The visitor, having reached the northern end of the Egyptian Saloon, should turn to the south, and begin a minute examination of its contents. The sarcophagi, or outer coffins of stone, in which the rich ancient Egyptians deposited the embalmed bodies of their relations, occupy the greater part of the ground space of the saloon. They are massive shells, hewn from the solid rock, polished and engraved skilfully with hieroglyphics, which, so far as the learned have been able to decipher, record the exploits of the great men they contained. Some of them are in the shape of common boxes with raised lids; while in others, attempts to represent the features of the deceased, and a rough outline of a mummy are apparent. These massive coffins, which are upwards of three thousand years old, and are eloquent with the mystic written language of that remote antiquity, deserve more than a transient notice even from the unscientific visitor. Mummies were found in most of these, proving their use. Some were discovered placed in an erect, and others in a recumbent posture, in the tombs of Thebes, or on the sites of ancient cities.
Of the sarcophagi or coffins, fashioned in the shape of a mummy, the visitor should notice that in calcareous stone, numbered 47, which was discovered at Tana; another, with the paintings restored, marked 39; another in green basalt, marked 33, known to be that of a female called Auch, decorated with the embalming deities, and inscribed with a prayer on behalf of the deceased woman; and one of later date which has held the remains of a member of the priestly class, numbered 17. To arrive at a fair estimate of the average art displayed in these ancient sepulchral remains, it is worth the trouble of the visitor to wander a little about the saloon from one specimen to the next immediately connected with, or proximately resembling it. Having examined the coffins shaped like mummies, the visitor should next direct his attention to the massive oblong cases which lie upon the ground on either side of him.
The first of these which he may examine is that marked 32. This sarcophagus was excavated from the back of the palace of Sesostris, near Thebes. Athor appears in bas-relief upon the lid; the sun is represented in the interior, together with Heaven represented as a female, and a repetition of the goddess Athor.
The names of several royal ladies have been deciphered from the inscriptions, which are the addresses of deities. The black granite chest of a sarcophagus, numbered 23, is that of a royal scribe named Hapimen. Here the well-known figures of the Amenti, the embalmer Anubis, and other deities and symbols, will remind the visitor of the Egyptian room up stairs, with its strange green little images of figures half human and half bestial. Round the interior are the deities to whom the various parts of the human body were severally dedicated. Since this massive granite was the coffin of Hapimen, it has been known to the Turks as the "Lover's Fountain," and used by them as a cistern. The Syenite sarcophagus of a standard-bearer, is marked 18. The chest of a royal sarcophagus that was taken from the mosque of St. Athanasius at Alexandria, and which contained the mummy of a king of the twenty-eighth dynasty, is marked number 10. On the exterior, the Sun is represented, attended by appropriate deities travelling through the hours of the day; and on the interior the visitor will recognise the quaint symbolic forms of the usual sepulchral gods and goddesses. The two remaining sarcophagi are those of a scribe and priest of the acropolis of Memphis, and a bard. That of the former, marked 3, is covered with the figures of Egyptian divinities and inscriptions to the deceased; that of the latter, in arragonite, is in the form of a mummy, like those first examined by the visitor. This coffin has five distinct lines of hieroglyphics engraved down the front, expressing a chapter of the funeral ritual: and the face bears evidence of having been gilt.
Having sufficiently examined these massive coffins, upon which the proudest undertaker of modern times must look humbly, and deplore the decline of his business as an art, the visitor should at once turn to other specimens of the sepulchral art of the ancient Egyptians. Of these, the most interesting are the sepulchral tablets, which are literally
ANCIENT EGYPTIAN TOMBSTONES.
Our modern tombstones record only the virtues of the dead. If future generations have to rely upon the revelations of our churchyards for facts connected with the people of modern times, they will write that we were all of us faultless as fathers, irreproachable as husbands, and devoted and self-sacrificial as children. Every tombstone is engraved with a catalogue of human virtues; and idlers wandering round about our country churches, find themselves surrounded by the ashes of fond husbands, innocent angels, and adored wives. These prattlings of sorrow have their happy significance, since they show the universal forgiveness that follows even the worst and basest of mankind to the grave. But viewed as historical records, tombstones are sadly erring guides. They tell histories of men, written by their mistresses or their children. The sculpture which adorns the graves of modern races in this country, generally represents urns, or weeping cherubims, broken flowers, or fractured columns, or grieving angels. These symbols of death and grief contrast often oddly with the hopeful scriptural sentences which they surmount. In some instances the occupation or calling of the deceased is typified on his tomb—the unstrung lyre telling the whereabouts of a dead musician; and a palette indicating the resting-place of a defunct painter. Little that is great in sculpture has of late marked burial-places.
