The Ancient History of the Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians Part 19

Indeed the difference of conditions, and the contempt with which persons of the lowest rank are treated, are owing merely to the distance from the common root; which makes us forget that the meanest plebeian, when his descent is traced back to the source, is equally n.o.ble with those of the most elevated rank and t.i.tles.

Be that as it will, no profession in Egypt was considered as grovelling or sordid. By this means arts were raised to their highest perfection. The honour which cherished them mixed with every thought and care for their improvement. Every man had his way of life a.s.signed him by the laws, and it was perpetuated from father to son. Two professions at one time, or a change of that which a man was born to, were never allowed. By this means, men became more able and expert in employments which they had always exercised from their infancy; and every man, adding his own experience to that of his ancestors, was more capable of attaining perfection in his particular art. Besides, this wholesome inst.i.tution, which had been established anciently throughout Egypt, extinguished all irregular ambition, and taught every man to sit down contented with his condition, without aspiring to one more elevated, from interest, vain-glory, or levity.

From this source flowed numberless inventions for the improvement of all the arts, and for rendering life more commodious, and trade more easy. I once could not believe that Diodorus was in earnest, in what he relates concerning the Egyptian industry,(377) _viz._ that this people had found out a way, by an artificial fecundity, to hatch eggs without the sitting of the hen; but all modern travellers declare it to be a fact, which certainly is worthy our investigation, and is said to be practised also in Europe. Their relations inform us, that the Egyptians stow eggs in ovens, which are heated to such a temperament, and with such just proportion to the natural warmth of the hen, that the chickens produced by these means are as strong as those which are hatched the natural way. The season of the year proper for this operation is, from the end of December to the end of April; the heat in Egypt being too violent in the other months. During these four months, upwards of three hundred thousand eggs are laid in these ovens, which, though they are not all successful, nevertheless produce vast numbers of fowls at an easy rate. The art lies in giving the ovens a due degree of heat, which must not exceed a fixed proportion.

About ten days are bestowed in heating these ovens, and very near as much time in hatching the eggs. It is very entertaining, say these travellers, to observe the hatching of these chickens, some of which show at first nothing but their heads, others but half their bodies, and others again come quite out of the egg: these last, the moment they are hatched, make their way over the unhatched eggs, and form a diverting spectacle.

Corneille le Bruyn, in his Travels,(378) has collected the observations of other travellers on this subject. Pliny likewise mentions it;(379) but it appears from him, that the Egyptians, anciently, employed warm dung, not ovens, to hatch eggs.

I have said, that husbandmen particularly, and those who took care of flocks, were in great esteem in Egypt, some parts of it excepted, where the latter were not suffered.(380) It was, indeed, to these two professions that Egypt owed its riches and plenty. It is astonis.h.i.+ng to reflect what advantages the Egyptians, by their art and labour, drew from a country of no great extent, but whose soil was made wonderfully fruitful by the inundations of the Nile, and the laborious industry of the inhabitants.

It will be always so with every kingdom whose governors direct all their actions to the public welfare. The culture of lands, and the breeding of cattle, will be an inexhaustible fund of wealth in all countries, where, as in Egypt, these profitable callings are supported and encouraged by maxims of state and policy: and we may consider it as a misfortune, that they are at present fallen into so general a disesteem; though it is from them that the most elevated ranks (as we esteem them) are furnished, not only with the necessaries, but even the luxuries of life. "For," says Abbe Fleury, in his admirable work, _Of the manners of the Israelites_, where the subject I am upon is thoroughly examined, "it is the peasant who feeds the citizen, the magistrate, the gentleman, the ecclesiastic: and whatever artifice and craft may be used to convert money into commodities, and these back again into money; yet all must ultimately be owned to be received from the products of the earth, and the animals which it sustains and nourishes. Nevertheless, when we compare men's different stations of life together, we give the lowest place to the husbandman: and with many people a wealthy citizen, enervated with sloth, useless to the public, and void of all merit, has the preference, merely because he has more money, and lives a more easy and delightful life.

