How to Study Architecture

by Charles H. Caffin

The King was the supreme head of the whole system, descendant of the Sun-god, Ra, the individual embodiment of the nation’s greatness, while beneath him the people were divided into the official class, middle class, and slaves. The first included generals, high-priests, officers, physicians, overseers, district-chiefs, judges, master-builders, scribes, and many others—officialdom being spun like a web over the life of the people. The middle class, composed of merchants, traders, ordinary priests, artisans, free working potters, carpenters, joiners, smiths, and agriculturists, enjoyed many of the privileges of the upper classes, but were not permitted to erect tombs, though their place of burial might be marked by a stele with inscriptions. The slaves were mere hewers of wood and drawers of water.

Title to all land, except that attached to the temples, was vested in the King and the land was worked for the State by slaves or let out at an annual rental. In connection with this subject compare the story of Joseph, especially Genesis xli.

Each administrative department had its own troops—or, to use the modern word, corvée—of slaves, under an overseer who kept tally of work done and rations distributed. It was the troop, not the individual, that constituted the unit. Agriculturists ranked higher than the artisans; although the work of the latter was highly esteemed. The weavers made baskets, mats, and boats of papyrus leaves and produced linen of the finest quality as well as coarser grades. The carpenter, notwithstanding the scarcity of timber, did creditable work with the simplest kind of tools. Little variation was attempted by the potters in the forms of vessels, which were crude but often finished with fine glazes. The metal workers used gold, silver, bronze, iron, and tin; silver exceeding gold in value. Whence they procured tin is unknown, but the other metals came from the mines of Sinai and Nubia.

The processes of agriculture were of the simplest. The plough was formed of a sharpened stake, dragged by oxen; the crops were cut with sickles, and the grain was winnowed by casting it in the air, after which it was stored in large, tunnel-shaped receptacles, filled from the top by a ladder. While the Egyptians prided themselves on their immense herds of cattle, sheep, goats, pigs, and asses, the shepherds, living in the remote marshes, were “an abomination unto the Egyptians” (Genesis xlvi, 34).

Their recreations included the hunting of wild animals with dogs, while the men were armed with lasso and spear and occasionally a bow and arrows. In the marshy districts birds were brought down with a boomerang or caught in nets and traps. The people indulged in wrestling matches, gymnastics, ball-playing, quoits, and juggling, while work was performed to the accompaniments of music and singing, and music and dancing enlivened the feasts. The instruments comprised the flute and a kind of whistle, the guitar, harp, and lyre, the last two having sometimes twenty strings.

The school, “bookhouse” or “house of instruction,” was presided over by a scribe and attended by children of all classes. The curriculum included orthography, calligraphy, and the rules of etiquette, together with practice in the technical work of the department for which the children were being trained.

The uniform male garment for all classes was an apron fastened around the loins. To this in early times the King added a lion’s tail and the noble a panther-skin. In the Middle Empire the apron took a pointed, triangular shape in front and became longer, while by degrees a single apron gave way to a short, opaque under-apron with a long, transparent one over it. The short apron, however, continued to be the sole garment of the priest. In time, the costume of the King included garments covering the upper part of the body, a practice which dates from the Eighteenth Dynasty, when the vigorous Queen Hatasu adopted the male costume. The uniform dress of women was a transparent robe hung from the shoulders by straps and reaching from the breasts to the ankles. In later times it was supplemented with a sleeved or sleeveless mantle.

These, and countless other particulars of daily life, are pictured with precise details, in coloured carvings and in paintings on the walls of tombs, so as to continue after death, for the benefit of the Ka or double, the conditions which the deceased had been accustomed to in life. This Ka was believed to be separate from the body, mind, or soul of the individual; an independent spiritual existence which, as long as it was present, ensured “protection, life, continuance, purity, health, and joy.” Hence the care with which provision was made to induce it to remain with the individual when dead. For continuance of life after death was the cardinal principle of Egyptian religion. It was the spiritualised expression of the people’s intense conservatism; and the preservation of the body as a mummy and the taking of measures to ensure that the Ka would abide with it or, at least, visit it frequently, were the chief duties of the priesthood. The homes of the living, therefore, were considered of less importance than those of the dead; and, while few traces remain of dwellings or even of palaces, Egypt abounds with Tombs. These are the memorials of individuals, while the Temples embody the pride and glory of the national, collective life. Indeed, it would seem that during life the individual, except only the King, who represented the union of all, was regarded simply as a factor in the collective organisation of the community, the splendour and power of which was visualised in the Temples.

Hence the importance which was attached to size and beauty of colour in the Temple architecture. Evidence shows the Egyptians were not an intellectual race. That is to say, they were not given to speculation; nor did they carry their mathematical or scientific studies beyond the point at which they were needed for material and practical purposes. And equally devoid of abstract qualities was their imagination. It conceived of “better” in terms of “bigger,” and “best” in terms of “biggest.” Through all their centuries of civilisation they did not progress beyond the crude stage of finding sufficient satisfaction in constructing or possessing “the biggest thing on earth.” And the biggest was constructed by sheer force of numbers of slave-workers, at an immense human sacrifice. It has been computed that every stone in the huge Temples cost at least one life.

Accordingly, the distinguishing features of their Temple architecture are colossal height and the spreading out over vast areas, as succeeding kings added to the original building another Court or Hall to demonstrate the grandeur of his reign.