Page:A History of Art in Ancient Egypt Vol 1.djvu/364

 274 A History of Art in Ancient Egypt. they had done him while ahve and for those which they might still do him when dead. In their latter capacity these buildings have a right to be considered temples, and we shall defer the consideration of their architectural arrangements, which differ only in details from those of the purely religious buildings, until we come to speak of the religious architecture of Egypt. We shall here content our- selves with remarking that the separation of the tomb and the funerary chapel by some mile or mile and a half was a novelty in Egypt. The different parts of the royal tomb were closely connected under the Memphite Empire, and the change in arrangement must have been a consequence of some modifica- tion in the Egyptian notions as to a second life. In the mastaba the double had everything within reach of his hand. Without trouble to himself he could make use of all of the matters which had been provided for the support of his precarious existence : the corpse in the mummy pit, the statues in the serdab, the por- traits in bas-relief upon the walls of the public chamber. Through the chinks between the pieces of broken stone by which the well was filled up, and through the conduits con- trived in the thickness of the walls, the magic formulae of the funerary prayers, the grateful scent of the incense, and of the burnt fat of the victims (Fig. 177), reached his attentive senses. Brought thus into juxtaposition one with another, the elements Fig. 176. — Amenophis III. presenting an offering to Amen. Decoration of a pier at Thebes ; from Prisse.