"But let us imagine to ourselves a country where so great a difference is not made between the several conditions; where the life of a n.o.bleman is not made to consist in idleness and doing nothing, but in a careful preservation of his liberty; that is, in a due subjection to the laws and the const.i.tution; by a man's subsisting upon his estate without a dependence on any one, and being contented to enjoy a little with liberty, rather than a great deal at the price of mean and base compliances: a country, where sloth, effeminacy, and the ignorance of things necessary for life, are held in just contempt; and where pleasure is less valued than health and bodily strength: in such a country, it will be much more for a man's reputation to plough, and keep flocks, than to waste all his hours in sauntering from place to place, in gaming and expensive diversions."

But we need not have recourse to Plato's commonwealth, for instances of men who have led these useful lives. It was thus that the greatest part of mankind lived during near four thousand years; and that not only the Israelites, but the Egyptians, the Greeks, and the Romans, that is to say, nations the most civilized, and most renowned for arms and wisdom. They all inculcate the regard which ought to be paid to agriculture, and the breeding of cattle: one of which (without saying any thing of hemp and flax so necessary for our clothing) supplies us by corn, fruits, and pulse, with not only a plentiful but delicious nourishment; and the other, besides its supply of exquisite meats to cover our tables, almost alone gives life to manufactures and trade, by the skins and stuffs it furnishes.

Princes are commonly desirous, and their interest certainly requires it, that the peasant who, in a literal sense, sustains the heat and burden of the day, and pays so great a proportion of the national taxes, should meet with favour and encouragement. But the kind and good intentions of princes are too often defeated by the insatiable and merciless avarice of those who are appointed to collect their revenues. History has transmitted to us a fine saying of Tiberius on this head. A prefect of Egypt having augmented the annual tribute of the province, and, doubtless, with the view of making his court to the emperor, remitted to him a much larger sum than was customary; that prince, who, in the beginning of his reign, thought, or at least spoke justly, answered, "that it was his design not to flay, but to shear his sheep."(381)

Chapter VI. Of The Fertility Of Egypt.

Under this head, I shall treat only of some plants peculiar to Egypt, and of the abundance of corn which it produced.

Papyrus. This is a plant, from the root of which shoot out a great many triangular stalks, to the height of six or seven cubits. The ancients writ at first upon palm leaves;(382) next, on the inside of the bark of trees, from whence the word _liber_, or book, is derived; after that, upon tables covered over with wax, on which the characters were impressed with an instrument called Stylus, sharp-pointed at one end to write with, and flat at the other, to efface what had been written; which gave occasion to the following expression of Horace:

Saepe stylum vertas, iterum quae digna legi sint Scripturus:

_Sat._ lib. i. x. ver. 72.

Oft turn your style, if you desire to write Things that will bear a second reading--

The meaning of which is, that a good performance is not to be expected without many erasures and corrections. At last the use of paper(383) was introduced, and this was made of the bark of Papyrus, divided into thin flakes or leaves, which were very proper for writing; and this Papyrus was likewise called Byblus.

Nondum flumineas Memphis contexere byblos Noverat.

Lucan.

Memphis as yet knew not to form in leaves The wat'ry Byblos.

Pliny calls it a wonderful invention,(384) so useful to life, that it preserves the memory of great actions, and immortalizes those who achieved them. Varro ascribes this invention to Alexander the Great, when he built Alexandria; but he had only the merit of making paper more common, for the invention was of much greater antiquity. The same Pliny adds, that Eumenes, king of Pergamus, subst.i.tuted parchment instead of paper, in emulation of Ptolemy, king of Egypt, whose library he was ambitious to excel by this invention, which had the advantage over paper. Parchment is the skin of a sheep dressed and made fit to write upon. It was called Pergamenum from Pergamus, whose kings had the honour of the invention. All the ancient ma.n.u.scripts are either upon parchment, or vellum, which is calf-skin, and a great deal finer than the common parchment. It is very curious to see white fine paper wrought out of filthy rags picked up in the streets. The plant Papyrus was useful likewise for sails, tackling, clothes, coverlets, &c.(385)

Linum. Flax is a plant whose bark, full of fibres or strings, is useful in making fine linen. The method of making this linen in Egypt was wonderful, and carried to such perfection, that the threads which were drawn out of them, were almost too small for the observation of the sharpest eye.

