temple of deir elba 12 e gyp

8/13/2019 Temple of Deir Elba 12 e Gyp

1/82


2/82

a D

llk^klliikl^fcill

D ^ diAaMi

^U U ^.ii::^.

D

i^

onU

D D DI]

u ic^ZT-i


3/82


4/82


5/82


6/82


7/82

THE TEMPLE OF

DEIE EL BAHARI:ITS PLAN, ITS FOUNDERS, AND ITS FIRST EXPLORERS.

TNTEODUCTORY MEMOIE

EDOUARD NAVILLE, D.Litt., D.Phil.,COBRESPONDE>-T OF TUE INSTITUTE OF FRANCE ; HONORARY FELLOW OF KINO's COLLEGE; LONDON.

TWELFTH MEMOIR OFTHE EGYPT EXPLORATION FUND.

PUBLISHED BY OIWEE OF THE COMMITTEE.

L A' D N :SOLD AT

The offices OF THE EGYPT EXPLORATION FUND, 37, Great Russell Street, W.C;AND 15, Blagden Street, Boston, Mass., U.S.A.;

AND DY KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER & CO., Paternoster House, Cuabing Cross Road ;B. QUARITCH, 15, Piccadilly; A. ASHER & CO., 13, Bedford Street, Covent Garden.

194.


8/82


9/82

EGYPT EXPLOEATION FUND.IPreslOcnt.

SIR JOHN FOWLEK, Bart., K.C.M.G.UlccsiprcalOeiits.

Sir Chaeles Newton, K.C.B., D.C.L.R. Stuart Poole, Esq.^ LL.D, {Hon. Sec).E. Maunde TnoMPSON, Esq., C.B., D.C.L., LL.D.Charles Dudley Waener, Esq., L.H.D., LL.D.

(U.S.A.).The Rev. W. C. Winslow, D.D., D.C.L.

(IIo7i. Treat, and Hon. Sec, U.S.A.).

The Hon. Edward G. Mason (U.S.A.).The Hon. John Geo. Bourinot, D.C.L,

(Canada).Prof. G. Maspero, D.C.L. (France).JosiAH MxjLLENS, Esq. (Australia).M. Charles Hentsoh (Switzerland).

on. ^ccasuccrs.H. a. Grueber, Esq., F.S.A. The Rev. W. C. Winslow, D.D., D.C.L. (Boston, U.S.A.).

Clarence H. Clark, Esq. (Penn. U.S.A.).

Iboii. Secretary'.R. Stuaet Poole, Esq., LL.D,

/IBcnitets ofThe Rt. Hon. Loed Amherst ofHackney.F.S.A.T. H. Batus, Esq., M.A., Q.C.Miss Biudbuey.J. S, Cotton, Esq., M.A.M. J. DB Morgan {Birecteur Geniral des Anti-

quites de VEgypte).Sir John Evans, K.C.B., D.C.L., LL.D.W. Fowler, Esq.Major - General Sir Francis Grenfell,G.C.M.G., KG.B.F. L. Griffith, Esq., B.A., F.S.A.T. Farmer Hall, Esq.Peof. T. Hattee Lewis, F.S.A.Mbs. McClure,

Committee.The Rev. \V. JLioGeegor, M.A.Prof. J. H. Middleton, M.A., Litt.D., D.C.L.A. S. MuREAT, Esq., LL.D., F.S.A.D. Parrish, Esq. (U.S.A.).Francis Wm. Percival, Esq.Lieut.-Col. J. C. Ross, R.E., C.M.G.The Rev, Peof. A. H. Satoe, M.A., LL.D.H. ViLLiERs Stuaet, Esq.Mes. Tirard.The Rev. H. G. Tomkins, M.A.The Rt. Rev. The Lord Bishop of Truro.Hermann Weber, Esq., M.D.Major-General Sir Charles Wilson, K.C.B.,K.C.M.G., F,R,S.


10/82


11/82

PKEFACE

This Memoir is not intended to be a full statement of the results hithertoobtained from the present excavations at Deir el Bahari, but simply as anintroductory volume describing the building, its plan, and the period towhich it belongs, and also giving an account of the work accomplished byprevious excavators on this spot, and especially by Mariette. I have dweltat some length on the reign of Hatshepsu, Avhose temple of Deir el Bahariwas at once her own creation and her noblest monument.

Some reference to discoveries made in the course of the last twowinters' excavations Avas unavoidable, and I have more than once alludedto them, particularly in showing how they have corrected erroneous restora-tions of the plan of the building. But I have carefully refrained fromdrawing from these discoveries any premature inferences which might haveto be modified as the work progresses. As long as the excavations are stillin progress, it is not possible, on many points, to arrive at definite conclusions.

Plates Nos. I.III. are reproductions of the plans made by the Frenchexpedition, by Lepsius, and by Mariette, and it is interesting to comparethe difierences between them. Lepsius' plan (PI. II.) is evidently conjecturalin places, as, for example, in the restoration of the northern part of the


12/82

vi PREFACE.

lower colonnade, which he cannot have seen and must have supposed tobe similar to the southern part.

The phototypes contained in this volume, like those in my precedingmemoirs, have been executed by the firm of MM. Thevoz et Cie, of Geneva.All the smaller illustrations are from photographs taken by Mr. HowardCarter, one of the artists attached to our staff at Deir el Bahari.

The original text of this memoir was wi'itten in French, and has beentranslated under the direction of the Committee.

EDOUARD NAVILLE.Malagny,

August, 1894.


13/82

CONTENTS.

Chap. I. The Urst explorers, Champolliou, Wilkiusou, LepsiusII. Mariette

, III. Plan of the Temple, IV. The family of the Thothmes ...., V. Hatshepsu ......., VI. Hatshepsu's naval expedition to the Laud of Punt, VII. End of Hatshepsu's reign, Thothmes II. and Thothmes III.

PAGE1

6913152126

Index .Contents of Plates

2932


14/82


15/82

DEIE EL BAHAEI.CHAPTER I.

THE FIRST EXPLORERS : CHAMPOLLION, WILKINSON, LEPSIUS.The tourists avIio annually swarm into Thebesseldom depart from the ancient city of Amonwithout visiting the magnificent natural amphi-theatre of Deir el Bahari, where the hills of theLibyan range present their most imposing aspect.Lea^^ng the plain by a narrow gorge, whose wallsof naked rock are honeycombed with tombs,the traveller emerges into a wide open spacebounded at its further end by a semi- circular wallof chfifs. These cliffs of white limestone, whichtime and sun have coloured rosy yellow, form anabsolutely vertical barrier. They are accessibleonly from the north by a steep and difficult pathleading to the summit of the ridge that dividesDeir el Bahari from the wild and desolate Valleyof the Tombs of the Kings.

Built against these chffs, and even as it wererooted into their sides by subterranean chambers,is the temple of which Mariette said that it isan exception and an accident in the architecturallife of Egypt.

Our earliest detailed description of the place isthat given by Jollois and DeviUiers, two scholarsattached to the French expedition of 1798. Theymade a plan of what they found there, and that planis here reproduced (pi. i.). Their description isinteresting'; it gives us a fairly good idea of the

1 Descrii'tiun


16/82

DEIR EL BAIIART.following the continuation of the avenue, we findon the north traces of a wall more than forty-fivemetres (49 yards) long. At each end of it arethe remains of a column, but they do not riseabove the level of the ground. Here, Mariette'splan is blank (pi. iii.). These vestiges of a wallmust have belonged to an adjunct of what he calls the Eastern Terrace. Farther on we come tothe ruins of two flights of steps which led up tobuildings on a higher level. This descriptionclearly applies to the avenue which is in a linewith the axis of the temple. At the far end ofthat avenue is a rectangular edifice built on stillhigher ground, forty-eight metres (52 yards)long, by twenty-nine (31 yards) wide. In thesame direction lie some inner rooms whose formsare easily followed. Pococke, who saw the ruinswhich we describe, here found many remains ofmummies. A red granite door-way, in almostperfect preservation, forms the entrance to thispart of the building, and is covered with hiero-glyphs in sunk relief of the most careful workman-ship. It is hidden under plaster, with which itwould seem to have been coated by the Chris-tians, for images of their saints may yet be seenupon it.

There can be no doubt that the descriptionhere refers to the central part of the westernplatform, the highest part of the temple, andbuilt against the rock itself. We gather that thesouthern chambers of the platform, which wereafterwards cleared by Mariette, were not alto-gether buried out of sight at the close of the lastcentury, but probably were filled with rubbishup to a certain height. Neither do I think thatthe floor or pavement of the platform could thenbe seen. The platform was reached through thegranite portal, which early Christians had coatedwith white plaster and painted with figures ofsaints, and the mention of the state of this door-way and of the sanctuary by Jollois and Devillicrsis the only indication given by those authorsas to the later use to which the temple was put.The name of Deir el Bahari Convent of the

North was apparently unknown to them,as also the fact that the temple became aconvent ; they never notice the Coptic super-structures, whose ruins are still standing andmust then have been far more extensive. Theygive a long description of what is now thoughtto be the sanctuary, the subterranean chamberopening on to the court, to which the pro-longed avenue leads. They make the chamberthirteen and a half metres (44 ft.) long, byfive (IG ft.) Avidc. They also speak of itsrounded ceiling, which is vaulted in appear-ance only, for we can easily sec that its hori-zontal courses of stone were laid so as to overlapeach other and finally close the space which wasto be covered in, while its cylindrical form wassubsequently produced by chiselling away theangles and thus shaping the ceihng into a vaultof the desired curve. The sculptures of thechamber are covered with a coating of plasterpainted with figures of Christ, and this wouldlead us to infer that it was a place of Christianworship during the earlier centuries of ourera.Hence all that was to be seen of the templeat the close of the last century were theremains of the dromos at the entrance, and thepedestals of the sphinxes which lined it on eitherside. The two first platforms must have beencompletely covered with sand except for the out-crop of certain lengths of wall on the north sideof the lower, or eastern platform ; but further,the central part of the upper platform wasvisible, and the subterranean chamber was alsoaccessible. Traces of long-abandoned Christianworship remained upon all that was then foundstanding. The general appearance of the site wasmuch the same earlier in the century ; for Pococke,who visited the spot in 1737, and is quoted byJollois and Devillicrs, gives a similar account totheirs. His description is very short, and by nomeans clear. After mentioning the mummieswhich aboundedhe adds that here it seemedas though the mountain had been vertically hewn


17/82

THE FIRST EXPLORERS.out by the hand of man, and the people of theplace said that there had once been a passagethrough it into the next valley.

