CHAPTER IV.
THE KINGDOM OF MEMPHIS

The lists of the Egyptians place Menes (Mena) at the head of their series of kings. They describe him as a native of This, a place in the neighbourhood of Abydus, below Thebes, a district which Diodorus considers the oldest part of Egypt. Menes passes for the founder of the kingdom and the builder of Memphis (Mennefer); he is said to have taught the Egyptians the worship of the gods and the offering of sacrifice.¹³⁰ Herodotus informs us that he learnt from the Egyptian priests that Menes had thrown a dam across the Nile about 100 stades above Memphis, and thus forced the stream which previously flowed at the foot of the Libyan chain of hills to leave its ancient channel, and flow at an equal distance between the two ranges. When the land thus gained by the dam had become firm, he built upon it the city, now called Memphis, and still situated in the narrow part of Egypt. Towards the north and west sides of the city, Menes had excavated a lake, and filled it with water from the river – which was itself a protection to the city on the east, – and in the city he built the greatest and most remarkable temple of Hephæstus (Ptah).¹³¹ Diodorus observes: – The founder of Memphis, the most splendid city in Egypt, selected the most suitable site by founding the city in the place where the Nile separates into several arms, so that the city, lying on the pass, commanded the navigation up the Nile. He also obtained for the place a wonderful advantage and security by throwing a huge dam in front of it towards the south, as the Nile at the time of inundation overflows the district. This dam was a protection against the rising water, and at the same time served as an acropolis and defence from the attack of enemies. On all the other sides of the city he caused a large and deep lake to be excavated, which received the overflow of the water and afforded the strongest protection for the city. The circuit of the city he placed at 150 stades, and owing to the excellence of the situation, Memphis was generally chosen by the kings as their place of residence.¹³² The situation, just a little above the place where the river-valley, hitherto enclosed between the two ranges of hills, opens out into the Delta, was certainly the best adapted to form the centre of an empire extending over the narrow valley of the upper river and the broader district of the Delta, with its wealth of corn-land and meadows, and to check the entrance of enemies who came from the north-west or the north-east into the upper valley, even when it was no longer possible to maintain the Delta against them. About fifteen miles above Memphis, at Kafr-el-Yat, the Nile makes a considerable bend to the east, and modern investigations claim to have discovered traces showing that this curve is due to the hand of man.

Menes, whose accession, according to the arrangement of Lepsius, would fall in the year 3892 B.C., was followed on the throne by King Athotis (Ateta), who was said to have built the citadel at Memphis. Next came Kenkenes, whose successor was Uenephes, to whom is ascribed the erection of the pyramids. We have seen what care and labour the Egyptians devoted to their tombs, their "everlasting houses." The west, where the sun sets, and the desert spreads out in boundless expanse beyond the Libyan range, belonged in their minds to the gods of night, of the under-world, and of death. About ten miles to the west of Memphis there rises a desolate and barren plateau of rock, which for many miles runs parallel to the river, about 100 feet above the blooming and animated valley through which the Nile takes its course. In that rocky soil, which separates the fruitful land from the desert, the bodies of the dead were placed in chambers, either hewn in the solid stone, or, where the soil was less firm, built of masonry, and thus secured even from the overflow of the river. Even the kings sought their resting-places on this plateau of rock. They, above all, gave attention to the solidity and durability of their tombs; and in death, as in life, they wished to be kings. The place where a king rested must be marked as royal, and visible from a distance; the grave of a king must tower over the rest; his chamber must be of all most difficult to open. Thus at first blocks of stone were rolled upon the closed burial-place of a king, or a mound of earth was raised over it, if sand and soil were to be obtained in the neighbourhood. The strong winds which blew from the desert made it, however, necessary to secure these mounds, and cover them with stone. Hence by degrees the sepulchral heaps acquired a definite shape: they were rectangular structures, lessening toward the apex; then, by extending the base and sharpening the gradient, they were brought into the form of pyramids, and thus obtained the greatest possible firmness and solidity. For a similar reason the core, or central part, was no longer made of earth, but of brick; where blocks of stone could be obtained they were fitted into the core with more and more regularity, until at last these structures were completed within and without of rectangular hewn blocks of stone in regular layers, and artificial mountains of stone towered over the sepulchral chambers of the kings.

