A few grassy mounds are the only vestiges of the once mighty city; and in the midst of a forest of palm trees is an excavation dug in the ground, in which lies a huge granite block, exposed to view by the encompassing débris being cleared away. This huge block is a gigantic statue lying face downwards. It is well carved, the face wears a placid countenance, and its size is immense. The nose is longer than an umbrella, the head is about ten feet long, and the whole body is in due proportion; so that the colossal monolith (for it is one stone) probably weighs about four hundred tons.
Colossal Statue of Rameses II., at Memphis.
In the day of Memphis’ glory a great temple, dedicated to Ptah, was one of the marvels of the proud city. “Noph” (Memphis) “shall be waste and desolate,” saith Jeremiah; a prediction literally fulfilled. Of the great temple not a vestige remains; but Herodotus says that in front of the great gateway of the temple, Rameses II., called by the Greeks Sesostris, erected a colossal statue of himself. The colossal statue has fallen from its lofty position, and now lies prostrate, buried amid the ruins of the city, as already described. On the belt of the colossus is the cartouche of Rameses II. The fist and big toe of this monster figure are in the British Museum. In the Piazza of St. John Lateran, at Rome, the tall obelisk towers heavenwards like a lofty spire, adorning that square. Originally it was one hundred and ten feet long, and therefore the longest monolith ever quarried. It was also the heaviest, weighing, as it does, about four hundred and fifty tons, and therefore considerably more than twice the weight of the London obelisk.
As the sphinx is closely associated with the obelisk, and as Thothmes is four times represented by a sphinx on the London Obelisk, and as, moreover, two huge sphinxes have lately been placed on the Thames Embankment, one on each side of the Needle, it may not be out of place to say a few words respecting this sculptured figure. An Egyptian sphinx has the body of a lion couchant with the head of a man. The sphinxes seem for the most part to have been set up in the avenues leading to the temples. It is thought by Egyptologists that the lion’s body is a symbol of power, the human head is a symbol of intellect. The whole figure was typical of kingly royalty, and set forth the power and wisdom of the Egyptian monarch.
In ancient Egypt, sphinxes might be numbered by thousands, but the gigantic figure known by pre-eminence as “The Sphinx,” stands on the edge of the rocky platform on which are built the pyramids of Ghizeh. When in Egypt, the writer examined this colossal figure, and found that it is carved out of the summit of the native rock, from which indeed it has never been separated. On mounting its back he found by measurement that the body is over one hundred feet long. The head is thirty feet in length, and fourteen feet in width, and rears itself above the sandy waste. The face is much mutilated, and the body almost hidden by the drifting sand of the desert. It is known that the tremendous paws project fifty feet, enclosing a considerable space, in the centre of which formerly stood a sacrificial altar for religious purposes. On a cartouche in front of the figure is the name of Thothmes IV.; but as Khufu, commonly called Cheops, the builder of the great pyramid, is stated to have repaired the Sphinx, it appears that the colossus had an existence before the pyramids were built. This being so, “The Sphinx” is not only the most colossal, but at the same time the oldest known idol of the human race.
One of the most appreciative of travellers thus describes the impression made upon him by this hoary sculpture:—
“After all that we have seen of colossal statues, there was something stupendous in the sight of that enormous head—its vast projecting wig, its great ears, its open eyes, the red colour still visible on its cheek; the immense proportion of the whole lower part of its face. Yet what must it have been when on its head there was the royal helmet of Egypt; on its chin the royal beard; when the stone pavement by which men approached the pyramids ran up between its paws; when immediately under its breast an altar stood, from which the smoke went up into the gigantic nostrils of that nose, now vanished from the face, never to be conceived again! All this is known with certainty from the remains that actually exist deep under the sand on which you stand, as you look up from a distance into the broken but still expressive features. And for what purpose was this sphinx of sphinxes called into being, as much greater than all other sphinxes as the pyramids are greater than all other temples or tombs? If, as is likely, he lay couched at the entrance, now deep in sand, of the vast approach to the second, that is, the central pyramid, so as to form an essential part of this immense group; still more, if, as seems possible, there was once intended to be a brother sphinx on the northern side as on the southern side of the approach, its situation and significance were worthy of its grandeur. And if further the sphinx was the giant representative of royalty, then it fitly guards the greatest of royal sepulchres, and with its half human, half animal form, is the best welcome and the best farewell to the history and religion of Egypt.”—Stanley’s Sinai and Palestine, p. lviii.
Standing amid the sand of the silent desert, gazing upon the placid features so sadly mutilated by the devastations of ages, the colossal figure seemed to awake from sleep, and speak thus to the writer:—