Egyptian Hall

“ That which first occurs to the beholder, who has old Egypt in his thoughts, is its inferiority in artistic effect to the stupendous but simple grandeur of the Egyptian Priests’ House of Parliament in the hypostyle Hall of Karnak, with its entourage of awe-inspiring temples, its vast outer court, and its lofty propylons. ”

“ All these things, which have done so much to reconstitute for us the history of the earliest period of the Egyptian monarchy, were placed under the care of the dead slaves whose bodies were buried round the empty tomb-chamber of their royal master in Abydos.
The killing and entombment of the royal servants is of the highest anthropological interest, for it throws a vivid light upon the manners of the time. It shows the primeval Egyptians as a semi-barbaric people of childishly simple ways of thought. The king was dead. For all his kingship he was a man, and no man was immortal in this world. ”

“ It is in the Italian style, and resembles a Palladian Palace. Its conspicuous front, with Corinthian columns supporting a pediment, in the centre of which is a group of allegorical sculpture, is well known to all frequenters of the city. Formerly it had an open court, but this has been roofed over and converted into a grand banquetting hall, known as the Egyptian Hall. There are other dining rooms, a ball room, and drawing room, all superbly decorated, and the Mansion House is a worthy home for the Lord Mayor of London. ”

“ Henceforth Egyptian civilization runs an uninspired and undeveloping course till the days of the Saïtes and the Ptolemies. This point in the history of Egypt, therefore, forms a convenient stopping-place at which to pause, while we turn once more to Western Asia, and ascertain to what extent recent excavations and research have thrown new light upon the problems connected with the rise and history of the Assyrian and Neo-Babylonian Empires. ”

“ It will be observed that in this case the abacus does not extend beyond the architrave, as it does in the Doric order of the Greeks.
We have given a column from the central aisle of the Great Hall at Karnak, as affording a good type of the bell-shaped capital (Fig. 80) . We also give an example, with slight variations, from the Ramesseum (Fig. 92) . It comes from the principal order in the hypostyle hall, and shows Egyptian architecture perhaps at its best. The profile of the capital combines grace with firmness of outline in the most happy manner. ”

“ Every picture has its astronomical and mythological significance. In the rear portion of this space, which is partitioned off, is the hall of tombs, and here are the tomb chambers from Memphis, and the other monuments of the Old Kingdom.
The middle hall is divided into the portico, the hypostylic hall, and the sanctuary of an Egyptian temple. The portico, which lies to the south, and which in Egypt is covered only by the bright blue arch of heaven, is intended to arouse in the spectator the sensation of being still in the open air. ”

“ Here we have an elderly man with a long pointed beard, there two women with inane smiles upon their countenances, here another woman, of better work this time, with a child slung across her shoulder. This figure, which is in the British Museum, must be very late, as prehistoric Egyptian antiquities go. It is almost as good in style as the early Ist Dynasty objects. Such were the objects which the simple piety of the early Egyptian prompted him to bury with the bodies of his dead, in order that they might find solace and contentment in the other world. ”

“ We see from this what an Egyptian artist could do when his shackles were removed, but unluckily Egypt never produced another king who was at the same time an original genius, an artist, and a thinker. When Akhunaten died, the Egyptian artists’ shackles were riveted tighter than ever. The reaction was strong. The kingdom had fallen into anarchy, and the foreign empire which his predecessors had built up had practically been thrown to the winds by Akhunaten. The whole is an example of the confusion and disorganization which ensue when a philosopher rules. ”

“ The transference of the royal power to Memphis under the Hid Dynasty naturally led to a great increase of Egyptian activity in the Northern lands. We read in Manetho of a great Libyan war in the reign of Neche-rophes, and both Sa-nekht and Tjeser seem to have finally established Egyptian authority in the Sinaitic peninsula, where their rock-inscriptions have been found. ”