ChampoUion and Wilkinson must have visitedDeir el Bahari within a short interval one of theother. ChampoUion' scarcely pauses to describethe building, which seems to have been in muchthe same condition as it was in the days of JoUoisand Devilhers. He tells us that his object in goingto study it was to fix the as yet unknown dateof the edifice, and to ascertain its original pur-pose. He was chiefly attracted by the upperpart, and the granite portal leading to it, onwhich he read the cartouche of Thothmes III.,called Moeris by the Greeks. He at onceperceived that the cartouches of Thothmes III,were usurpations, and that they must have super-seded two others, which were all the more readilydetermined since he found them upon the templewalls. The second of these cartouchesthat ofQueen Ilatshepsuhe read Amenenihe,'^ butdeclined to call it a queen's. He persists in re-garding it as belonging to a king, and hence ofiersno satisfactory explanation of the employment ofthe feminine form in all the inscriptions. If,says he, ' ' I felt somewhat surprised at seeinghere, as elsewhere throughout the temple, therenowned Moeris, adorned with all the insignia ofroyalty, giving place to this Amenenthe, forwhose name we may search the royal lists invain, still more astonished was I to find on readingthe inscriptions that wherever they referred to thisbearded king in the usual dress of the Pharaohs,nouns and verbs were in the feminine, as thougha queen were in question. I found the samepeculiarity everywhere. Not only was there theprenomen of Amenenthe preceded by the titleof sovereign ruler of the world, with the femi-nine affix, but also his o-rni name immediatelyfollowing on the title of 'daughter of the Sun.'Finally, in all the bas-reliefs representing the

' Letlrcs ccriies d'ligijpte et de Nuhie, no. 15.- The cartouche is read Amonemhe iu the Notices.

gods speaking to this king, he is addressed as aqueen, as iu the following formula : ' Behold, thussaith Amon-Ra, lord of the thrones of the world,to his daughter whom he loves, sun devoted tothe truth : the building which thou hast made islike to the divine dwellintj.' By way of solving this problem, ChampoUion

propounded the existence of a queen called Amense,sister of Thothmes II. He thought to havefound her name iu a cartouche attached to thatof an unknown Thothmes, who would have beenher first husband, and who must have reigned inhis wife's name. On his death, Amense must havetaken Amenenthe for her second husband, and healso ruled in her name. She evidently pre-deceased him, for Amenenthe afterwards reignedconjointly with Thothmes III., the Moeris ofthe Greeks, who was under his guardianship.The ward would not seem to have felt muchgratitude towards his guardian, but did hisutmost to consign him to oblivion, by diUgcutlyhammering out his legends.

ChampoUion proved from the inscriptions thatthe temple was dedicated to Amon. Accordingto several travellers who had preceded him, thisedifice with vaulted ceilings could be no otherthan the tomb of Moeris ; but its chambers andaccessories show it to be a genuine temple, forthey contain scenes of offerings to the godsand to the ancestors of the Pharaohs. Cham-poUion notes signs of restorations by Horus,Rameses the Great, his son Merenphtah, andlater by Ptolemy Euergetes 11. Remarking onthe inferiority of sculptures of the Greek periodas compared with the magnificent bas-reliefs ofthe XVIIIth Dynasty, ChampoUion takes theopportunity of giving renewed expression to oneof his favourite ideas, viz : that, far from havingprofited by Greek influence, Egyptian art had onlysuffered through it. It was his conviction thatthe origin of Greek art lay in servile imitation ofthe Egyptian. Ancient Egypt had taught herarts to Greece, who developed them to the pointof sublimity; but had it not been for Egypt,

B 2


18/82

DEIR EL BAHARI.Greece would in all probability never have becomethe classic land of the fine arts.

In 1827 Wilkinson was in the temple, since hespeaks of excavations which he then made, for thepurpose of clearing part of the walls. ^ He callsthe building by the same name under which it isknown to us : Below the cliffs of the Libyanmountain is an ancient temple, whose modernname, Dayr el Bahri, or the northern convent,indicates its having served, like the vicinity andprecincts of most of the temples of Thebes, as achurch and monastery of the early Christians.He speaks of the long dromos leading, between tworows of sphinxes whose fragments still remain,to a square enclosure before which two pedestalsmark the sites of two obelisks. Wilkinson'sdescription is somewhat confused. He mentionsan inclined plane of masonry leading to the cen-tral court of the temple, and intersecting at rightangles a covered corridor formed by a peristyle ofeight polygonal columns. The inner face ofthis corridor, which is the front of the first scarpof a series of terraces, is doubtless what Mariettecalled the Eastern Terrace. Wilkinson givesns some interesting details as to the sculpturesadorning its walls. On the southern sideare processions of soldiers carrying boughs orweapons, the sacrifice of an ox, and the remainsof two boats. All this may still be seen, andeven more than Wilkinson describes. A scenefound by the English traveller, and representingthe dedication of two obelisks to Amon by theroyal founder of the temple, has not altogetherdisappeared, though it has considerably suffered.These obelisks, very different from those ofDiospolis (Karnak), must have been erected onthe pedestals at the end of the dromos. Wil-kinson translates the accompanying inscription.After giving the names and titles of the PharaohAmunneitgori,^ the inscription goes on to say

1 Topography of Thehes, 1835 edition, p. 90.^ See the description in Murray's Handbook, 18G7 ed., of

wl\i(;h the bulk is derived from Wilkinson. Tiie name of thePharaoh is there read Amun voo-het, instead of Amunneitgori.

she has made (this) her work for her fatherAmunre, lord of the regions (and) erected to himtwo fine obelisks of granite she did this(who is) the giver of life like the sun for ever.This bas-relief supplies evidence in favour ofWilkinson's theory that there were two obelisksat the entrance to the temple. It also seems tofurnish an indication that the blocks which werefound built into walls erected on the upper plat-form carved with scenes referring to the transportof two obelisks in one case showing one of themonuments placed upon a sledge had beenbrought thither from the eastern platform by theCopts.Coming to the granite gateway which gives

access to the western platform, Wilkinson, likeChampollion, testifies that its inscription is inthe feminine, and refers to the Pharaoh whosename he reads as Amunneitgori ; all the same,he hesitates to call this sovereign a queen. Hedescribes the sanctuary and its bas-reliefs, and inthis connection confutes ChampolHon's hypothesisof a queen Amense, wife to an unknown Thoth-mes. He proves that the unknown Thotlimesis no other than Thothmes II., and that therewas no queen Amerise. He also mentions thetradition of the existence of a passage connectingthe temple of Deir el Bahari M'ith the valley ofBiban el Molouk.

Whether any one worked at Deir el Bahari afterChampollion we do not know ; but certainlyLepsius appears to have seen something more ofthe temple than his predecessors, as may begathered from his plan of the building (pi. ii.).He describes the dromos (but without speaking ofany obelisks), the western platform, the granitegateway, and the sanctuary. Lepsius believes thatthe temple was originally connected with that ofKarnak, since the axis of the prolonged dromoswould lead straight to the great temple of Amon.He was the first to discover the founder of thetemple, which he still calls the temple of theAssassif. It was a queen, Numt Amen, eldestsister of Thothmes IIL, who devised this bold


19/82

THE FIRST EXPLORERS.scheme for uniting the two sides of the Nilevalley. She it was who erected before the templeof Karnak the two largest obelisks left to us.Numt Amen are the two first words of the car-touche of Hatshepsu, and Lepsius had in truthrecognised the name of the founder of the temple,although, as he had at once observed, thequeen is never represented as a woman, butalways in the dress of a man. Her sex is re-vealed by the inscriptions. Doubtless it was

contrary to the law of succession for a queen tooccupy the throne, and this was the reason thather brother, probably still a minor, subsequentlyappears as sharing the throne along with her.After the queen's death her cartouches were re-placed by those of Thuthmosis III., and her namewas not admitted upon the lists of legitimatesovereigns.

1 Brie/e, p. 282.


20/82

DEIR EL BAHARI.

CHAPTER 11.MARIETTE.

From the days of Lepsius on-\varcls, huntersafter mummies and antiquities have probablyattacked Deir cl Baliari from time to time. Ofthis I had a proof on the 14th February 1893,when, on reaching the roof of the coveredchamber situate at the N.W. angle of the westernplatforma chamber unknowni to Mariettefound a pencilled notice on its walls stating thatit had been opened by Greene in 1855.

Mariette made three excavations at Deir elBahari, but regrets having been unable to workthere as uninterruptedly as in other parts of Egypt.On three occasions only (1858, 18G2, 180G)was I able to take small detachments of menfrom the excavations at Goornah and make moreor less successful attempts on Deir cl Bahari.The first proved to be the most important in itsresults. Then it was that the plan of the templewas ascertained (pi. iii.),and discovery made of thefamous bas-reliefs of the naval expedition to theland of Punt. The subsequent explorations chieflysci-ved to form collections of sarcophagi andmummies, either for the Museum of Boulaq orfor the Paris Universal Exhibition of 18G7.

