Encyclopaedia Britannica > Volume 8, DIA-England

558
EGYPT.
Egypt, ed the three successive wells to the depth of a hundred
and fifty-five feet. He also described the catacombs of
Alexandria, which seem to have been principally employ¬
ed by the Greek inhabitants of that city. The same vo¬
lume contains a very interesting account of the customs
and manners of modern Egypt, from the journal of Dr
Hume.
A considerable addition has been made to our know¬
ledge of the geography of Egypt by the publication of
Lieutenant Colonel Leake’s accurate and elegant map of
that country, comprehending also a sketch of Nubia, as
far as the southern Cataract, which appears to be the limit
of the existing remains of antiquity. Besides the results
of his own personal survey, Colonel Leake has employed
the observations of the French astronomers for the deter¬
mination of the situation of the different places ; and, with
respect to the remoter parts, he had the advantage of con¬
sulting the manuscript papers of the lamented Mr Burck-
hardt, who unhappily fell a victim to a dysentery at Cairo
in October 1817, after having obtained, by a long resi¬
dence in the country under the name of Sheikh Ibrahim,
an intimate acquaintance with every thing that could have
tended to facilitate the further prosecution of his projected
expedition into parts of the continent still more remote.
Besides the ruins of Greek churches scattered throughout
this country, the principal points of Nubia, which are
remarked as exhibiting remains of still greater antiquity,
are the Parembole of the Itinerary of Antoninus near De¬
bod, and Tzitzi, now Klitzie, both of which had been vi¬
sited by Colonel Leake and Mr Hamilton; Kardassy or
Gartaas ; Taphis and Contra Taphis, now Tafa; Kalabshe,
the ancient Talmis; Merowan, the ancient Tutzis, near
Gyrshe; Pselcis, now Dakke and Corte, still Korti; Ma-
harraka, supposed to be the Hierosycaminon of the Itine¬
rary, and which may very possibly have been the Maracu
mentioned by Vansleb as an archbishopric; Seboua;
Hasseya; Derr; Ibrim, the Premnis of the ancients;
Ybsambul, perhaps the Aboccis, with its two temples, still
better known by the labours of the active and ingenious
Belzoni; Beyllany, or rather Fereyg; Serra, probably
Phthuris; Sukkoy, perhaps Cambusis; Samne, not impro¬
bably the Acina of Nero’s spies; Aamara, possibly Stady-
sis; and Soleb, not far short of the southernmost Cata¬
ract, where the author is disposed to place the Napata of
the ancients, in latitude about 19^°. This situation would
agree very well with the distances of Napata from Syene
and from Meroe; but it is impossible to admit that this
Cataract can be so far south as even 20°, consistently with
the testimony of other geographers respecting the lati¬
tudes of Mosho and Sukkot; and indeed the course of the
river is laid down more nearly north and south than the
description of Burckhardt requires.1
The Quarterly Review, in various numbers, afforded a
highly interesting and gratifying detail of the operations
and discoveries which had been conducted in Egypt by
several of our spirited and enterprising countrymen.
Amongst these Mr Bankes proceeded the farthest south
in the steps of Mr Burckhardt, and made collections and
drawings of a great number of striking remains of antiqui¬
ty ;2 and he sent home to this country a variety of statues
and bas reliefs, as well as large manuscripts on papyrus,
in the epistolographic or enchorial character. Mr Salt
was also indefatigable in his exertions, and he most for¬
tunately found an assistant of Herculean strength of body,
and of proportional energy of mind, in the person of Mr
Belzoni. The head called a young Memnon, now in the
British museum, which weighs eight or ten tons, and which
is one of the very finest specimens of Egyptian sculpture F
extant, was a joint present of Mr Salt and Mr Burckhardt - ,
and Mr Belzoni, as already stated, had the merit of having ' ^
conducted the very difficult operation of bringing it down
to the Nile. Mr Hamilton conjectured that it might have
belonged to the statue described by Philostratus as a
Memnon of great beauty;3 but the remaining fragment
of the hieroglyphical inscription agrees better with the
name of another sovereign, apparently of the same family,
who is represented in several other magnificent monu¬
ments at Thebes and elsewhere.
Captain Caviglia, the master of a mercantile vessel in
the Mediterranean, exerted himself with singular activity
and perseverance in examining the interior of the great
pyramid of Cheops. After having retraced the forgotten
steps of Mr Davison, he succeeded in pursuing the prin¬
cipal oblique passage two hundred feet farther downwards
than it w-as before practicable, and in discovering at this
point a communication with the well, which descends from
the floor of the upper chamber. This communication af¬
fording him a freer circulation of air, he was enabled to
proceed twenty-eight feet farther in the passage, when he
found that it opened into a spacious chamber, sixty-six
feet by twenty-seven, but of unequal height, immediately
under the centre of the pyramid, which Mr Salt supposes
to have been the place of the theca, or sarcophagus, men¬
tioned by Strabo as situated at the end of the oblique
passage, though at present no sarcophagus is to be found
in it. The floor is elevated thirty feet above the level of
the Nile, so that the water could never have flowed into
this part of the pyramid, to surround the tomb of Cheops,
as Herodotus imagined. Some passages leading out of
this chamber appear to terminate abruptly, without open¬
ing into any others. The dimensions of the upper cham¬
ber, which still contains a sarcophagus, are only thirty-five
and a half feet by seventeen and a quarter, and eighteen
and three fourths high.
Captain Caviglia having proceeded to examine a num¬
ber of detached mausoleums, more or less dilapidated, in
the neighbourhood of the pyramids, found their embellish¬
ments chiefly in the style of the Theban catacombs; and,
what is not a little remarkable, they sometimes contained
images too large to have been brought in through the
doors or wdndows. Some of the stones with sculptures
were placed upside down ; and it was conjectured that
these might possibly have been portions of the original
casing of the pyramids, which is said to have been sculp¬
tured, but which is now fallen down. His next under¬
taking w-as the very arduous task of digging away the
sand in front of the great Sphinx ; a share of the expenses
of this labour, which amounted to eight or nine hundred
pounds, being contributed by Mr Salt and some other
gentlemen. The body of the monster is principally form¬
ed out of the solid rock, and the paws are of masonry, ex¬
tending forwards fifty feet from the body; between them
were found several sculptured tablets, so arranged as to
constitute a small temple or chapel; and farther forwards
a square altar with horns, which seems to have been em¬
ployed for burnt offerings.
Mr Belzoni, after many fruitless efforts, succeeded, as
already mentioned, in discovering the entrance into the
second pyramid of Cephrenes, in which Herodotus had
asserted that there were no chambers. An Arabic in¬
scription testifies that the pyramid had once been open¬
ed in the presence of the “ Sultan Ali Mahomet the First,
Ugloch,” who may possibly have been the Ottoman em¬
peror, Mahomet the First, in the beginning of the fif*
1 Map of Egypt, two sheets, Lond. 1818.
2 Quarterly Review, No. 31.
3 Ibid. No. 36.