The Egyptians, on the contrary, employed their choicest workmen to decorate their tombs. The visitor may, gathering together the scattered fragments from this saloon, picture to himself one of the massive solemn vaults of the old Egyptians—the walls decorated with sepulchral tablets, and beneath each tablet a massive sarcophagus, containing the mummy of the deceased whose actions the tablet records. Not altogether unlike the vaults of the present day, save that perishable materials suffice for modern notions; whereas the Egyptian provided comforts for the long, long rest, that, according to his creed, would elapse, before the mummy would shake off its bandages, and walk forth bodily once more. The Egyptian tablets, of which there are a great number scattered about the saloon, are, as the visitor will perceive, of small dimensions, but crowded with mystic hieroglyphics, and ornamental groups of the funereal deities and other subjects. The writing records the actions and the name of the deceased, together with various religious sentiments; and is therefore, in form and spirit, not unlike the modern epitaph. This resemblance is not so wonderful as it at first appears, seeing that the same circumstances acted upon the dictator of the old Egyptian epitaph, as those which make the modern widow eloquent. The most modern of the tablets in the present collection are those executed while Egypt was a Roman state, many are of the time of the Ptolemies, and one is believed to be of a date before the time of Abraham. This tablet is to the memory of a state officer: it is marked 212. The examination of the sarcophagi, will have led the visitor to the southern end of the saloon; and from this point he should once more turn to the north, and examine the sepulchral tablets on the eastern and western walls. He will notice that numbers of them exactly resemble one another in certain forms; that certain sepulchral scenes are frequently repeated, and that therefore the tablets cannot be said in many cases with certainty, to represent either passages in the life of the deceased, or symbolic images of his career.
First let the visitor remark, numbered 90, a basalt slab, presented to the museum by the Lords of the Admiralty. It is supposed to have been originally the cover of a stone coffin, in the time of the Ptolemies. It is remarkable for a Graeco-Egyptian recumbent figure, executed in bas-relief. The sepulchral tablets marked 128-9-31-32, are in calcareous stone. The first is that of a scribe, who is receiving a funeral offering from his son; the second is that of Akar-se, who is receiving the offerings of his bereaved family; the third, from Abydos, has similar representations of family offerings, and the fourth is that of the chief keeper of the cattle of Rameses II., named Hara, who prays to Horus, Isis, Nephthys, and Osiris. The first three tablets are dedicated to Isis. The visitor may also remark in this neighbourhood a fragment in bas-relief from the tomb near Gizeh, of Afa. Afa was a palace officer, who is supposed to have flourished about the period of the fourth dynasty. He is here represented, in company with various members of his family.
The next tablet to which the visitor should direct his attention is from Thebes, and is marked 139. It is that of a priest named Rames, who flourished during the reign of King Menephtah. Here the priest is represented in the act of adoring various deities, and accepting funeral honours from his family. The tablet marked 142 is of the time of the nineteenth dynasty. It bears an inscription referring to a governor of the Ramesseium, named Amen-mes. The next tablet that deserves particular remark is one in calcareous stone, from Abydos. It is in honour of a military chief of the twelfth dynasty, named Nechta. The pictorial embellishments represent the chief before a table of offerings, with his wife, mother, and nurse, seated before him. On the next tablet (144) a judge named Kaha, is adoring funeral deities, and receiving the usual honours from his family. Passing the tablet of the commander of the troops of the palace of Sethos I. (146) the visitor should pause before the interesting tablet marked 147. This tablet records the date of the birth and marriage of a female named Tai-em-hept, of the advent of her son Tmouth, and of her death which took place in the tenth year of the reign of Cleopatra. As the visitor progresses with his inspection of these tablets, he will be more and more struck with the minute revelations they afford of the subdivision of labour among the ancient Egyptians. For instance, one tablet (148) is that of a superintendent of the builders of the palaces of Thothmes IV. in Abydos; another (149) is that of a scribe of the royal quarries; a third (150) is that of a Theban judge, on the lower part of which are representations in yellow, in the style of the nineteenth dynasty, of the transport of the corpse, and other funeral ceremonies; a fourth (154) is that of a royal