"At a distance of forty stades from Memphis," Strabo tells us, "is a range of hills, on which stand the pyramids, or sepulchres of the kings. Among these, three are especially deserving of notice. Rectangular in shape, they are about one stadium high; and the height is slightly less than the length of either side. The sides are not equal, one is a little longer than the other, and near the middle of the longer side is a stone, which can be taken out. Behind this a winding, hollow passage leads to the tomb. Two of these pyramids stand close to each other on the same level; at a distance, on a higher level, rises the third, which, though much smaller, has been erected at much greater cost." "Like mountains," says Tacitus, "the pyramids have been raised amid impassable quicksands by the emulation and power of the kings."¹³³

About seventy of these structures, which rise in a long line on the plateau of Memphis, from Abu Roash to Dahshur,¹³⁴ remain as witnesses of the rulers of the old kingdom of Memphis and their dependants, of the artistic skill and laborious industry of their nation. Of some only the bases and a few fragments are in existence; of the largest, the points, and at least a part of the casing, are either decayed, fallen down, or broken off; for at a later time the Arabs used these monuments as quarries. Three pyramids which stand in the neighbourhood of the modern Abusir are formed of rough blocks of stone, both in the cores and in the passages to the sepulchral chambers; and these blocks are fastened together by mud from the Nile poured in between them; their casings, now decayed, were of lime-stone blocks, and in height they extended from 150 to 200 feet. Others, originally at least, of an equal height, of which the core was regularly built of brick, are found farther to the south near Dahshur. The architecture of these remains shows that the kings of Memphis commenced building their tombs soon after their accession. They began, it would seem, with a core of moderate size, and in this they probably constructed a sort of temporary chamber. If time sufficed, the first plan was overlaid with new strata, and thus it gradually increased in size. Should the builder die before the whole was completed, the casing of the structure thus raised in the form of steps was left to the successor.¹³⁵ Between seven smaller pyramids, built regularly of stone blocks, which are about 150 feet in height, and of similar plan and structure, rise the three largest at Gizeh; the highest was originally 480 feet in height, though now it measures only 450 feet; the next greatest, standing south-west of the highest, is now 447 feet, and was originally 457 feet in height; the third measures but 218 feet. The second largest, originally twenty-three feet lower than the largest, is on a slightly higher level, the masonry is inferior to the largest, and the chamber lies immediately under the area of the structure. The largest measures 716 feet, or 500 Egyptian cubits,¹³⁶ on each side of the area; the height along the slope is 574 feet, and the structure contains about ninety million cubic feet of masonry. Fifty feet above the original area, now covered with the sand of the desert, in the middle of the north side, there commences a gradually descending passage, about three feet broad and four feet high, leading to a chamber hewn deep in the foundation rock. This chamber lies more than one hundred feet below the level of the pyramid, exactly 600 feet under the apex, and in a perpendicular line with it; it is thirty-six feet above the level of the Nile. From this passage to the chamber there branches off, just behind the entrance, a horizontal shaft, and from this rises an ascending passage leading to two chambers, one over the other, which, like the sepulchral chamber below, lie in the axis of the pyramid. The third and smaller pyramid – its sides measure 333 feet, and the height of the slope is 262 feet – being built upon looser soil, required a greater substructure, on which it rose in five or six perpendicular and gradually diminishing stories, the spaces between being filled up with bevelled masonry. Up to a considerable height the casing consists of polished slabs of granite. Under this structure in the native rock lies a larger chamber, and behind this the sepulchral chamber.