Priests were always habited in linen, and never in woollen; and all persons of distinction generally wore linen clothes. This flax formed a considerable branch of the Egyptian trade, and great quant.i.ties of it were exported into foreign countries. The manufacture of flax employed a great number of hands in Egypt, especially of the women, as appears from that pa.s.sage of Isaiah, in which the prophet menaces Egypt with a drought of so terrible a nature, that it should interrupt every kind of labour.

"Moreover, they that work in fine flax, and they that weave network, shall be confounded."(386) We likewise find in Scripture, that one effect of the plague of hail, called down by Moses upon Egypt, was the destruction of all the flax which was then bolled.(387) This storm was in March.

Byssus. This was another kind of flax extremely fine and delicate, which often received a purple dye.(388) It was very dear; and none but rich and wealthy persons could afford to wear it. Pliny, who gives the first place to the Asbeston or Asbestinum, (_i.e._ the incombustible flax,) places the Byssus in the next rank; and says, "that the dress and ornaments of the ladies were made of it."(389) It appears from the Holy Scriptures, that it was chiefly from Egypt that cloth made of this fine flax was brought: "fine linen with broidered work from Egypt."(390)

I take no notice of the Lotus, a very common plant, and in great request among the Egyptians, of whose berries, in former times, they made bread.

There was another Lotus in Africa, which gave its name to the Lotophagi or Lotus-eaters; because they lived upon the fruit of this tree, which had so delicious a taste, if Homer may be credited, that it made those who ate it forget all the sweets of their native country,(391) as Ulysses found to his cost in his return from Troy.

In general, it may be said, that the Egyptian pulse and fruits were excellent; and might, as Pliny observes,(392) have sufficed singly for the nourishment of the inhabitants, such was their excellent quality, and so great their plenty. And, indeed, working men lived then almost upon nothing else, as appears from those who were employed in building the pyramids.

Besides these rural riches, the Nile, from its fish, and the fatness it gave to the soil for the feeding of cattle, furnished the tables of the Egyptians with the most exquisite fish of every kind, and the most succulent flesh. This it was which made the Israelites so deeply regret the loss of Egypt, when they found themselves in the wilderness: "Who,"

say they, in a plaintive, and at the same time, seditious tone, "shall give us flesh to eat? We remember the flesh which we did eat in Egypt freely; the cuc.u.mbers and melons, and the leeks, and the onions, and the garlick.(393) We sat by the flesh-pots, and we did eat bread to the full."(394)

But the great and matchless wealth of Egypt arose from its corn, which, even in an almost universal famine, enabled it to support all the neighbouring nations, as it particularly did under Joseph's administration. In later ages, it was the resource and most certain granary of Rome and Constantinople. It is a well-known story, how a calumny raised against St. Athanasius, _viz._ of his having threatened to prevent in future the importation of corn into Constantinople from Alexandria, incensed the emperor Constantine against that holy bishop, because he knew that his capital city could not subsist without the corn which was brought to it from Egypt. The same reason induced all the emperors of Rome to take so great a care of Egypt, which they considered as the nursing mother of the world's metropolis.

Nevertheless, the same river which enabled this province to subsist the two most populous cities in the world, sometimes reduced even Egypt itself to the most terrible famine: and it is astonis.h.i.+ng that Joseph's wise foresight, which in fruitful years had made provision for seasons of sterility, should not have taught these so much boasted politicians, to adopt similar precautions against the changes and inconstancy of the Nile.