usher; a fifth is that of Pai, a queen's officer, among the illustrations of which a tame cynocephalus may be noticed. The tablet marked 159 is a very ancient specimen. It is that of Rutkar a priest, who is represented, in company with his wife, surveying the domestic occupations of his dependents. The tablet from Thebes, of Baknaa, a master of the horse in the reign of Sesostris is marked 164. Here the deceased is represented adoring a group of deities. The other tablets in this vicinity are chiefly of the time of Rameses II. or III, and are in honour of scribes and other functionaries immediately connected with the court. Two sepulchral tablets from Sakkara are interesting. That marked 184 is in honour of a priestess of Phtha named Tanefer-ho. The pictorial embellishments represent the priestess about to be introduced to Osiris and other deities by Anubis and other presiding spirits of the tomb. This specimen bears the date of the nineteenth year of the reign of Ptolemy Auletes. The second tablet from Sakkara (188) is that of an ancient pluralist named I-em-hept, who is represented introduced to Osiris and other deities by Anubis and his brother spirits or genii. The inscription below, in the vulgar character of the ancient Egyptians, is supposed to begin with the sixth year of Cleopatra. Near these tablets is one in dark granite, of a date before the twelfth dynasty (187) in honour of Mentu-hept, a superintendent of granaries and wardrobes. The next tablet to which the visitor's attention should be directed, is one crowded with symbolic animals and deities (191). It is that of a functionary named Kaha, who is adoring Chiun, standing on a lion, and grasping snakes, with Horus and other deities. Asi, a military chief and priest of a very remote period, is represented on the next tablet (192), with food before him, and the next (193) is that found before the great sphinx at Gizeh. On it the sun is represented, and a Greek inscription tells that it was erected in the time of Nero, by the inhabitants of Busiris to the Roman governor of Egypt, Tiberius Claudius Balbillus. The next tablet (194) is that discovered by Belzoni, near the temple of Karnak, on which a line of adoring deities are represented. The tablets marked 548, 9, 51 have no particular points of interest; the visitor may therefore at once pass to the group, most of which are coloured yellow, and are elaborately embellished, marked from 555 to 598. The first of these worth especial notice is that (555) of a Theban judge of the eighteenth dynasty. It is coloured yellow and the deceased is represented with the boat and the sun's disc above, and in company with his sister adoring the cow of Athor; the second (566) is in the form of a doorway, is of the nineteenth dynasty, is coloured, and is in honour of a conductor of the festival of Amen-ra; the third and fourth (557-8) are of earlier date, or the twelfth dynasty, and represent the deceased before tables of viands; the fifth tablet (560) is in honour of Her-chen, who is represented with his relations, and Phtah-kan, a scribe, also represented and similarly attended, all well finished and coloured; the three following tablets represent the deceased before tables of viands, coloured; the next (564) is that of the keeper of the treasury, or "silver abode," in the twelfth dynasty—he too is before a table of food in company with his relations; the next remarkable specimen is that marked 569, which is in honour of Athor-si, a functionary supposed to have been the superintendent of mines in the twelfth dynasty, who is here represented in one part before a table loaded with food, and in another part seated, with his hands humbly crossed upon his breast; the next tablets presenting particular points for remark are those of Eun-necht, (575) a superintendent of corn and clothing, of the twelfth dynasty. Senatef, chief of the palace to Amen-emha II., who is represented receiving a goose, a haunch, and other food from his relations. Eunentef, a chief and his son standing face to face, bearing wands and sceptres—a sculptor named User-ur, who is represented with his wives and parents, and upon which the square red lines used by the precise Egyptian artists are still visible on the unfinished parts. After several other tablets of the twelfth dynasty, is placed (584) a small square one of an earlier date in honour of Chen-bak, an architect, who is seated with his wife, receiving the duty of his children. Near this is a good specimen of old Egyptian bas-relief on calcareous stone, in honour of a palace officer named Amen-ha (586); and next to it (587) is a tablet in honour of a superintendent of all the gods, named Seraunut. Hereabouts also is the tablet from Thebes in honour of Hera, a royal scribe (588). On this tablet the deceased is represented bearing an appropriate feather sceptre before Nameses the ninth of the twentieth dynasty, who is seated on his throne, under the particular guardianship of the God of truth.