in alternate bond. If they did not always work equally well, their shortcomings must be charged to the imperfect mechanical means at their disposal. The enclosure walls, part.i.tions, and secondary facades were upright; and they raised the materials by means of a rude kind of crane planted on the top. The pylon walls and the princ.i.p.al facades (and sometimes even the secondary facades) were sloped at an angle which varied according to the taste of the architect. In order to build these, they formed inclined planes, the slopes of which were lengthened as the structure rose in height. These two methods were equally perilous; for, however carefully the blocks might be protected while being raised, they were constantly in danger of losing their edges or corners, or of being fractured before they reached the top (Note 7). Thus it was almost always necessary to re-work them; and the object being to sacrifice as little as possible of the stone, the workmen often left them of most abnormal shapes (fig. 52). They would level off one of the side faces, and then the joint, instead of being vertical, leaned askew. If the block had neither height nor length to spare, they made up the loss by means of a supplementary slip. Sometimes even they left a projection which fitted into a corresponding hollow in the next upper or lower course. Being first of all expedients designed to remedy accidents, these methods degenerated into habitually careless ways of working. The masons who had inadvertently hoisted too large a block, no longer troubled themselves to lower it back again, but worked it into the building in one or other of the ways before mentioned. The architect neglected to duly supervise the dressing and placing of the blocks. He allowed the courses to vary, and the vertical joints, two or three deep, to come one over the other. The rough work done, the masons dressed down the stone, reworked the joints, and overlaid the whole with a coat of cement or stucco, coloured to match the material, which concealed the faults of the real work. The walls rarely end with a sharp edge. Bordered with a torus, around which a sculptured riband is entwined, they are crowned by the _cavetto_ cornice surmounted by a flat band (fig. 53); or, as at Semneh, by a square cornice; or, as at Medinet Habu, by a line of battlements. Thus framed in, the walls looked like enormous panels, each panel complete in itself, without projections and almost without openings. Windows, always rare in Egyptian architecture, are mere ventilators when introduced into the walls of temples, being intended to light the staircases, as in the second pylon of h.o.r.emheb at Karnak, or else to support decorative woodwork on festival days. The doorways project but slightly from the body of the buildings (fig. 54), except where the lintel is over-shadowed by a projecting cornice. Real windows occur only in the pavilion of Medinet Habu; but that building was constructed on the model of a fortress, and must rank as an exception among religious monuments.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 53.--Temple wall with cornice.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 54.--Niche and doorway in temple of Seti I. at Abydos.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 55.--Pavement of the portico of Osiris in the temple of Seti I. at Abydos.]

The ground-level of the courts and halls was flagged with rectangular paving stones, well enough fitted, except in the intercolumniations, where the architects, hopeless of harmonising the lines of the pavement with the curved bases of the columns, have filled in the s.p.a.ce with small pieces, set without order or method (fig. 55). Contrary to their practice when house building, they have scarcely ever employed the vault or arch in temple architecture. We nowhere meet with it, except at Deir el Bahari, and in the seven parallel sanctuaries of Abydos. Even in these instances, the arch is produced by "corbelling"; that is to say, the curve is formed by three or four superimposed horizontal courses of stone, chiselled out to the form required (fig. 56). The ordinary roofing consists of flat paving slabs. When the s.p.a.ce between the walls was not too wide, these slabs bridged it over at a single stretch; otherwise the roof had to be supported at intervals, and the wider the s.p.a.ce the more these supports needed to be multiplied. The supports were connected by immense stone architraves, on which the roofing slabs rested.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 56.--"Corbelled" arch, temple of Seti I. at Abydos.]

The supports are of two types,--the pillar and the column. Some are cut from single blocks. Thus, the monolithic pillars of the temple of the sphinx (Note 8), the oldest hitherto found, measure 16 feet in height by 4- 1/2 feet in width. Monolithic columns of red granite are also found among the ruins of Alexandria, Bubastis,[12] and Memphis, which date from the reigns of h.o.r.emheb and Rameses II., and measure some 20 to 26 feet in height. But columns and pillars are commonly built in courses, which are often unequal and irregular, like those of the walls which surround them.

The great columns of Luxor are not even solid, two-thirds of the diameter being filled up with yellow cement, which has lost its strength, and crumbles between the fingers. The capital of the column of Taharka at Karnak contains three courses, each about 48 inches high. The last and most projecting course is made up of twenty-six convergent stones, which are held in place by merely the weight of the abacus. The same carelessness which we have already noted in the workmans.h.i.+p of the walls is found in the workmans.h.i.+p of the columns.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 57.--Hathor pillar, Ab Simbel.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 58.--Pillar of Amenhotep III., Karnak.]

