Volume I Part 21 (2/2)
Another innovation of the saain according to Herodotus,[214] another pyramid constructed at about the same time, namely, that which formed one side of the Labyrinth ”It had,” says the historian, ”forty fathoe size The entrance was by a subterranean passage” From the Greek word used (???????pta?) we see that Herodotus means that the faces, or perhaps only the principal face, of this pyrah, were covered with bas-reliefs There is in Egypt no other example of a pyramid so decorated The architectural works of this period have almost entirely vanished, but we may, perhaps, look upon it as one of their characteristics that the bareness which they had inherited froyptian art, was relieved and adorned by the intervention of the sculptor
[214] HERODOTUS, ii 148 DIODORUS (l 89) speaks of the same and STRABO, who also appears to have seen it, asserts its funerary character (p 1165, C) He says it was four plethra (393 feet) both in width and height This last diyptian pyramids that are known to us the shortest diaht
It was the desire for such ornaantic pedestals for statues According to all the analogies afforded by later ages, these statues must have been those of the princes who built the pyramids in question We have no reason to suppose that any of the kings of the first six dynasties erected any colossal figures like those which were set up in such nule exception of the Sphinx, none of the statues left to us by the ancient ereatly exceed the natural size But it is evident that such figures as would be fit to crown the pyraant size even if no eneral outlines were to be visible from below Seen from a point nearly 500 feet below, and in consequence of the inclination of the pyramid faces, at some considerable distance laterally, even a statue fifty feet high, like the two colossi of Ah to a spectator Its artistic results would be very slender, and yet its erection would require prodigious mechanical efforts It would have required all the multitudes of labourers, the patience, and the tiyptians alone dared to expend upon their monuments But perhaps it may be said that these colossi were statues built-up of comparatively small stones To this we ypt is a monolith A statue, of whatever size, made in different pieces would foryptian sculpture as we know it
Until such works are proved to exist we decline to believe in them
The problem was a much simpler one in the cases of the pyra to Herodotus they were about 309 feet high, doubtless including their statues
Situated as they were in the middle of the lake, Herodotus could not himself have measured them, and his statement that they sank as far below the level of the water as they rose above it is an obvious exaggeration When the bed of the lake was formed, two masses of rock were no doubt reserved, as in the cases of the other pyramids, to form the core of the projected edifices, and therefore it is likely enough that the lowest courses of the constructions themselves dipped but little below the surface of the lake[215] In his as were conceived, Herodotus has too often attributed excessive diht of the Great Pyraht plethra, or about 820 feet, nearly 340 feet in excess of the truth It is therefore probable that the figures which he gives for the lake pyraerated
These pyramids were, on account of their comparatively modest dimensions, much better adapted to the ideas of the Ousourtesens and Aantic piles of Cheops, Chephren, and Mycerinus
[215] If the passage in which Herodotus makes the statement here referred to be taken in connection with the remarks of Diodorus, a probable explanation of the old historian's assertion???tt?? t??t?? (?????
sub) ?at???pe? ?? ?s? t?p??, ?? ? t?f?? ???d??se ?a? d??
p??a?da?, t?? ?? ?a?t??, t?? d? t?? ???a????, stad?a?a? t?