“ In any case, at the dawn of connected Egyptian history, we find two main centres of civilization in Egypt, Heliopolis and Buto in the Delta in the North, and Edfu and Hierakonpolis in the South. Here were established at the beginning of the Chalcolithic stage of culture, we may say, two kingdoms, of Lower and Upper Egypt, which were eventually united by the superior arms of the kings of Upper Egypt, who imposed their rule upon the North but at the same time removed their capital thither. The dualism of Buto and Hierakonpolis really lasted throughout Egyptian history. ”

“ This temple, although of late construction, is considered one of the most important in Egypt. But it is incomplete, smaller, and less satisfactory than that at Edfoo. The architecture of the portico and succeeding hall is on the whole noble, but the columns are thick and ungraceful, and the sculptures are clumsy and unartistic. The myth of the Egyptian Avenues is worked out everywhere with the elaboration of a later Greek temple. ”

“ Under the decadent Memphites of the VIIth and VIIIth Dynasties, Egyptian art rapidly fell from the high estate which it had attained under the Vth Dynasty, and, though good work was done under the Hierakonpolites, the chief characteristic of Egyptian art at the time of the Xth and early XIth Dynasties is its curious roughness and almost barbaric appearance. ”

“ They carried out in the realm of art what their king had carried out in the political realm, and to them must be attributed the origin of the art of the Middle Kingdom which under the XIIth Dynasty attained so high a pitch of excellence. The sculptures of the king’s temple at Dêr el-Bahari, then, are monuments of the renascence of Egyptian art, after the state of decadence into which it had fallen during the long civil wars between South and North ”

“ This claim was never allowed by the Asiatics, it is true, and their kings wrote to the proudest Pharaoh as to an absolute equal. Even the King of Cyprus calls the King of Egypt his brother. But Palestine was admitted to be an Egyptian possession, and the Phoenicians were always energetic supporters of the Egyptian régime against the lawless Bedawîn tribes, who were constantly intriguing with the Kheta or Hittite power to the north against Egypt. ”

“ Every part of the venerable edifice contains, indeed, some object of interest. The rooms, and halls, and galleries are thronged with rare and beautiful works of Art; a series of perfect vases from Herculaneum lie on the tables of the Picture Gallery; several antique busts and statues line the hall; a magnificent bath, of red Egyptian granite, is placed in the entrance passage; and the furniture and interior decorations are all of corresponding excellence and beauty. ”

“ Before we turned from Egypt to summarize the information, afforded by recent discoveries, upon the history of Western Asia under the kings of the Assyrian and Neo-Babylonian periods, we noted that the Asiatic empire of Egypt was regained by the reactionary kings of the XIXth Dynasty, after its temporary loss owing to the vagaries of Akhunaten. Palestine remained Egyptian throughout the period of the judges until the foundation of the kingdom of Judah. With the decline of military spirit in Egypt and the increasing power of the priesthood, authority over Asia became less and less a reality. ”

“ I have not cursed God, and let not evil hap come upon me through the king who dwelleth in my day. Homage to you, O ye gods, who dwell in the Hall of double Maāti, who are without evil in your bodies, and who live upon right and truth, and who feed yourselves upon right and truth in the presence of the god Horus, who dwelleth in his divine Disk: deliver ye me from the god Baba who feedeth upon the entrails of the mighty ones upon the day of the great judgment. ”

“ A low wall surmounted by a balustrade of cedar-wood separated this sacred enclosure from a court to which the people were permitted to have free access. Both palace and temple were probably designed in that pseudo-Egyptian style which the Phoenicians were known to affect. The few Hebrew edifices of which remains have come down to us, reveal a method of construction and decoration common in Egypt; we have an example of this in the uprights of the doors at Lachish, which terminate in an Egyptian gorge like that employed in the naos of the Phonician temples. ”