Deir el Baharithe Convent of the North,which the people of the place also call Deir elAssassifthe Convent of the Assassifor Deir esSultanthe Convent of the Kingbears thatname because ruins of a Coptic convent stand onpart of the temple site even to this day. TheCopts did not take possession of the whole ; theydid not occupy the eastern platform. But it wasfrom this platform that they took material forbuilding the wretched walls which divided theirconvent into different rooms. These walls areeither of brick, brick and stone, or altogether of

stone. The latter are built of miscellaneoussculptured blocks, capitals and bases of columnsbeing used indiscriminately with bas-reliefs turnedupside down. The destruction and the havocwrought in this temple by the Copts is incal-culable. For instance, all the great wall atthe end of the western platform, built againstthe rock, and protecting the court on the west,is made of ancient blocks. Mariette did not seethis wall. In the course of my first winter's workI cleared a good deal of it, and satisfied myself thatit contains fragments of very important inscrip-tions which must, if possible, be completed as theexcavation proceeds.

Mariette rightly insisted upon the peculiarcharacter of the temples on the left bank of theriver at Thebes. Here only do we find a certainspecial type of builc]ing, and all the examplesdate from the comparatively limited period coveredby the XVIIIth to the XXth Dynasties. Thegreat temples on the right bank of the NileKarnak, Luxor are in the first place buildingserected for the worship of the local deity, andthe work of many generations. From the timeof the Xllth Dynasty, the dynasty of theAmenemhats and Usertesens, almost everysovereign or reigning family undertook the dutyof adding to or repairing the structure of Karnak.Each generation insisted on being representedthere, so that the walls of the great temple ofAmon became as it were the annals of theEgyptian monarchy. It is altogether otherwisewith the temples on the left bank. There theking began a temple with the intention of com-pleting it himself. The plan was his, and he triedto carry it out from beginning to end ; for, in fact,


21/82

MARIETTE.these temples were monuments raised by theking to his own glory and to his o^YU memory,and the inscriptions with which they are coveredoften take the form of chapters from his autobio-graphy. In order to understand the object ofthese temples we must compare them with theEgyptian tomb such as it was even under the OldKingdom. An Egyptian tomb consisted of threeparts : the exterior chapel, the shaft, and thesepulchral chamber. The exterior chapel wascomposed of one or more rooms, sometimeslavishly decorated, adorned with colonnades orperistyles, and always accessible to the kindredof the deceased and to his priests, if he had any.Hither came his family to make libations andbring oflerings of food and incense to the dead :they also came at certain times in the year tocelebrate religious rites, whose nature and detailswere prescribed by the ceremonial code.

In the chapel, or near to it, was the openingof the vertical shaft by which the sarcophaguswas introduced into the sepulchral chamber. Thispit was filled up, and the chamber hermeticallyclosed, so that no one could gain access to themummy, which must be secured from sight, andabove all from sacrilege. The funerary chapel,on the other hand, was open to visitors, and therethe dead man wished to show what his lifehad been. As may be seen at Beui Hassan, itwas here that he had caused his praises to beinscribed, and that it had pleased him to setforth to posterity the rare qualities by which hehad been distinguished, the high deeds whichhad marked his career, the dignities to which theroyal favour had raised him, and the riches thathe had gathered.

Let us now return to Thebes, to the entranceof the vast necropolis which occupies so large aspace on the left bank of the river, and considerthe tombs destined for the greatest personagesin the realm, that is to say for the kings.Here we find the three essential parts of theAncient and Middle Kingdom tomb, but insteadof being all together, or at least in close proximity

to each other, they are separated by considerabledistances. In the Valley of the Kings, far fromcultivated land, and in the midst of a solitudethat one is little tempted to disturb, is thesepulchral chamber, and the equivalent of theshaft, namely the long subterranean gallery pene-trating far into the rock, and often excavated atseveral different levels. None of this was meantto be accessible, and all was hermetically closed.Outside the valley, and nearer to the town, stand-ing out against the sand of the desert in sight ofall men, and close to a college of priests, was thechapel to which ofi'erings were brought, and whererites were celebrated through the pious care of thefamily, or of visitors. But the chapel had growninto a temple ; of such temples there must oncehave been several, and four of them are standingto this day : Goornah, the Ramesseum, MedinetHaboo and Deir el Bahari.

It is to Mariette that we must give the creditof having fully recognised the nature and func-tion of these temples of the left bank. They aregreat funerary chapels, closely connected with theroyal tombs whose existence they imply. Theirspecial character being determined, we may nowproceed to divide these funerary temples intotwo categories : those erected for a single sove-reign, and those which were intended to servefor several royal tombs. To the first categorybelong the Piamesseum and Medinet Haboo.Rameses II., the vainest and most ostentatious ofEgyptian kings, and after him that one amonghis successors who, dazzled by the external mag-nificence and vainglor}^ of his reign, seems tohave resolved to imitate him in every wayRameses III.built their own funerary chapels,monuments designed to perpetuate their mightydeeds, and to carry down to posterity what theyesteemed as their chief titles to fame. Henceeach of these temples was in connection with onetomb only. It was otherwise with those of Goor-nah and Deir el Bahari. Seti I. began the build-ing at Goornah, and there raised a funerarychapel to his father, Rameses I. The inscriptions


22/82

DEIIl EL BAIIAUI.on the walls show that Rameses was dead, and heis represented as seated in his sanctuary andbearing the emblems of Osiris. In his lionour thetemple was built and the ceremonies celebrated.Seti I. did not complete the building. Rameses II.continued it, and adhering to its original dedi-cation consecrated it also to his father, Seti I. ;for in a large bas-relief we see Seti I. coming forthfrom his tomb, and invoking Amon in favour ofhis son, who stands before him, offering perfumesto the sacred bark of the god. The temple ofGoornah is therefore the great chapel of twotombs, and it is as though in a mastabat of theOld Kingdom, or in one of the tombs of BeniHassan, there were two pits opening from thesame room.

This is also the case at Deir el Baliari. Thattemple belonged to several tombs whose sites areunknown to us, but which may well have been inits immediate neighbourhood. Mariette thoughtthat the queen had built it with regard to her owntomb only ; but had he made further excavationsin the direction of the north-west angle of thewestern platform, which I cleared last spring, hewould have seen that the building, althoughcertainly made for the queen, was in the firstplace intended to be the funerary temple of herfather, Thothmes I. The rock-cut chapel ofthat king, which I discovered, and the altarplaced before its door, seem to show that thequeen's first thought had been for Thothmes I.She chose a site which had served as a necro-polis in times that were ancient even in herdays, for ]\Iarietto states that at the far endof the amphitheatre, towards the south-west,there was another edifice, now utterly destroyed,which dated from King Mentuhotep II., of the

Xlth Dynasty. There may even be traces ofa third building of the same kind.

The temple must also have been intended forceremonies connected with the tomb of the queen.The great vaulted chamber on the south, whichwas cleared by Mariette, and where we see longprocessions of priests bearing offerings (pi. vi.),is likewise of a funerary character. It is certainthat the queen must have made her tomb inThebes, near to the burial-places of the rest of herfamily, and on that side of the river where thistemple stands. But where did she cause that tombto be hewn out whose site we have never yet dis-covered ? Is it in the valley of Biban el Molouktogether with most of the royal tombs ; is it pei'-adventure in the western valley ; or in some secretplace beneath the walls of the temple that we arenow excavating ? We do not know. Did the ven-geance of Thothmes III. , the fury with which heerased the inscriptions of his aunt and guardian,lead him to destroy her tomb also and to cast herashes to the wind ? That is scarcely likely. Thefact remains that we have the bodies of Thoth-mes II., Thothmes III., and according to M.Maspero, of Thothmes I., without counting thoseof many princes and princesses of the familybutnot the body of the queen. Moreover, we do notknow the tomb of any Thothmes, nor fromwhat places or caves their mummies were re-moved to the hiding-place which was so well con-cealed as to keep the secret of its precious deposituntil our time. One thing at least is certain thatin Deir el Bahari we have a building which was thefunerary chapel of Thothmes I. and of his daughter.Perhaps it also belonged to Thothmes 11., andThothmes III. ; but of this we cannot be sure atthe present stage of our researches.


23/82

CHAPTER III.PLAN OF THE TEMPLE.

The funerary temple built by Queeu Hatshepsuon the site of an Xlth Dynasty necropolis bore noresemblance to other Egyptian temples ; it wassui generis (pi. iii.). We shall proceed to describeits plan, mainly basing our description upon theresearches of Mariette. His work notwithstandingour knowledge of the temple is as yet imperfect,and it is hoped that further and complete infor-mation on the subject may result from thepresent excavations, which will doubtless occupyseveral winters. The excavations of 1893 showed

No one can fail to admire the indomitable energyand perseverance by which he triumphed over allobstaclessometimes wantonly placed in hispathduring his search for the Serapeum at theoutset of his Egyptian career. But in manycases we are constrained to admit that, by hismethod of work, Mariette prevented himself fromcompleting his own excavations, and made theundertaking exceedingly difficult for his successors.At Deir el Bahari he carried out on a large scalehis custom of heaping his rubbish close to the place

Torraca

Midilla colonnaJij

Lower colounaJoMiJdlo platform

,llJ.

Court 11 ^'= ''

U|ipcr platiorm

Lower platformMariette's theoretical reconstruction of the build-ing to be inaccurate as regards the upper platform

;

and from time to time our own ideas of the templewill probably be modified as we clear away themounds of rubbish still covering parts of it.Far be it from us to detract from the merit

and value of Mariette's researches, which amendedand restored large portions of Egyptian history.