When Herodotus visited Egypt about the middle of the fifth century B.C., and questioned his interpreter and guide about the builders of these three pyramids, he was told in answer that they were built by Cheops, Chephren, and Mycerinus. He was told that Cheops first caused a road to be made from the stone quarries in the Arabian chain of hills – the range east of the Nile – down to the river, and again from the west side of the river to the high ground above Memphis. The road was built of smoothed stones five stades in length, ten fathoms broad, and at the highest places thirty-two fathoms high; and it was intended to convey the materials from the Arabian side of the river. In making this road and building the subterranean chamber for the grave of Cheops ten years were consumed, although 100,000 men were constantly employed upon it by spaces of three months, when they were relieved by an equal number of fresh workmen. Twenty years were then spent upon the pyramid, of which each side and the height measured 800 feet; it was built in such a manner that the structure was carried out by landings and steps, like a staircase. When the proper height was reached, the landings were covered from top to bottom with smoothed and carefully-fitted stones, and no stone is less than thirty feet. Under the surface was a canal carried in masonry from the Nile round the subterranean chamber. "It is also inscribed on the pyramid," Herodotus continues, "what the workmen consumed in radishes, onions, and garlic, and on these, as I well remember, the interpreter who read the letters told me, 1,600 talents of silver were spent. If this is true, what must have been expended upon iron for the tools, and on food and clothing for the workmen?" When Cheops had reigned fifty years he was succeeded by his brother Chephren, who also built a pyramid, though not equal in size to the other, and without any chamber or subterranean canal. "Both pyramids stand on the same elevation, of about one hundred feet; but the second is forty feet lower than the first; the lower stratum is built of vari-coloured Ethiopian stone." When Chephren had reigned fifty-six years, he was followed by Mycerinus, the son of Cheops. This king also left a pyramid behind him, "but his pyramid was much smaller than that built by his father: the sides are only 280 feet in length; the lower half is built of Ethiopian stone."¹³⁷

The account of Diodorus is as follows: – King Chemmis of Memphis reigned fifty years, and built the largest of the three pyramids, which in height measures more than six plethra, and along the sides more than seven plethra. It is entirely constructed of solid stone, very difficult to work, and therefore of endless durability. Even now, although not less than a thousand, or as some say even more than 3,400, years have passed, the structure is uninjured, and the joints of the stones unloosened. Besides, we are told that these stones were brought from a considerable distance out of Arabia, and the structure was carried to its present height by means of mounds of earth. Most wonderful of all, no traces of these mounds, no fragments from the hewing and smoothing of the stones remain; so that it would seem that this work was not accomplished gradually by the hand of man, but was planted complete by a god in the midst of the surrounding sand. Though it is said that 360,000 men bestowed their labour on the structure, the work can hardly have been finished in twenty years, and the number of men who erected it must also have removed the mounds of earth and excavated material, and put everything in its original condition. Chemmis was followed by his brother Kephren, who reigned fifty-six years. Other accounts tell us that the kingdom descended on his son, Chabryes, and not on his brother. But all agree that he built the second pyramid, which resembles the first in the art of the execution, though much inferior in size, since on the sides it measures only one stadium (or, according to recent measurement, exactly 700½ Greek feet). And while the money spent in radishes and garden herbs for the builders is inscribed on the larger one, the smaller remains without any inscription. Though both these kings had destined these tombs for their place of burial, neither is buried there. Roused by the burden of their labours, the cruelty and violence of these kings – and in Herodotus also Cheops and Chephren appear as wicked and godless kings – the people threatened to take their bodies out of their graves and insult them. Terrified by this threat, each of the kings in his last moments bade his relations bury him privately in a secret place. After Kephren reigned Mycerinus, whom others call Mencherinus, the son of Chemmis. He built the smallest pyramid. Though less in size, it surpasses the others in the excellence of the work and the beauty of the stone; up to the fifteenth layer it consists of black stone resembling the stone of Thebes; from thence to the top the stone is the same as in the other pyramids. On the north side is written the name of the builder, Mycerinus. Abhorring the cruelty of his predecessors, Mycerinus, as we learn, sought to make his rule moderate and beneficent to his subjects, and did everything to gain the affections of the nation. He paid great attention to the administration of justice; and to the common people who had not received from the tribunals such a sentence as seemed just to him, he made presents. "But as to the building of the pyramids, there is no agreement either among the Egyptians or their historians; some ascribe them to the kings I have mentioned; some to other kings."¹³⁸

The accounts given by Herodotus and Diodorus of the structure of the largest pyramid are completely confirmed by modern researches. Even now it is thought that traces can be recognised of the causeway which served for the transport of the materials from the left bank of the Nile to the plateau.¹³⁹