“ The birds in Egypt have no reverence for age. Never have I seen them more restless, more gay, or more impertinent, than in the immemorial ruins of the ancient land. Beyond is an enormous portal, on the lofty ceiling of which still linger traces of faded red and blue, which gives access to a great hall with rows of mighty columns, those on the left hand round, those on the right square, and almost terribly massive. There is in these no grace, as in the giant lotus columns of Karnak. ”

“ Artists of this school seem to have been in disfavor in ancient Egypt. To be sure, in the matter of portraying scenes where captives, slaves or the humble people were gathered, artists of the conventional school drew these with considerable degree of freedom and ease. In the same picture the king, or noble, or high official was represented according to the established custom.
All Egyptian drawing of human figures, birds and animals is plain, and it is possible for any one today to read the stories of long series of tomb pictures—studying them out, one by one. ”

“ Fifth Egyptian Room. VII. Fifth Egyptian Room.—In the middle would be arranged, in two rows, the remaining sculptures of the Eighteenth and part of those of the Nineteenth Dynasty. In the recesses between the pilasters might be fixed wall-cases, which would rather improve than impair the architectural effect of the room, and for which the light is well adapted, the rays from the opposite windows striking sufficiently low to obviate the shadow occasioned by shelves in rooms lighted from above. Such cases would contain small objects from the Egyptian collection now on the Upper Floor. ”

“ Most of the travellers who visit Egypt expect to find huge monolithic shafts rearing their lofty heads on every side, and their surprise is great when they are told that the huge columns of the hypostyle halls are not cut from single blocks. Their first illusion is fostered by the large number of monolithic granite columns which are found at Erment, at Antinoé, at Cairo, in most of the modern Egyptian mosques. When they arrive at Thebes they discover their error. At Karnak and at Luxor, at Medinet-Abou and in the Ramesseum, the columns are made up of drums placed one upon another. ”

“ The spirit and progressive character of their art offers the strongest contrast to the stiff, lifeless, and unchanging conventionalism of the dwellers on the Nile. Their language and alphabet are confessedly in advance of the Egyptian. Their religion is more earnest and less degraded. In courage and military genius their superiority is very striking; for the Egyptians are essentially an unwarlike people. The one point of advantage to which Egypt may fairly lay claim is the grandeur and durability of her architecture. ”

“ This change of policy, occurring at just the period when the rising states of Greece and Rome were shaping their institutions, was a most significant event. Egypt became the University of the Mediterranean nations. From this time forward Greek philosophers, as in the case of Pythagoras and of Plato, are represented as becoming pupils of the Egyptian priests; and without question the learning and philosophy of the ancient Egyptians exerted a profound influence upon the quick, susceptible mind of the Hellenic race, that was, in its turn, to become the teacher of the world. ”

“ Palmyra in the desert was then ornamented with the spoils of Egypt; and travellers yet admire the remains of eight large columns of red porphyry, each thirty feet high, which stood in front of the two gates to the great temple. They speak for themselves, and tell their own history. From their material and form and size we must suppose that these columns were quarried between Thebes and the Red Sea, were cut into shape by Egyptian workmen under the guidance of Greek artists in the service of the Roman emperors ”

“ It was built at the culminating point of Egyptian art and greatness. The conception was an inspiration of a consciousness of excellence and power. Everything here is grand, even for Egypt; the lofty propylons, the Osirid court, the great halls, and, above all, the colossal statue of the king seated on his throne, a monolith of red granite, weighing nearly 900 tons, and which is now lying on the ground in stupendous fragments, its overthrow having been probably the work of the vengeful Persians. Nothing can exceed the interest of this grand structure. ”

“ Perhaps, among temples, it is the most wondrous thing in all Egypt, as it was, no doubt, the most wondrous temple in the world; among temples I say, for the Sphinx is of all the marvels of Egypt by far the most marvellous. The grandeur of this hall almost moves one to tears, like the marching past of conquerors, stirs the heart with leaping thrills at the capacities of men. Through the thicket of columns, tall as forest trees, the intense blue of the African sky stares down, and their great shadows lie along the warm and sunlit ground. ”