' The above plan give.s the nomenclature which will beadopted in this and the subsequent volumes in describingthe various parts of the temple at Deir el Bahari.

from which it came, instead of removing it to adistance. Probably this practice was forced uponhim by circumstances, but it sometimes resultedin his covering important sites with earth orsand, and thus led to his overlooking discoveriesto which he himself would have attached highvalue. It has several times fallen to my lot todeal with these results of Mariette's method,especially during my excavations at Deir elBahari. In clearing the north-west corner of theupper platform, and trying to find the rock against


24/82

10 DEIR EL BAHART.which that platform stands, I have not only re-moved the debris which concealed it from the eyesof Wilkinson and Lej^sius, but I was in the firstplace obliged to carry away beyond the templeenclosure large accumulations from the south sideof the same platform, cast here by Mariette. Hehad never suspected that beneath his rubbishheaps lay a hall decorated with gigantic sculptures,although Greene had noticed the top of it. Stillless did he suspect that here too was the roofedchapel of Thothmes I., and an inner court con-taining that great altar whose discovery was themost important result of my first season's work.All this part of the temple I have completely cleared.We must not be too severe in our judgment ofMariette ; probably he would gladly have actedotherwise ; but the necessity for proceedingrapidly, and the pecuniary conditions by whichhe was hampered all his life, obliged him to workas economically as possible. The excavator isalmost invariably confronted with the difficultyof disposing of his rubbish, especially in such aplace as Deir el Bahari, where the temple is shutin between hill and necropohs. Here the debrismust be carried out to an old clay pit, a sort ofpond which the Arabs call the lake birket in order to run no risk of covering either buildingor tombs.The enclosure wall has almost entirely dis-

appeared, but its course can still be traced.According to Mariette it embraced not only theXVnith Dynasty building, but also a much olderfunerary temple dating from the Xlth Dynasty.The whole surrounding country is indeed onevast necropolis, and mummy-pits dug all overthe temple of Hatshepsu show that from thetime of the XXHnd Dynasty the building itselfhad served as a receptacle for mummies.

Not one stone is now standing of that entrancegateway near which AVilkinson found traces of apylon. Mariette saw no objection to admittingthat there had been a pylon here, but he was lesswilling to admit that two obelisks stood in frontof it ; for obelisks were not usually placed before

temples on the left bank of the river. Still, heultimately decided that the bas-relief describedby Wilkinson settled the question, and lastyear's excavations seem to me to confirm hisopinion that two great monoliths had onceadorned the entrance to the temple. Followingthe avenue which divides the whole length of thetemple, at about 50 metres (55 yards) within theenclosure wall, Mariette notes two angles of arectangular construction whose nature cannot bedetermined. Beyond it begins the graduatedinchne leading to that raised colonnade of thefirst platform, which Mariette calls the EasternTerrace. We shall return later to the bas-reliefs on its wall, which were protected by a roofdoubly supported on a row of quadrangular pillarsand another row of columns of a composite stylethe inner row being of the style sometimes calledproto-Doric and found elsewhere throughout thetemple. The north part of the wall is far moredamaged than the south part, its bas-reliefsrepresenting religious scenes having been almostentirely effaced. The damage at the south endhas been chiefly effected by excavations in searchof the many mummies found there, these excava-tions having also involved the removal of thepavement.A high retaining wall, upholding the whole

length of the middle platform above the valley,starts from the south-east angle of the lower oreastern platform, and is in good preservation.Its lower courses are decorated by a series ofcarved panellings, surmounted by alternatinghawks and urnei of colossal size (pi. xiv.). Thisornamentation extends the whole length of theplatform, i.e., for about 90 metres (98 yards).Little remains of the pavement ; on the south ithas almost entirely disappeared, owing to graveshaving been dug there and afterwards rifled. Nocomplete plan of the building is possible until thegreat mounds of rubbish on the north side of thisplatform have been completely cleared away.A graduated incline, or flight of steps, led

from the centre of this platform to the upper or


25/82

PLAN OP THE TEMPLE. 11western platform, which was upheld by the retain-ing wall terminating the middle platform, just asthe middle platform was upheld above the lowerone. The face of this wall bears very importantinscriptions, and was protected by a portico formedof two rows of square pillars. The southern halfis covered with the famous pictorial representa-tion of the expedition to the Land of Punt ; onthe northern half, which I have already partlycleared, are most interesting texts and scenesrelating to the birth of the queen and herenthronement by her father, Thothmes I.On the same level as the portico, and at either

end of it are rock-cut sanctuaries. That on thenorth consists of one small central chamberparallel to the axis of the temple, opening on twoothers which are at right angles to each other.These three chambers are approached through atwelve-columned portico, whose roof is in perfectpreservation. The scenes painted on the wallsof the Northern Speos are exclusively religious ;they are only partially effaced, and are full of lifeand colour. The Southern or Hathor Speos isthe more important. It is entered through acovered vestibule whose pillars have Hathor-headed capitals, and whose walls bear scenesrelating to the rejoicings at Thebes on the suc-cessful return of the fleet from the Land of Punt.On an inner wall of the Speos, Hathor is repre-sented under the form of a cow suckling a boybearing the queen's name.The upper platform was occupied by various

buildings. In the first place there is a terrace,and, judging by what I found on the north side,this terrace was roofed in, and the roof rested upona single row of columns and abutted against athick wall, now more than half ruined, on whichthe Copts erected their convent tower. The redgranite gateway, which is exactly opposite to theentrance to the sanctuary, leads through the wallinto a large inner court. This portal was seenby Jollois and Devilliers in the last century ; itconsists of red granite monolithic posts andlintel, and furnishes two instances of that deface-

ment of inscriptions from which the whole templehas suffered. First the queen's cartouche waschiselled out and replaced by that of her nephew,Thothmes III., who left all the rest of the in-scription in the feminine : Menlclieperra (Thoth-mes III.), she has raised this monument to herfather, Amon Ba. Subsequently the name ofthe god was also struck out, evidently by orderof Khueuaten, who, in his passionate antagonismto the worship of Amon, erased the name andfigure of that divinity throughout the temple.Name and figure were afterwards roughly andimperfectly restored, and the credit of these veryinferior restorations is probablydue to Kameses II.,who thus acquired the right of inscribing hisown name on almost every wall of the temple.There is no inscription of a few yards longwhich does not prove to contain the following

:

Q'I Kameses II. j '=' [lWOOO Aw _S*SIII

King Bamses II. restored these monuments of hisfather, Amon Ba. This formula occurs no lessthan five times on the south half of the wall ofthe lower colonnade.

Passing through the granite gateway we entera rectangular space bounded by thick walls on thenorth and south, and terminated on the west bythe vertical cliff which closes in the valley. Thiscourt was all that was seen by Jollois andDevilliers. Directly opposite the granite gate-way, and in a line with the avenue of approach,is the rock-cut sanctuary whose vaulted roof,described by the French savants, is constructed intrue Egyptian fashion as above explained (p. 2).The west wall of the court is a retaining wallbuilt against the cliff side, and containing nichesfor ofierings or sacred emblems. I cleared almostthe whole of the northern half of this wall lastyear, and found that it had been rebuilt by theCopts, and that the blocks which they had usedfor this purpose are carved with fragments of agreat inscription, to whose sculptures they hadpaid no regard whatever. The loss of this greatinscription is lamentable.


26/82

12 DEIR EL BAHARI.Before my excavations were begun in 1893 the

south side only of the upper platform had beencleared ; high mounds of rubbish covered it onthe north. But although the south side alonewas laid bare by Mariette, and the north sideinvisible to him, his plan shows the wall whichbounded the inner court on the north. Onthe south he had found several chambers, andespecially one large vaulted room, orientedfrom east to west like the temple, and containingat its far end a granite stela whose inscription iscompletely effaced. The walls of this chamberare sculptured with processions of priests bringingofferings to Queen Hatshepsu, the work being ofremarkable fineness (pi. vi.). None of these havebeen hammered out excepting the name of thequeen.

In Mariette's, or rather M. Brune's, conjecturalrestoration of the upper or western platform, itis assumed that the buildings on its north sideexactly correspond with those on its south. Myexcavations have proved that this is not the case.There are two doors in the north wall of thecourt. The larger and western door opens onto a somewhat high and narrow hall, lyingnorth and south, and decorated with giganticrepresentations of the queen making offerings toAmon. The figure of the god has been con-sistently effacedprobably by Kliuenatenandroughly restored by Rameses II. The secondand eastern door is much smaller, and loads to apart of the building entirely separate from therest of the temple, and which 1 believe to havebeen specially dedicated to Thothmes I. It isentered through a covered vestibule with a singlerow of three columns running from north to south.A doorway in the vestibule leads into an open

court, and in the midst of this court stands agreat altar made of good white An stone.The altar is dedicated to Harmakhis, and is soplaced that the priest ascending the flight of stepsleading to its platform would face the rising sun.Opposite the north side of the altar is a doorleading to the little rock-cut chapel which Ibelieve to be the funerary chapel of Thothmes I.Here we found the name of the king's motherSenseueb. It is obvious, even from this briefdescription, that the north side of the upper plat-form considerably differs from the side clearedby Mariette, and that the two sides of the buildingare in no wise symmetrical to each other.No chambers were built over the Northern

Speos, nor yet over the Southern; and no useseems to have been made of the platforms abovethem, which were only intended to protect theirroofs from the talus of the cliffs. I clearedthe platform over the Northern Speos to the levelof the pavement, and there found a panel of theebony shrine dedicated by Thothmes II. Thisdiscovery led me to conclude that from the timeof the destruction of the shrine, perhaps from thetime of the reign of Khuenaten, rubbish anddebris were allowed -to accumulate on this spot,and that no one ever went there.On the north side of the middle platform are

the first columns of a colonnade starting from theNorthern Speos, running from west to east, andhaving in its wall little niches for offerings suchas arc found elsewhere throughout the temple.In M. Brune's plan this is represented as acolonnade of thirty-seven columns, and as stretch-ing the full length of the middle platform. Ourexcavations prove it to have been much shorter,and to have consisted of fifteen columns only.


27/82

13

CHAPTER IV.THE FAMILY OF THE THOTHMES.