Pliny, in his panegyric upon Trajan, paints with wonderful strength the extremity to which that country was reduced by a famine under that prince's reign, and his generous relief of it. The reader will not be displeased to read here an extract of it, in which a greater regard will be had to Pliny's thoughts, than to his expressions.

"The Egyptians," says Pliny, "who gloried that they needed neither rain nor sun to produce their corn, and who believed they might confidently contest the prize of plenty with the most fruitful countries of the world, were condemned to an unexpected drought, and a fatal sterility; from the greatest part of their territories being deserted and left unwatered by the Nile, whose inundation is the source and sure standard of their abundance. 'They then implored that a.s.sistance from their prince which they had been accustomed to expect only from their river.'(395) The delay of their relief was no longer than that which employed a courier to bring the melancholy news to Rome; and one would have imagined, that this misfortune had befallen them only to display with greater l.u.s.tre the generosity and goodness of Caesar. It was an ancient and general opinion, that our city could not subsist without provisions drawn from Egypt.(396) This vain and proud nation boasted, that though conquered, they nevertheless fed their conquerors; that, by means of their river, either abundance or scarcity were entirely in their own disposal. But we now have returned the Nile his own harvests, and given him back the provisions he sent us. Let the Egyptians be then convinced, by their own experience, that they are not necessary to us, and are only our va.s.sals. Let them know that their s.h.i.+ps do not so much bring us the provision we stand in need of, as the tribute which they owe us. And let them never forget that we can do without them, but that they can never do without us. This most fruitful province had been ruined, had it not worn the Roman chains. The Egyptians, in their sovereign, found a deliverer, and a father. Astonished at the sight of their granaries, filled without any labour of their own, they were at a loss to know to whom they owed this foreign and gratuitous plenty. The famine of a people, though at such a distance from us, yet so speedily stopped, served only to let them feel the advantage of living under our empire. The Nile may, in other times, have diffused more plenty on Egypt, but never more glory upon us.(397) May Heaven, content with this proof of the people's patience, and the prince's generosity, restore for ever back to Egypt its ancient fertility!"

Pliny's reproach to the Egyptians, for their vain and foolish pride with regard to the inundations of the Nile, points out one of their most peculiar characteristics, and recalls to my mind a fine pa.s.sage of Ezekiel, where G.o.d thus speaks to Pharaoh, one of their kings, "Behold I am against thee, Pharaoh, king of Egypt, the great Dragon that lieth in the midst of his rivers, which hath said, My river is my own, and I have made it for myself."(398) G.o.d perceived an insupportable pride in the heart of this prince: a sense of security and confidence in the inundations of the Nile, independent entirely on the influences of heaven; as though the happy effects of this inundation had been owing to nothing but his own care and labour, or those of his predecessors: "the river is mine, and I have made it."

Before I conclude this second part, which treats of the manners of the Egyptians, I think it inc.u.mbent on me to bespeak the attention of my readers to different pa.s.sages scattered in the history of Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, and Moses, which confirm and ill.u.s.trate part of what we meet with in profane authors upon this subject. They will there observe the perfect polity which reigned in Egypt, both in the court and the rest of the kingdom; the vigilance of the prince, who was informed of all transactions, had a regular council, a chosen number of ministers, armies ever well maintained and disciplined, both of horse, foot, and armed chariots; intendants in all the provinces; overseers or guardians of the public granaries; wise and exact dispensers of the corn lodged in them; a court composed of great officers of the crown, a captain of his guards, a chief cup-bearer, a master of his pantry; in a word, all things that compose a prince's household, and const.i.tute a magnificent court. But above all these, the readers will admire the fear in which the threatenings of G.o.d were held, the inspector of all actions, and the judge of kings themselves; and the horror the Egyptians had for adultery, which was acknowledged to be a crime of so heinous a nature, that it alone was capable of bringing destruction on a nation.(399)

Part The Third. The History of the Kings of Egypt.

