Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 7.djvu/757

733 Pi ilAMID AGE.J EGYPT 733 not represented in the tombs, and when he is spoken of it is in terms of the most distant respect. Similarly there is an extraordinary reserve as to worship. Religious subj ects are wanting, and the religious inscriptions are usually limited to the formula of dedication. The priesthood is already numerous, but it is connected with the service of the chapels of the pyramids. In the vast court a baneful bureaucratic class is already growing, in future to destroy the welfare of the people. The reign of Khufu is principally marked by the building of the Great Pyramid. We learn from a curious inscription of a later date that he rebuilt the temple of Isis, near the Sphinx, carved out of the rock by some earlier king, and that he made a pyramid for the Princess Heut-sen in the same neighbourhood. The charge of impiety which the local tradition reported by Herodotus brings against Khufu thus fails, and the charge of tyranny associated with it, may be equally groundless. The cost of life in building the Great Pyramid can scarcely be compared with that of a long war under conditions resembling those of modern China. It should be noted that Khufu, as well as Khafra and Ratatf, were still objects of worship under Dynasty XXVI. (Brugsch, Mist., 2d ed. 57, 58). The only record of foreign conquest is a tablet in the peninsula of Sinai, commemorating what was probably no more than a suc cessful maintenance of the posts already there established to guard the mines. The reign of Khafra is commemorated, like that of Khufu, by the royal sepulchre and the tombs of subjects. From the latter we are able to contradict the tradition of his hostility to the national religion, in which Herodotus associates him with Khufu. The most interesting remains of the time are the statues of this king found in a well near the Sphinx, into which they were probably thrown either by a foreign invader or by early Christians or by Arabs, rather than hi a popular revolt after his death (&amp;lt;/., however, Maspero, Histoire Ancienne, 73). A statue and a bust of Khafra from this rind have been published by M. de Ilouge (Six Prem. Dyn., pi. iv. v,). Both are remarkable works, showing a naturalistic style that makes them far superior to later statues. The king s head is evidently a portrait, and the type is more Caucasian than the generality of later subjects. Menkaura, or Mencheres, the Mycerinua of Herodotus, and the founder of the Third Pyramid, does not seem to have been specially reverenced in later times, in contradic tion to the report of Herodotus. It is, however, interest ing, in connection with the tradition of his support of religion, that the Egyptian Ritual speaks of its 6-ith chapter as found by Har-tot-ef, son of Mencheres, at Hermopolis Magna, when he made an inspection of the temples of Egypt, and brought as a precious document to the king (Brugsch, Hist., 2d ed. p. 59, 60). It would thus appear that the Ritual was not then completed, and Manetho s statement that Suphis I., Khufu, wrote the sacred book may be another hint as to its date. It may also be noticed that the queen of Khafra was priestess of Thoth (Six Prem. Dyn., 277 segq.}, and a noble, probably son of Khafra, was high-priest of Thoth at Hermopolis, a dignity held by another prince in the same reign (Id. 280, 281). The most interesting record of Menkaura is his wooden mummy-case, found by General Howard Vyse in the Third Pyramid. In the disappointing silence of those vast monu ments, without a single ancient Egyptian writing save the graffiti of workmen and the inscriptions of native visitors, this solitary record of the time is the one authoritative voice from the royal sepulchres, and it tells us in its short archaic formula that the whole myth of Osiris in its rela tions to human destiny was already matured. The king as Osiris has become divine and has vanquished his enemies (Brugsch, Mist., 2d ed., 58, 59). The next family, Dynasty V., continued to rule at Memphis. 1 Of its sovereigns we know but little. The last but one, Assa, is the first Pharaoh whom we know to have had two names, the throne-name as well as the ordinary one. To his son Ptah-hotep is assigned the ancient moral treatise already noticed in speaking of Egyptian literature, which is on the whole the best fruit of Egyptian thought that time has spared. The last king, Unas, varied the form of royal tombs, by constructing the great truncated pyramid now called Mastabat-Faraoon, or Pharaoh s Seat, north of the Pyramids of Dahshoor. (Id. 67.) The Sixth Dynasty was probably a family of a different part of Egypt. 2 It has left many records which indicate less centralization at Memphis than those of the earlier sovereigns, and mark the beginning of wars for predatory purposes and extension of territory. This change is accompanied by a less careful style of sculpture, and less pains in the excavation of the tombs, as though the Egyptians were gaining a larger horizon, or, it may be, exchanging religion for ambition. The interest of the dynasty centres in the undoubtedly long reign of Pepi, second or third king of the line, and the inscription of Una. In this inscription we first read of great wars, and foreign conquered nations are spoken of by name. A military system had already begun, for we read how the king sent with Una an officer and soldiers to transport a sarcophagus for the royal tomb from the quarries of Tura. A war is then undertaken against the nomads of the eastern desert the Amu (Shemites 1) and the Herusha, &quot; those who are on the sand.&quot; An army is levied from the whole population of Upper and Lower Egypt, as though there were no military caste. Negroes are also enrolled from several countries mentioned byname, which must have been subject to Egypt, and are drilled by Egyptian officers, including priests. Una is appointed general in chief. Five separate expeditions are conducted by him into the country of the Herusha. It seems an error to suppose that this nation were Arabs of the desert, for the Egyptian general cut down their vines and their fig-trees (1) Another expedition was conducted by water against the same nation in a country called Takheba 1 (De Ilouge) or Terehba ] (Brugsch), which M. de Bouge&quot; conjectures may be Arabia Petrsea, or a part of Syria, remarking that it was near Egypt, for the expedi tions seem to have been annual. The external activity of the reign of Pepi is also attested by a tablet at Wadee Ma- gharah, and his public works by many inscriptions, among which we must not omit the occurrence of his name at Tanis, and in the inscription relating to the building of the temple of Dendarah. He founded a city called the &quot;City of Pepi&quot; in Middle Egypt, which has wholly disappeared, and tombs of his time are found in various parts of the Nile valley. His pyramid, which, like Memphis, was called the &quot; good station,&quot; Men-nofer, was probably at the ancient capital, and may be one of the two great pyramids of Dahshoor, which 1 This Dynasty appears to have consisted of nine kings, who pro bably reigned nearly 200 years (Brugsch, Hist., 1 ed., 288). 2 Manetho assigns to Dynasty VI. a duration of 203 years. The monumental lists, themselves in disaccord, the Turin Papyrus, and the contemporary inscription of Una, show that Manetho s list is here hopelessly corrupted. Una was in office under the immediate or second predecessor as well as under the immediate successor of Pepi, usually identified with Phiops, to whom the Egyptian historian assigns a reign of 100 or possibly 94 years. M. de Ilouge has seen this difficulty, and discussed without finally resolving it (Six Prejn. Dyn., 361 scqq.). M. Maspero has proposed a most ingenious restoration of the dynasty, on the idea that Neferkara is the lor.g-lived Phiops, and that his familr- name must therefore have been Pepi (Hist. Anc., 96). This conjec ture seems to us to be confirmed by the name of the later Neferkani Pepi of the Tablet of Abydos being qualified by the title &quot;seneb,&quot; as if to distinguish him from an earlier king of otherwise identical nan;