Before considering the reign of the great queenwho built the temple of Deir el Bahari, let usfirst investigate her family history. In thismatter the conclusions of earlier Egyptologistshave been successively modified by later dis-coveries. We will therefore explain the case as itnow stands, though it is liable possibly to furtherimportant modifications from future research.

In the genealogical table of the XVIIIthDynasty as drawn up by M. Maspero with thehelp of the inscriptions found on the Deir elBahari mummies/ the wife of Amenophis I. isQueen Aahhotep II. ; Thothmes I. being theirson, and the princess Aahmes their daughter.Brother and sister married, and of that marriagewas born Queen Hatshepsu, the founder of thistemple. But Thothmes I. had two other wives :Mutnefert, whose son was Thothmes II., andIsia, evidently of inferior rank, whose son wasThothmes III. The genealogy which untilquite recently seemed most likely to be correctran as followsAmenophis I. Aahhotep II.

Aahmes (queen) Thothmes I. jMutnefert Isis

Hatshepsu Thothmes II. Thothmes III.

Hence Thothmes II. and Thothmes III. wereboth sons of Thothmes I., and consequently half

1 Mission archeologique fran(;aise au Caire, vol. i., p. C37.2 Maspero, Pros, of the Soc. of Bibl. Arch., vol. xiv.,

p. 170.

brothers to Hatshepu, who became the wife ofThothmes II. and the guardian of Thothmes III.An important alteration of this genealogical

table was necessitated by M. Boussac's discoveryof the great stela of Anna in a tomb atGoornah.^ The stela tells us that when kingThothmes II. appeared in heaven and rejoinedthe gods, his son took his place as king of thetwo lands, and he was prince upon the throne ofhim who begat him. His sister, the royal wifeHatshepsu, discharged the office of regent ofthe land. Thothmes III. is not here mentionedby name, but as there was no intermediate kingbetween him and Thothmes II., Thothmes III.must needs have been the son of Thothmes II.This conclusion is confirmed from the dedicatoryinscription of a statue at Karnak.

M. Maspero has therefore altered the secondpart of his genealogical table as follows :Aahmes Thothmes I. Mutnefert

Hatshepsu Thothmes II. Isis

Hatshepsu II. Thothmes III.In concluding his notice of the XVIIIth

Dynasty, M. Maspero indicated one point as stilldoubtful. This first table makes Queen Aahhotepthe mother of Thothmes I., and thus the king'swife Aahmes is his full sister. But M. Masperodid not consider this as conclusively settled, andwe now find that his doubt is justified. ProfessorErman has recently published an inscription on apiece of limestone in the Ghizeh Museum, whichgives the text of a letter or circular sent round to hissubordinates by Thothmes I. (in this instance to


28/82

14 DEIR EL RAIIARr.an officer at Elephantine), announcing his acces-sion to the throne. In reference to the formulafor oaths he says : a-a ^ v\ ~wv^ T ^ Q])

n I) : J) Let them sivcar hy the iiainc of HisMajesty, life, health, and strength, horn of theroyal mother, Senseneh. From this inscriptionit would seem that Senseneh, although wife ofAmenophis I., was not of royal hlood, or that atany rate she had not been raised to the rank ofqueen. Now in the funerary chapel of Thoth-mes I. the king is represented with his well-known wife, the queen-sister Aahmes, J V '5:&^^S (^ ^

[|i * ] ''^^'^^ ^1*50 with another queen

called the royal mother, irrinccss of the two Innch,1 ^x Senseneh, who is evidently the one re-^ ferred to in the Ghizeh inscription. This

proves that Thothmes I. was only half-brother to his wife Aahmes. Senseneh ishere called queen, and her name enclosedin a cartouche ; but she is unmcntionedin the royal genealogies, her elevationbeing probably due to her husband'sfavour. The amended genealogical tableof the Thothmes family stands therefore

^ ^

Iyas followsAaliliotep Amrsnophis T. Senseneh

Aalimes Thothmes I. Miitnnfort

Hatshepsu Thothmes II. Isis

Hatshepsu II. Tlmtlimes III.

We here see that these four kings all marriedtheir half-sisters, a custom which lasted intoPtolemaic times, and which must have beenfounded on very ancient tradition. It is certainlythe remains of what is known as endogamy,i.e., marriage between the members of the family,and implies polygamy on the part of the father of

the man and wife, the father having been theking in the cases now under consideration.

The mother of Thothmes III. was made knownto us from the linen wrappings inscribed withtexts from the Book of the Dead which enfoldedhis mummy. Immediately following on the titleof Chapter I. arc these words, i |) Ij ] '^ ^jj^ j| c. ,SV/('(/ /;// the king Menhheiterra, son of

theStin, Thothmes, jristified, son of the royal motherIsis, justified. The name of Isis is not enclosed ina cartouche, and she has no other title than that of royal mother i.e., mother of a king. Hencewe may infer that Thothmes II. had not raisedIsis to the rank of queen, and that she wasmerely one of the royal harem. This fact mayperhaps furnish us with the key to a problemwhich has never been satisfactorily solved, namely,that presented by the relations which sub-sisted between Hatshepsu and Thothmes III.Hatshepsu was the legitimate wife of Thothmes II.,and seems to have had no son, but only twodaughters, one of whom was her namesake. Theson of Thothmes II.-, Thothmes III., was born ofanother wife, who was perhaps a rival or a slaveand if Hatshepsu shared her throne with the onlyheir of Thothmes II., it was doubtless becauseshe was constrained to do so either by circum-stances or by custom, and not from any affectionwhich she bore to her husband's son who wasalso her own nephew. The relations betweenaunt and nephew were certainly not character-ised by attachment and mutual confidence, forwith Thothmes HI. they left no trace of anythingbut resentment, which he sought to appease bydoing his utmost to destroy everything recallingthe reign of Hatshepsu. It is the story of Sarahand Hagar as enacted in a royal family ; but thequeen was less happy than the Sarah of Scripture,for she was obliged to instal Ishmael in the heri-tage of Abraham, to associate him with herself,and to give him her own daughter in marriage.


29/82

15

CHAPTEE V.HATSHEPSU.

Let us now consider the life of this queen ingreater detail. Judging from her monumentswe conclude that she did not fall below thestandard of the rest of the XVIIIth Dynasty,certainly one of the greatest and most powerfulof all the Egyptian dynasties. BamaJca,^ Hat-o

Q_>

shei^su, Numt Amen (pi. xiii.)-was,O fl '^^^ as we have seen, the daughter of

Thothmes I. (pi. xii.) and of hishalf-sister Aahmes (pi. xi.). She

t-J ^jii would seem to have given early evi-V J dence of her capacity to reign, for herfather, Thothmes I., associated her with himself inthe exercise of the sovereignty. A scene on one ofthe pylons at Karnak represents the king holdingbaton and mace, standing before a sanctuary con-taining the Theban triad, and preferring his re-quest. In the accompanying inscription, and moreespecially addi-essing the god Amon, he says : 7have come unto thee, king of the gods, I prostratemyself (before thee). In return for what I havedone for thee do thou, bestow Egypt and the BedLand (the desert) on my daughter Bamaka,living eternally, as thoiL hast done for me.Further on he proceeds to say : My dauglderTJsertkau (one of her titles), who loves thee, ivhois united unto thee, (who is) beloved, thou hasttransmitted the world unto her, {thou hast unitedit) in her hands, thou hast chosen her as queen.'^That Thothmes I. voluntarily associated hisdaughter with himself upon the throne is provedfrom the fact that this inscription was engravedduring his lifetime; had there been no other

1 The transcription of the name of Amenopliis III. in thetablets of Tell el Amarua shows that the correct reading ofthis cartouche must be Ka ma ra.

record of his action in the matter than thatengraved by order of Hatshepsu, and in her owntemple, there might have been doubt on thispoint.A fuller account of Hatshepsu's accession to

the throne as co-reguant with her father is givenin an inscription Avhich I found last spring in thenorthern half of the temple, on the retainingwall of the middle colonnade, i.e., on a placecorresponding to that occupied in the southernhalf of the temple by the record of the Expedi-tion to Punt. The inscription is somewhatobscure and requires close study. It can onlybe copied with great difficulty, because it has beenchiselled over from end to end, like all inscrip-tions exclusively commemorating Hatshepsu,which Thothmes III. could not appropriate tohimself as he appropriated the record of theExpedition to Punt.

Immediately preceding it are scenes referring tothe birth of Hatshepsu and to her being suckled bythe divine cow. These scenes are almost identicalwith those relating to the birth of Amenophis III.which adorn the walls of a chamber in the templeof Luxor, and were probably suggested by therepresentations at Deir el Bahari. The storyof Hatshepsu's childhood is followed by theaccount of her enthronement, and this directsequence implies that she was still very youngwhen that event took place. From childhood,Hatshepsu is always represented in full malecostume. In the Southern Speos she is depictedin the hkeness of a boy being suckled by theCow Hathor ; she is shown as a youth in thescene which we are about to consider, and else-where throughout the temple of Deir el Bahari


30/82

16 nKII EL BAHART.she appears as a full-grown man (pi. xiii.). Ex-cepting as a goddess, she is never once representedunder the form of a woman. She officiates aspriest, and not as priestess ; and when enthronedwithin a sanctuary she wears the head-dress ofOsiris or of some other god,even the beard isnot omitted.

