Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 19.djvu/233

* THEBAN CYCLE. 189 THEBES. THEBAN CYCLE. The name pivon to a. series of ancient Greek ejiies treating tlic legends of Thelies. It inehides the Tlichais (q.v.) ; tlic Epiyini. a poem of about 7000 lines, telling of the eajiture of the city hy the descendants of the heroes of the Tlicbais: and the (Edipodvia. attrib- uted to Cinirthon, a Laced;rnionian, containing about 0000 lines and giving the story of (Edipus. THEBES, thf'bz (Lat! Thcha;, from Gk. eijliat). A celebrated city of ancient Egypt, situ- ated on both sides of the Nile in about latitude 25° 50' N. Its old Egj'ptian name was Wfset, but in later times it was also called yu(t) Amen. 'the city of Amnion,' -Vi/(0 'o, 'the great city.' or simply -Yi( ( M . 't'le city' (urhs) ; in the Old Testament it is called .A'o or No Amon, and in the Assyrian inscriptions its name appears as AT. hy the (Jreeks, who identified the god Amnion with Zeus, it was sometimes called 'Diosjiolis. 'the city of Zeus.' and it was specially designated as 'Great Diospolis' to distinguish it from 'Lesser Diospolis.' the modern Hon. The origin of the more usual Greek name Qijffai is obscure. Thebes was the capital of the fourth nome of Upper Egypt, and was a very ancient city, but did not rise to importance xmtil the time of the Eleventh Dynasty, which was of Theban origin. Under this and the following dynasty the city was the capital of Egj'pt, and some of its oldest temple buildings date from this period. Its real greatness, however, begins with the ex- pulsion of the Hyksos invaders by the Theban princes, who united the whole land under their sway (Eighteenth Dynasty), and adorned their city with temples and palaces of unprecedented magnificence. The kings of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Dynasties added to the work of their predecessors, and for centuries Thebes was the chief residence of the Egyptian Pharaohs and far surpassed all other cities of the land in wealth and splendor. The persecution of the worship of Amnion by the heretic King Amenophis IV. (q.v.), and the temporary removal of the seat of government to Tel el-Amarna, afTected Thebes but little. Setl I. and especially Rameses II. (c. 1.340-127.3 B.C.) restored the desecrated sanc- tuaries and lavished enormous wealth upon the Theban temples. Under the Twenty-first Dynasty, however, Thebes ceased to be the capital of Egypt, and from this time gradu- ally declined in importance. In the seventh century B.C. it was again the seat of gov- ernment, for a time, under the Twenty-fifth or Ethiopian Dynasty, but when the cajiital was removed to Sais (q.v.) by the following dynasty ( Twenty-sixth ), it began a new period of de- cline, its temples were repaired and new build- ings were erected by later nionarchs, especially by the Ptolemies, but. overshadowed by the rise of new cities, it gradually sank to the position of an insignificant provincial town. Its great temples sustained serious injuries in the course of various revolts against the Ptolemies, and were further ruined by an earthquake in B.C. 27. In the time of the geographer .Strabo (B.C. 24) Thebes was a ruined city as at present, its site being occupied merely by a few scattered villages. The city proper lay upon the east bank of the river between the great temples now represented by the ruins of Luxor (q.v.) and Karnak (q.v.) ; a little to the north was the suburb Ma'dii. the modern Medamut, with a temple built by Amen- ophis II. (Eighteenth Dynasty) and dedicated to the Theban war god .Mont (q.v.). -Additions were made to fliis temple by Seti I., Rameses 11., and several of the Ptolemies, but it is now al- most entirely destroyed. On the west side of the river were suburbs of considerable size, and Rameses III. seems to have built his palace in the neighborhood of his memorial temple at Medinet Ilabu (q.v.), but in general this side of the river was occupied by the Theban necropolis, which extended to the Libyan range. It con- tained numerous temples, erected as memorials of the Egyptian kings, and to these temples were at- tached dwellings for the priests, schools, gran- aries, stables, barracks, and other buildings. Nearer the hills were the dwellings of the arti- sans whose emplo.yment was in the necropolis: stone-masons, builders, painters, sculptors, and especially, the enibalmers. There were also inns for the entertainment of visitors, and many .shops for the sale of funeral ollerings and other ob- ,iects. The necropolis, in fact, formed a great city, and under the New Empire was under the direction of a high official entitled the 'Prince of the Western City.' The principal memorial temples of the Theban necropolis, beginning at the north, were those of Kurnah (q.v.) and Deir el- Bahri (q.v.), the Ramesseum (q.v.), and that of iledinet Habu (q.v.). The Temple of Deir el-Medineh, dedicated to the goddess Hathor, lies a little to the west of the Medinet Habu. It was founded by Ptolemy IV. Philopator, was completed under Ptolemy Philometor and Ptolemj- Euergetes II.. and in Christian times was converted into a monasterv. Between the line of memorial temples and the hills are the cemeteries of Drah Abu'l Negga, Asasif. Abd el- Kurnah, and Kurnet JIurraT. The rocky hills bordering on the plain of the necropolis are honeycombed with tombs. In a narrow valley to the north of Kurnah are the tombs of the kings, in which were buried the nionarchs of dynasties XVIII-XX. Each of these tombs con- tains a number of galleries and chambers whose walls are covered with paintings and religious texts. Strabo states that forty of these tombs were worthy of special attention ; twenty- five of these are now accessible. The tombs of the queens, to the west of Aledinet Habu. are for the most part in an unfinished state. A few of them, however, dating from the Eighteenth Dvnasty. are elaboratelv constructed and arc rich- ly adorned with sculptures and paintings. Near Koni el-Hetan, between Medinet Habu and the Ramesseum, are two colossal statues of King Amenophis III.; the.y originallv stood before a temple erected by the King, but onl.y traces of the building now remain. The more northerly of these colossi, the famous 'vocal Jlemnon' (see Memnon) .was in no way distinguished from other colossi. The chief deities worshiped at Thebes were the great god Amnion (q.v.), his spouse JInt (q.v.). and their child Chons (q.v.). See Li'XOR and Karn.k. Consult: Dexn-iption de I'Erji/ptc (Paris, 1809- 29) : Lepsius, DenlcmOler (Berlin, 1840-58) ; Wil- kinson. Topoqraphi/ of Thebes (London. 1835) ; Mariette. Monuments of Upper Egypt (ib., 1877) : Wiedemann, Geschichte des alien Aegyp- tens (Berlin, 1878). THEBES (Gk. e^;3ai. 77ir&at). The principal city of B(jcotia, in ancient Greece, situated in