No part of ancient history is more obscure or uncertain, than that of the first kings of Egypt. This proud nation, fondly conceited of its antiquity and n.o.bility, thought it glorious to lose itself in an abyss of infinite ages, which seemed to carry its pretensions backward to eternity.

According to its own historians,(400) first, G.o.ds, and afterwards demiG.o.ds or heroes, governed it successively, through a series of more than twenty thousand years. But the absurdity of this vain and fabulous claim is easily discovered.

To G.o.ds and demiG.o.ds, men succeeded as rulers or kings in Egypt, of whom Manetho has left us thirty dynasties or princ.i.p.alities. This Manetho was an Egyptian high priest, and keeper of the sacred archives of Egypt, and had been instructed in the Grecian learning: he wrote a history of Egypt, which he pretended to have extracted from the writings of Mercurius, and other ancient memoirs, preserved in the archives of the Egyptian temples.

He drew up this history under the reign, and at the command of Ptolemy Philadelphus. If his thirty dynasties are allowed to be successive, they make up a series of time, of more than five thousand three hundred years, to the reign of Alexander the Great; but this is a manifest forgery.

Besides, we find in Eratosthenes,(401) who was invited to Alexandria by Ptolemy Euergetes, a catalogue of thirty-eight kings of Thebes, all different from those of Manetho. The clearing up of these difficulties has put the learned to a great deal of trouble and labour. The most effectual way to reconcile such contradictions, is to suppose, with almost all the modern writers upon this subject, that the kings of these different dynasties did not reign successively after one another, but many of them at the same time, and in different countries of Egypt. There were in Egypt four princ.i.p.al dynasties, that of Thebes, of Thin, of Memphis, and of Tanis. I shall not here give my readers a list of the kings who have reigned in Egypt, of most of whom we have only the names transmitted to us. I shall only take notice of what seems to me most proper, to give youth the necessary light into this part of history, for whose sake princ.i.p.ally I engaged in this undertaking; and I shall confine myself chiefly to the memoirs left us by Herodotus and Diodorus Siculus, concerning the Egyptian kings, without even scrupulously preserving the exactness of succession, at least in the early part of the monarchy, which is very obscure; and without pretending to reconcile these two historians.

Their design, especially that of Herodotus, was not to lay before us an exact series of the kings of Egypt, but only to point out those princes whose history appeared to them most important and instructive. I shall follow the same plan, and hope to be forgiven, for not having involved either myself or my readers in a labyrinth of almost inextricable difficulties, from which the most able can scarce disengage themselves, when they pretend to follow the series of history, and reduce it to fixed and certain dates. The curious may consult the learned pieces,(402) in which this subject is treated in all its extent.

I am to premise, that Herodotus, upon the credit of the Egyptian priests, whom he had consulted, gives us a great number of oracles and singular incidents, all which, though he relates them as so many facts, the judicious reader will easily discover to be what they really are-I mean, fictions.

The ancient history of Egypt comprehends 2158 years, and is naturally divided into three periods.

The first begins with the establishment of the Egyptian monarchy, by Menes or Misraim, the son of Cham,(403) in the year of the world 1816; and ends with the destruction of that monarchy by Cambyses, king of Persia, in the year of the world 3479. This first period contains 1663 years.

The second period is intermixed with the Persian and Grecian history, and extends to the death of Alexander the Great, which happened in the year 3681, and consequently includes 202 years.

The third period is that in which a new monarchy was formed in Egypt by the Lagidae, or Ptolemies, descendants from Lagus, to the death of Cleopatra, the last queen of Egypt, in 3974; and this last comprehends 293 years.

I shall now treat only of the first period, reserving the two others for the aeras to which they belong.

(M64) THE KINGS OF EGYPT.-MENES. Historians are unanimously agreed, that Menes was the first king of Egypt. It is pretended, and not without foundation, that he is the same with Misram, the son of Cham.