The enthronement inscription is accompaniedby a scene illustrating the text, and finely carvedin rehef, Hke all the sculptures on this wall.Thothmes is seated within a shrine, his namesand titles being inscribed above his head, andneither the figure of the king, nor his titles, northe opening words of the text have been defaced.But it is otherwise with the rest of the scene andrecord. Thothmes holds by the left arm a yoimgman, who is standing. This is the queen, whosenames and titles arc also placed above her head ;and although inscription as well as figure havebeen hammered out, it is still possible to decipherthe characters. The long text is hard to read,and at present I can only give a summary of it.It is at least evident that the king has summonedtogether the nobles of his kingdom, and tellsthem that he has conferred the prerogatives andinsignia of royalty upon his daughter, whom theyare henceforward to obey. A curious indicationthat this inscription was engraved by order ofthe queen, and not by order of Thothmes, isthat he speaks of the queen in the masculine :/ww ^t^^ literally, The Majesty of him

my daughter, or ^s, ^ he, my (laughter.The inscription also contains a somewhat obscureallusion to the death of the king, followed by anaccount of the rejoicings which celebrated theaccession of the queen. On that occasion hernames and titles are said to be completed, i.e.,her two cartouches are henceforth preceded andfollowed by long formulas of epithets and attri-butes. At this time also there would seem tohave been a reform of the calendar. The 1st o^Thoth (which is the first day of the first monthof the vague year) and the ])oginning of the

seasons {i.e., the beginning of the fixed yearwhich was founded upon the recurrence of certainnatural phenomena especially the rise of theNile) were made to fall upon the same day, sothe inscription tells us. From time to time theAncient Egyptians must have felt the incon-venience noted in the Cauopic inscription, that,namely, of finding such of their festivals as wereregulated by dates in the vague year graduallymaking the round of the seasons. This was ob-viated by again causing the two yeai's to begin onthe same day. There was a fresh start ; and sincethe difference between the two years was but thatof one day in four years, the old inconveniencewas unfelt during the reign of the prince whomade the reform, and his successors were free toemploy the same means as he had done when thedisparity between the vague and fixed yearsbecame so great as to be troublesome.

Although the genealogy of the Thothmes kingsfrom Amenophis I. to Tliothmes III. can now berestored with almost absolute certainty, there isno such certainty with regard to the reigns,

I regencies, and co-regencies of the family. ThatjThothmes I. was the son of Amenophis I., andthat he associated his daughter with himself uponthe throne, are two well established facts. Mariettaconcluded from the inscriptions on an unpublishedmonument that Thothmes I. and Thothmes II.were for a time co-regnant. This seems to mealtogether unlikely. Hatshepsu was not marriedwhen she joined her father on the throne, and ifThothmes I. and Thothmes II. reigned together,'Thothmes I. must have associated his son as wellas his daughter with himselfa most improbableproceeding. It would rather seem as thoughHatshepsu had reigned alone in the intervalbetween her father's death and her marriage withThothmes II., and that it was during her solereign that she founded the temple of Deir elBahari. As a proof tliat the temple was notfounded in the lifetime of Thothmes I., Mariettestates that never once throughout the building isthat king's legend found as the legend of a living


31/82

HATSHEPStJ. 17Although agreeing with Mariettc's

conchision, I cannot support this statement. Ina part of the temple which Mariette did notexcavate, Thothmes I. does bear the titles of areigning king. On an outer wall of the upperplatform there is a long inscription, of whichunfortunately only a small portion remains, butit undoubtedly refers to Thothmes I. as living.(o 1LJ]1 Z3 . ML^,Baaakhejjei'Jca, loorshipper of Avion, lord of thethrones of the tioo lands, beloved, giving life likethe Sun eternally. This is certainly not the legendof a deceased king ; bat oddly enough the inscrip-tion is a palimpsest. It is carved with hollowedout signs, while the rest of the sculptures arein relief, and traces of the older inscription whichit superseded may still be discerned beneath it.Moreover, since it is inscribed on the outside of awall of the funerary chapel of Thothmes I., I aminclined to think that it was a later additionmade with the intention of attributing that build-ing to him and not to his daughter.

Neither are the king's titles in the enthrone-ment inscription those of a dead sovereign ; butthis text was very likely engraved by the queen'sorders, and may have been intended to settle thedisputed legitimacy of her accession. In inscrib-ing the walls of her temple with the long textillustrated by a scene representing Thothmes I.in the act of placing his hands upon her, she putherself as it were under his protection, andappealed to his authority in order to secure fromher subjects the obedience which he himself hadcommanded them to give her. She succeeded insecuring it during her Hfe, but after she wasdead her name was not admitted on the listsof legitimate sovereigns. Therefore, in spite ofappearances, and notwithstanding the two inscrip-tions which seem to prove the contrary, I do notthink that the temple of Deir el Bahari was con-secrated in the life-time of Thothmes I.

Nor do I agree with Mariette in ascribing theerection of the two largest obelisks in Egypt, the

obelisks of Hatshepsu at Karuak, to the jointreign of father and daughter. Unfortunately onlyone obelisk of this pair stands intact, while thesecond is in fragments, of which some may boseen serving as millstones in the neighbourhoodof Thebes.

These obelisks were erected in the peristylewhich precedes the great Hypostyle Hall. The in-scriptions engraved on each of the four faces wereintended to be in three lines on each face, and ofthe three lines the middle one is the most im-portant. The side lines contain scenes of offeringsmade by diiferent kings ; they are incomplete,but they represent Hatshepsu, Thothmes I., andeven Thothmes III., a fact which proves that inpart at least they were engraved after the queen'sdeath. On all four sides the middle inscriptiononly is complete.

The fourgi'eat central texts are very important,and contain particulars upon wliieli new light isthrown by the inscriptions of Doir el Bahari. Onthe north face we read: Her Majesty causedthe name of her father to be established on thismonument, which was placed when the king ofUpper and Lower Egypt, the king Piaaakheperka,gave praise to the Majesty of this god. HerMajesty raised the two great obelisks on her firstanniversary, for it was said by the king of thegods to thy father the king of Upper and LowerEgypt, Raaakheperka, Give orders that obelisksmay be raised, and thy Majesty will completethis monument.

At first sight the text seems somewhat con-fused, and the difficulty of understanding it isincreased by that change of persons from thirdto second which is common in Egyptian texts.According to this inscription it was Thothmes I.who had originally intended to erect the obelisks,and at the command of the god Amon ; but sincethe obelisks in question are here referred to inthe plural 'ww II 11 11 and not in the dual, thedivine command must have related to morethan two. Thothmes I. obeyed, and began thework. He erected two obelisks in the vestibule

C


32/82

18 DE[R EL BAHARI.preceding that of the queen and immediatelycontignons to the Hj-postj-le Hall.' One of theseobelisks is still standing, and its inscriptionsname him as sole king, without any mention ofhis daughter as co-rcgnant with him. Theseohehsks must therefore date from before thejoint reign of Thothmes I. and Hatshepsu. TheIdug was afterwards desirous of completing hisundertaking, but he probably died either beforeor immediately after beginning to do so, for theobelisk raised by his daughter bears no othermention of him except in the scenes of offeringsand in the inscription on the plinth, where he isqualified as i.e., as deceased. Hence thecompletion of the work of Thothmes I. by theerection of the two above-mentioned obelisks whichbear the queen's name must be attributed to thesole reign of Hatshepsu. The queen was veryproud of her work, and described it at length inthe inscription on the plinth of the one which isstill standing: I who sit in the palace rememberwho hath made me ; my heart hath hastened tomake for him two obelisks of smu metal, whosetops reach iinto the sky in the august hall ofcolumns which is between the two great pylonsof the king Ea-aa-kheper-ka (Thothmes I.) ...the words of men now living. When they seemy monument in the course of years, and seewhat I have done, beware of saying: I knownot, I know not. This hath been done by cover-ing the stone with gold all over. It is thus thatit hath been done. I swear it by the love of Raand the favour of my father Amon, who in-vigorateth my nostrils with life and strength. ^In stating the length of time occupied by thework, this same text supplies data from which avery interesting fact may be deduced. The textsays: My Majesty began to work at this inthe 15th year, and the first day of Mechir, tillthe IGth year, and the last day of Mesori, making

' Lepsius, Denkm., iii. G.' Translation by Mr. Lo Page Renouf, in Records of the

Past, vol. .\ii., p. 131.

seven months since the beginning of it in themountain. Here is incontrovertible proof thatthe regnal years of a sovereign were counted fromthe date of accession or coronation, and not fromthe 1st of Thoth. For, since Mechir was thesecond month of the second season, and Mesorithe fourth month of the third, the seven monthswoiild necessarily have fallen in the same regnalyear had that year been reckoned from the 1st ofThoth.

There is a remarkable agreement, in thematter of dates, between the obelisk inscriptionand the inscriptions at Deir el Bahari. Accord-ing to these statements the erection of theobelisks in the temple of Karnak, and of Hat-shepsu's building on the other side of the river,alike commemorated an anniversary of the queen'scoronation. On the obelisk we road /vwws f yy rn she has celehmtecl in his honour(that of Amon) (he first anniversary of the Sedfestival. And again Pf|14^ll--'J7P^the tn-o great obelisks were erected bij Her 3fajestijat the first anniversary. Now one of the mostfrequently recurring names of the temple of Deirel Bahari is that of n ^ ^ o )[ thesacred place of the first anniversary. In one ofthe inscriptions which I found, the god Amonspeaks as follows : Enter in peace, my daughter,within this good, and sacred, and pleasant jdacewhich thou liast made for me, aww> wm^ ^K H '^ a.^* O ^ W within the sacred place of the firstanniversary. The pillars of the colonnades re-peatedly mention the Sed festival. In one of myformer works I have described the celebration ofa Sed festival at some length.^ The generalcharacter of the festival is well known ; there isno doubt that it commemorated the sovereign'saccession ; but the period of time which must

^ TJie Festival Hall of OsorJcon II. in the Great Templeof Bubaslis.