???? By this it would appear that, in excavating the bed, or a part of the bed, of the famous lake, a mass of earth was left in order to bear future witness to the depth of the excavation and the general nitude of the work This mass would probably be reveted with stone, and, in order that even when surrounded and alnificance should not be lost, the pyraht--ED
Finally there is not a text to be found, outside the pages of Herodotus, which mentions pyramids surmounted by statues, and upon none of those monuments which in one way or another bear representations of the pyramids are they shown in any other way than with pointed summits Thus do we find them in the papyri, upon those steles of the Memphite necropolis which commemorate the priests devoted to their service, and in those tombs at Memphis, Abydos, and Thebes where the pyrahts, is used as a terminal element Neither in the small number of pyramids which have come down to us comparatively intact, nor in those which are represented in reliefs, is there the sn of a truncated summit or of any platform which could by any possibility have borne a statue
[Illustration: FIG 154--Pyramidion: Louvre]
We may say the sareat numbers in tombs and which fill our s in connection with the worshi+p of the sun ”The principal figure,” says M de Rouge, ”is generally shown in a posture of adoration, with his face turned to the sun On his left hand is the invocation to the rising, and on his right that to the setting sun These arrangements are enera lines as the orientation of the tombs themselves”[216] These minute pyraranite, or calcareous stone, and it is natural that we should look upon thereat funerary monuments which furnished a type, consecrated by the most venerable of the national traditions, of that structure facing the four cardinal points which we yptian toyptiens exposes dans les Galeries du Louvre_ (4th edition, 1865, p 56)
We may believe, then, that the pyramid of the ancient empire terminated in a pyraed with the final completion of the edifice worked doards fro the immense steps which each face displayed five or six thousand years ago and now displays again, with the final casing which protected them for so many centuries Even Herodotus saw that this must have been thewould have been too dangerous after the slope of the sides had beenof polished granite Work upon such a surface, with its 51 or 52 degrees of elevation, by eain, points of resistance could not have been obtained for the elevation of theor leaving holes in the casing, which would afterwards have to be filled up These difficulties would have unnecessarily coun from the top The masons could then make use of the steps for their own locoe to be lifted fro could be easier than to fix windlasses by which the largest blocks could be raised with facility
[217] ??ep????? d' ?? t? ???tata a?t?? p??ta, et? d? t? ?p?e?a t??t?? ??ep??e??(ii 125)
As the workmen approached the base they left above the at such an angle that no foot could rest upon it, and forradation of the pyra into the passages which led to the ave to the pyramid those continuous lines which were necessary to make its beauty complete, and, if the ested, it furnished colour effects which had their beauty also But, above all, it was a protection, a defensive ar as the pyramid preserved its cuirass intact, it was difficult for those who in their attack But this obstacle once pierced it was co The inner ; the joints were comparatively open, and the stones were soft and easily cut Hence we see that some pyramids, especially those which were built of bricks, have been reduced by the action of time into heaps of _debris_, in which the pyranised
Philo, who seems to be so well infor was put in place ”The whole work,” he says, ”is so well adjusted, and so thoroughly polished, that the whole envelope seems but one block of stone”[218] The pyramid of Cheops has been entirely despoiled of its outer covering, and it is to that of Mycerinus that we must now turn if ish to have some idea of the care hich the as done The lower part of this pyraranite, fixed and polished in the most perfect manner At the foot of the Great Pyramid several blocks have been found which see of that edifice[219] They are trapezoidal in foro re stones were placed one upon another, and adjusted by their external faces They were not, as was at first supposed, sunk into the upper face of the course below byrock in which the first course was fixed As to whether the external faces of these blocks were dressed to the required angle before they left the quarry, or whether the ere done after they were in place we cannot say with any certainty, but it is ed with the progress of time and the succession of architects In such a matter we should find, if we entered into details, diversity similar to that which we have already shown to have characterized the forements, and the materials of which they were composed
[218] S??a??? d? ?a? ?ate?es???? t? p?? ?????, ?ste d??e??
???? t?? ?atas?e??sat?? ?a? e??a? p?t?a? s?f??a?, p 2,259, A
So, too, the elder Pliny, though with rather less precision: ”Est autem saxo naturali elaborata et lubrica” (_Nat Hist_ xxxvi 12)
[219] According to Jorey lieneous than those of the body of the building”
(_Description de l'egypte_, t v p 640); but according to Philo, this casing was formed, as we have already said, of various ranite or other rock are shown to have forust, 1841
Thus soranite have been found at the foot of the pyramid of Chephren, which see[221] Such a section seems, upon paper, the sile between two of the steps, but it is far inferior in solidity to the trapezoidal section The prisms had no alliance one with another; they had to depend for their security entirely upon their adherence to the faces of the graded core, so that they could easily be carried off, or become dislocated from natural causes This systeeneous envelope with a thickness of its own, and partly independent of the ypt_, part i p 338 (ed of 1878) Herodotus (ii 127) says that the first course of the Great Pyramid was built of a parti-coloured Ethiopian stone (?p?de?a? t?? p??t??
d??? ????? ?????p???? p???????) By Ethiopian stone we ranite of Syene The Greek historian seehout the thickness of the pyramid, was of this stone His ood state of preservation, and he never thought of asking whether or no the core was of the same material as the outer case