The quadrangular pillar, with parallel or slightly inclined sides, and generally without either base or capital, frequently occurs in tombs of the ancient empire. It reappears later at Medinet Hab, in the temple of Thothmes III., and again at Karnak, in what is known as the processional hall. The sides of these square pillars are often covered with painted scenes, while the front faces were more decoratively treated, being sculptured with lotus or papyrus stems in high relief, as on the pillar- stelae of Karnak, or adorned with a head of Hathor crowned with the sistrum, as in the small speos of Ab Simbel (fig. 57), or sculptured with a full-length standing figure of Osiris, as in the second court of Medinet Hab; or, as at Denderah and Gebel Barkal, with the figure of the G.o.d Bes.

At Karnak, in an edifice which was probably erected by h.o.r.emheb with building material taken from the ruins of a sanctuary of Amenhotep II. and III., the pillar is capped by a cornice, separated from the architrave by a thin abacus (fig. 58). By cutting away its four edges, the square pillar becomes an octagonal prism, and further, by cutting off the eight new edges, it becomes a sixteen-sided prism. Some pillars in the tombs of Asan and Beni Hasan, and in the processional hall at Karnak (fig. 59), as well as in the chapels of Deir el Bahari, are of this type. Besides the forms thus regularly evolved, there are others of irregular derivation, with six, twelve, fifteen, or twenty sides, or verging almost upon a perfect circle. The portico pillars of the temple of Osiris at Abydos come last in the series; the drum is curved, but not round, the curve being interrupted at both extremities of the same diameter by a flat stripe. More frequently the sides are slightly channelled; and sometimes, as at Kalabsheh, the flutings are divided into four groups of five each by four vertical flat stripes (fig. 60). The polygonal pillar has always a large, shallow plinth, in the form of a rounded disc. At El Kab it bears the head of Hathor, sculptured in relief upon the front (fig. 61); but almost everywhere else it is crowned with a simple square abacus, which joins it to the architrave. Thus treated, it bears a certain family likeness to the Doric column; and one understands how Jomard and Champollion, in the first ardour of discovery, were tempted to give it the scarcely justifiable name of "proto-Doric."

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 59.--Sixteen-sided pillars, Karnak.]

The column does not rest immediately upon the soil. It is always furnished with a base like that of the polygonal pillar, sometimes square with the ground, and sometimes slightly rounded. This base is either plain, or ornamented only with a line of hieroglyphs. The princ.i.p.al forms fall into three types: (1) the column with campaniform, or lotus-flower capital; (2) the column with lotus-bud capital; (3) the column with Hathor-head capital.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 60.--Fluted pillar, Kalabsheh.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 61.--Polygonal Hathor-headed pillar, El Kab.]

I. _Columns with Campaniform Capitals_.--The shaft is generally plain, or merely engraved with inscriptions or bas-reliefs. Sometimes, however, as at Medamot, it is formed of six large and six small colonnettes in alternation. In Pharaonic times, it is bulbous, being curved inward at the base, and ornamented with triangles one within another, imitating the large leaves which sheathe the sprouting plant. The curve is so regulated that the diameter at the base and the top shall be about equal. In the Ptolemaic period, the bulb often disappears, owing probably to Greek influences. The columns which surround the first court at Edf rise straight from their plinths. The shaft always tapers towards the top. It is finished by three or five flat bands, one above the other. At Medamot, where the shaft is cl.u.s.tered, the architect has doubtless thought that one tie at the top appeared insufficient to hold in a dozen colonnettes; he has therefore marked two other rings of bands at regular intervals. The campaniform capital is decorated from the spring of the curve with a row of leaves, like those which sheathe the base. Between these are figured shoots of lotus and papyrus in flower and bud. The height of the capital, and the extent of its projection beyond the line of the shaft, varied with the taste of the architect. At Luxor, the campaniform capitals are eleven and a half feet in diameter at the neck, eighteen feet in diameter at the top, and eleven and a half feet in height. At Karnak, in the hypostyle hall, the height of the capital is twelve and a quarter feet, and the greatest diameter twenty-one feet. A square die surmounts the whole. This die is almost hidden by the curve of the capital, though occasionally, as at Denderah, it is higher, and bears on each face a figure of the G.o.d Bes (fig. 62).

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 62.--Column with square die, Contra Esneh.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 63.--Column with campaniform capital, Ramesseum.]