33/82

HATSHEPSU. It)have elapsed between a coronation and accessionand the celebration of the Sed festival, and mustagain have elapsed before the sovereign wasentitled to a second celebration of the same is notas yet determined. On the CAidenco of Ptolemaicinscriptions this period was first thought to havebeen one of thirty yearsr/Dta/foi^Taerrjpt? ; butthat conclusion is not borne out by the olderinstances, nor is it in accordance with the circum-stances of the Sed festival with which we are nowconcerned. The festival to which reference is madein the inscriptions of Hatshepsu at Deir el Baharimust have been held at the laying of the first stoneof the building, or else at its inauguration, whenthe obehsks were in place and the whole work com-pleted ; but even the second hypothesis gives thesixteenth, and by no means the thirtieth year ofthe queen's reign as the date of the celebration.Moreover, we have as yet no inscriptions ofHatshepsu later than the sixteenth year of herreign, which was also probably its limit. Hencethere is here no question of a period of thirtyyears, of a TpiaKovTaeT-qpCi; ; it is even improbablethat the festival should not have been celebrateduntil towards the end of the reign, and from theDeir el Bahari inscriptions I should rather con-clude that it was solemnised in the ninth year.

Besides the name commemorating the date ofits foundation, the temple of Deir el Bahari morefrequently bore that of ^ ctzd,^ QJ^ W^

,

(1 ,^ send, or send Amon, the sacred place,or the sacred place of Anion. In this name thereis nothing distinctive, the epithet %=^ ser beingcommonly apphed either to persons, oflerings,festivals, or places, i.e., to anything consecratedto divine use. It may be translated sacred, orloorthj to he had in reverence.We know the name of the architect to whoseabilities Hatshepsu had recourse, and who probablysuperintended the building of the temple. In therauseum of Berlin,* there is a statue of an official

Lepsius, Denhn., iii. 25.

called Senmut, who lived in the queen's reign.The numerous titles ascribed to him in itsinscription are nearly all connected with build-ings and the administration of estates. In ac-cordance with the queen's usual practice, theinscription mentions her sometimes in the mas-culine and sometimes in the feminine. Senmutsays : J ivas a great man tcho loved his lord, andI gained the favour of my queen. He exalted mebefore the face of the land to the rank of overseer ofhis house, and purveyor of the land. I was chiefover the chiefs, head of the architects,^ I executed hisorders in the land1 lived under the lady of theland, queen Eamalca, living cterncdhj. His memoryis perpetuated also upon the walls of his temple; inthe Southern Speos his name occurs as worshippingHathor.^ The base of a squatting statuette ofthis great personage in black granite, and abroken glass bead inscribed with his name werefound in the course of our recent excavations.

Is it to the queen or to her architect that thehonour of inaugurating a new style of architecturethat of a temple wholly or in pai't rock-cut, andknown as a speos or hemi-speosis due ? Thisstyle of temple developed greatlyunder Kameses 11.

,

and especially in Nubia ; but we have no olderexamples of it than such as date from theXVIIIth Dynasty and the reign of Hatshepsu.There can be no doubt that the conception of therock-cut temple of Deir el Bahari was suggestedby the tombs of Beni Hassan. At Deir elBahari as at Beni Hassan we find the squarepillars, and more especially the characteristicsixteen-sided columns known as Proto-Doric, sup-porting architraves on square abaci not widerthan the diameter of the columns, and withoutthe echinus never omitted between the shaft andabacus of the Doric column. The Speos ofHathor further recalls the tombs of Beni Hassan

^ Duemicheii, Ilist. Lmch., ii., pi. 34.c 2


34/82

20 T)ETR EL BAIIAUr.ill its arranj^oment. I sliould tliinlc that BeniHassan was the phice where the queen made herfirst experiment in such architecture ; for closeto those tombs, in the valley knomi as StahlAntar, she began the excavation of a speos whichshe never finished ; but she completed both thelateral rock-cut sanctuaries of Deir el Baharithat of the south or the Speos of Hathor, andthat of the north, which I shall call the Speosof Anubis. These sanctuaries are symmetricallyplaced at either end of the middle colonnade.The Speos of Hathor was certainly built before

the Northern Speos, and dates from the timewhen Hatshepsu had coased to reign alone, hadmarried her brother Thothmes II., and was reign-ing together with him for a few years. Strictlyspeaking it is a hemi-speos. It is preceded by acovered colonnade, whose roof of enormous blocksrests upon Proto-Doric columns and four pillarswith Hathor-hcad capitals. This forms the ap-proach to a small hypostyle hall, hewn out of thesolid rock and upheld by two Proto-Doric columnsonly, which leads into two narrow chambers, ofwhich the further is the narrower and also theless lofty, owing to the rise in the floor. Herewe find conformity to the same law which prevailsin the hypccthral temples and M. Perrot hasnamed the law of decreasing dimensions : i.e.,from portico to sanctuary (called the sclcos by M.Perrot, and by others the cclla) the dimensionsof the building decrease in every sense and thefloor itself rises. The innermost room containedthe sacred emblem of the goddess, probably in theform of a cow made of gold or some other preciousmetal; and as usual in Egyptian temples the figurewould be kept in a tabernacle or shrine. Thesacred bark which bore the tabernacle containing

the emblem was probably kept in the room im-mediately preceding the samituary. The variouslateral niches were the equivalents of the storechambers, built round the sanctuary of a templeto serve as repositories for offerings, preciousthings, the divine vestments, and all the sacredfurniture.

It is interesting to compare the Southern Speosof Deir el Bahari with that of Rameses II.at Abu Simbel, also dedicated to the goddessHathor. At Abu Simbel, as in most of tlieNubian temples, the sclcos is not blank, but onthe inner wall is carved the forepart of thesacred cow represented as emerging from themountain : beneath her head is the figure ofthe king. A similar group is sculptured onthe side-walls of the speos of Deir el Bahari.Hathor was pre-eminently the goddess of themountain ; she it was who emerged from the Moun-tain of the West, and to her the deceased madeadoration. Nothing could have been more suitableto her character as set forth in the inscriptionsthan a rock-cut sanctuary hewn out of clifis likethose of Deir el Bahari, especially if that sanctuarywere connected with a tomb. Wo cannot herepursue the comparison between the Egyptianrock-cut and hypaithral temples ; but each alikewas intended as the dwelling-place of divinity,and in all its essential parts presented a closeanalogy with the Egyptian tomb destined for thedwelling of the dead. To judge from remainingmonuments, Hatshepsu was the first to conceivethe idea of applying the subterranean architec-ture hitherto confined to tombs to the require-ments of divine worship : with her, or with herarchitect, originated the rock -cut temple inEgypt.


35/82

21

CHAPTER VI.IIATSIIEPSU S NAVAL EXPEDITION TO THE LAND OF PUNT.

One of the most important events of Hatsliepsu'sreigu was that naval expedition to the Land ofPunt, whose sculptured record covers the southernhalf of the wall stretching behind the middle colon-nade of her temple. The upper courses of thewall parallel to the colonnade are unfortunatelyin great part destroyed, and but Httle remains ofthe wall at right angles to it which closes in thecolonnade on the south. A peculiar interestattaches to this expedition, since it was not one ofconquest, but intended to establish commercialrelations with peoples of the African coasts.

Whatever was the exact situation of the Land ofPunt, it certainly belonged to what were known asthe lujuls of the South L '^ Did it also-^ ^ 111 i 1 1 Iform part of the region called Khciit Hunncfcrmn Pf I r^^^ a wide tract of country southof Egypt, stretching between the Nile and theRed Sea ? Brugsch holds that it did,^ and baseshis conclusion mainly upon the indubitable factthat in one of the great lists of Thothmes III.Punt appears under the general heading ofpeoples of the South and of Khent Hunnefer.^Nevertheless, Punt is generally distinguished fromKhent Hunnefer, and particularly so in the in-scriptions of Deir el Bahari, from which latter itwould seem that the two countries were con-tiguous, but of somewhat wide and indefiniteextent, Punt possessing a coast where vesselscould put in, while Khent Hunnefer lay in themountainous interior, and included the districtof - ^. 1=3 Di:^, which has been supposed to

' Vm-ertafel, p. 58. Mariette, Karnalc, p. 22.

be that of the Blemmyes. - %\ 1= f^^^ is readin several ways, of which M. Maspero's Ilini seemsto me the most correct.

If Punt and Khent Hunnefer were not one andthe same country, there was still great resem-blance between them ; each had a mixed popula-tion which included negroes, and their producewas almost identical.' On comparing the sculp-tures of Deir el Bahari with the somewhat laterscenes from the tomb of Rekhmara, we see thatin both cases incense is represented as the chiefproduct of Punt, especially the kind called anti.The giraffe is said to come from Khent Hunnefer,and not from the coast. The dogs figured in thetomb of Rekhmara are brought from the interior,while those at Deir el Bahari come from Punt.Ivory, panther-skins, live panthers, gold, ebony,antimony, and various kinds of monkeys, werecommon to both countries. All these productsbeing decidedly African, it is evident that Hat-sliepsu's expedition had been directed to anAfrican coast, and that her ships anchored in anAfrican port.

The arrangement of the Deir el Bahari sculp-tures, together with that of some of their accom-panying texts, is obviously intended to conveythe fact that the whole of the cargo and treasurewas brought back by a single expedition, and notby two, of which one was maritime and the otheroverland, as some have supposed. All thesemarvels, as the inscription calls them, werebrought in the queen's ships from the one famousexpedition which was her pride. And if productsof the land of Him were among them, their pre-

^ Hoskius, Travels in Ethiopia, plates pp. 328-330.


36/82

22 DEIR EL LAIIAIU.sence only serves to show that commercial re-lations existed even then between the interiora.nd the coast. The inhabitants of the hillydistricts of Upper Nubia and the Soudan broughttheir native produce to Punt, whence it waspassed on into other countries which had dealingswith the people of that land. We should natur-ally conclude that the inhabitants of the coasthad most frequent intercourse with their nearestneighbours, that is to say, with those peoples ofArabia separated from them by the Eed Sea only.Classic writers, and particularly Herodotus^ andStrabo,^ speak of Araby the Blest and its wealthof divers perfumes. There lay the other shore,along which, as the inscription states, stretchedthe Land of Punt, or the Divine Land, |for the two names seem to be synonymous.Hatshcpsu's fleet undoubtedly sailed for thecoasts of Africa and not for those of Arabia,but we arc not justified in limiting the Land ofPunt to the African coast alone. Punt, or To-neter, the home of perfumes dear to the Egyp-tians, and the land to which their religious textsascribe an almost legendary character, lay uponboth shores of the southern end of the Eed Sea.'There, from remote antiquity, dwelt a tradingpopulation which exported incense, myrrh, cin-namonall those perfumes for which ancientOrientals seem to have had a taste even morepronounced than that of their modern represen-tatives, and which must also have been highlyesteemed by the gods, since such large use wasmade of them in Egyptian ritual.The five ships sent by the queen (pi. vii.)

put in to shore in Africa, perhaps we can evenapproximately determine where ; but, as M.Maspero* has pointed out (and I am of his

' III. 107. ^ p. 778. Lielilein, Handel und Schijfahrt avf dem Rothcn Meere,

p. 52, et ff.* De quelqucs navigations des Eijypiiens sur Ics cotes de

la mer Erythrie, p. 9, et ff.

opinion in the matter), it was not on thecoast. The sculptured scenes represent nocoast scenery ; such native huts, and trees tallenough to shelter the cattle, would not be foundby the shore, nor do date-palms grow in thesand and pebbles of the beach. All this musthave been at some distance inland, safe fromthe high tides of the Red Sea, and also outof the reach of ships. In order to anchor nearthe dwellings of the natives the Egyptians pro-bably ascended one of the streams, wadys, orTTorajMtat noted by Greek geographers as frequenton this part of the coast, and which formedsmall natural harbours, identical in all likelihoodwith the Harbours of Incense, ^ as the inscrip-tion names the stations whence the perfumesand spices were brought. M. Maspero considersthat the stream up which the Egj'ptians madetheir way was the Elephant river, near to themountain of that name and running between theRas el Fil and Cape Guardafui, and his assump-tion is a plausible one. Still, it hardly seemsnecessary for the expedition to have gone so farsouth. The aromatifcra regio began much nearerthe Straits of Bab el Maudeb, near to the Gulfof Tajura ; and according to Greek geographersthe perfume and spice trade had many stationsor ifjimpia all along this coast. We are unfor-tunately reduced to conjecture in the matter, fortwo-thirds of the short wall on which was sculp-tured the description of the Land of Punt isdestroyed, and there is little hope of finding anyof the scattered fragments which might yieldinvaluable geographical and ethnographical par-ticulars.

The squadron having been made fast ashore,the queen's envoy, who has disembarked, is seenfollowed by an officer in command of eightsoldiers armed with axe, lance, and shield

^ ^ c^ ' ? * * ''^ ''' ' ''^^ staircases or theladders of a7it , curiously corresponding to tlio French wordvchellc which iu the East is applied to a harbour.


37/82

EXPEDITION TO THE LAND OF PUNT. 23(pi. viii.). The presents from Egypt, that isto say such objects as the Egyptians had broughtto offer in exchange for native produce, areplaced upon a small table. The inscription ofthis scene says : All good things (fromEgypt) are brought by order of Her Majestyto Hathor, Lady of Punt. These presents con-sist of an axe, a poignard in its sheath, two legbangles, eleven necklaces, and five large rings,which must have been wrought if they weremade of precious metal, but, since gold was theproduct of the Land of Punt, I should rathersuppose these rings to have been made of glassor glazed ware. Perhaps they were of bronze,or some other metal unknown to the natives.The poverty and meanness of the Egyptian giftsare in striking contrast to the value of thosewhich they receive. In looking at this sceneof barter we seem to be present at a transactionnot unlike those which Europeans now makewith negroes. The Egyptians presented theirown manufactured goods, and the study of thescene has suggested to me that perhaps thenecklaces, which here held the place of the beadsof modern commerce, were made of scaraboidssuch as are commonly found at Deir el Bahari,whose chief beauty hes in the fine blue glazewhich is characteristic of the ware of thatplace. The natives offered nothing but raw pro-ducts ; no manufactured articles were then to befound among their gifts, any more than they arenow included among their exports. At themost, the gold and precious metals were made upinto rings.^ The walls of Deir el Bahari pro-bably show specimens only of what the Egyptiansgave to the people of Punt, for the goods whichthe strangers are represented as taking away areout of all proportion to what they leave behindwith the native chiefs, who, nevertheless, appearto have been well content with their bargain. It

' See these rings of precious metals being weighed in thescale after the return of the expedition. The weights arein the form of bulls.

is true that, as we see in the second row ofscenes, in order to facilitate trade and securenative favour, a tent was set up and the chiefswere bidden to a feast of bread, beer, wine,meat, fruits, and all the good things of Egypt,as the queen had commanded.

Distrusting the sight of armed men, the nativesadvance somewhat fearfully into the presence ofthe envoy, and speak with hands uplifted insupplication : How have you reached this landunknown to the men of Egypt ? Have youdescended hither by the paths of the sky, or haveyou sailed the sea of To-Neter ? The nativetypes and costume furnish an interesting subject ofstudy, and Mariettc concluded that the peoplewere of two races. This may easily have beenthe case, since the trade of the interior camedown to the coast-land of Punt, and we alsoknow from the inscriptions that people of Himcame with the Puntites to greet the Egyptians.Individuals of the type to which the Princeof Punt belonged had aquiline noses, thickpendulous lips, and a hard expression of coun-tenance. They grew long beards, curving out-wards, and several of those distinguished as chiefswore a feather in the hair, after the manner ofsome Libyan tribes. The group speaking with theenvoy is that of the great chief and his family,and consists in the first place of the father, who isarmed with nothing more than a boomerang and apoignard hanging from his belt. His right leg isprotected by rings of yellow metal, forming sucharmour as the Bongo negroes wear on their arms,and to which they give the name of dangahor?Behind him is his wife, who has dismounted fromher ass. She is repulsively obese, her body beingnothing but rolls and masses of flesh. She wearsa yellow dress, and a necklace. The daughteris fast following in her mother's footsteps, and

This is also true of the Niam Niam. Cf. Marno, Reisein der ^Egypiischen Equatorial Provinx, p. 124, wherethere is an illustration showing the figure of a chief wearingsimilar rings on leg, arms, and neck.


38/82

24 DEIR EL BAIIAIU.will in due time attain to the same proportions.^It was at first supposed that this monstrosityindicated some such disease as tuberculousleprosy, or elephantiasis ; but African travellers,like Speke and Schweinfurth, state that amongcertain barbarous tribes of the interior suchobesity is still the ideal of female loveliness.Speke recounts that in the case of one royal ladythe weight of her arms alone prevented herstanding upright. The Queen of Punt must cer-tainly have found it difficult to enter her hut,which was built on piles, like the tuhth of someSoudanese tribes, and could only be reached bymeans of a ladder. 1^ ^^^ fD % VaroJiu, thename of the King, and (1 ^ ^ n(] Ati, that of hiswife, have no ethnographical significance.The type of the first group, which is also that

of most of the population, is as well marked asthat of the second is ill-defined ; the latter beingchiefly differentiated from the former by theabsence of a beard and the presence of the roundEgyptian wig. As neither type is representedwith the characteristic colour and features of thenegro, we must regard both types as belonging toCushite or Hamitic race, akin to the Egj^tianand probably of the same common origin.The products of the Land of Punt carried away

by the Egy^^tian ships were many and various.The inscription does not enumerate all thoserepresented ; e.g. it says nothing of the cattle andwhether they came from Punt or the Land ofIlim. Cattle still constitute the chief wealth ofmany tribes on the Upper Nile, and travellersmaintain that the Soudanese beasts are farsuperior to the Egyptian, a superiority doubt-less already recognized in the reign of Hat-shepsu. The text, however, duly records allthe precious woods of To-Nctcr, and among

' Since the publication of Jrariottc's Deir el BalMri, bothscenes containing tlio figure of the Queen of Punt have beencut out of tlic wall and stolen. The upper scene wa.s re-covered and is now in the Ghizeh Museum; the lower, whichalso contains the daughter's figure, has never been found.

them the Tashcp, which M. Loret has iden-tified with the odoriferous cinnamon wood fand the Klicsi, which is as yet unidentified butwas probably also odoriferous. But of all thewoods which formed the staple timber trade, alikeof Punt and of Khent Ilunnefer on the UpperNile, ebony held the chief place.^ Li the tombof Ti we find reference to one of his statues asbeing of ebony. The wood is mentioned againand again from tliat time onward to the reign ofPtolemy Philadelphus, who made a troop ofEthiopians bearing two thousand trunks of ebonymarch in one of his processions. The Egyptiansconsidered the bark good for the eyes, but thewood itself was in chief request for the manufactureof shrines, palettes, furniture and fine cabinet-making, and works of art in general. Very Ukelythe door and panel which I found in 1893, andwhich had formed part of a great shrine madefor Anion during the joint reign of llatshepsuand Thothmes II., is of Punt ebony.

The vegetable products of Punt in the greatestdemand were spices and perfumes, of which thechief kinds were called (1 ( D 1\ ^N ^cassia(?), ] | incense, and above all

I Q O O OQ \\ o anti, which was collected in lumps,like gum, and piled in large heaps. Thetrees which bore it were also exported ; dugup while still young, they were set in woodenboxes of earth to bo placed here and there ingardens as we put orange-trees (pi. x.), or to betransplanted into ground where they eventuallygrew tall enough for cattle to pass beneaththem (pi. ix.). The anti si/canwres, as thesetrees were called, have not yet been identified.Perhaps the bas-reliefs exaggerate their size, asis always the case wher

temple of deir elba 12 e gyp

Documents