Tombs of The Kings at Ancient Thebes
The Greeks and Romans who went up the Nile as far as the "hundred-gated" city of Thebes declared that the Tombs of the Kings, cut in the limestone sides of the Libyan range of mountains, were among the wonders of the world. The tourist of to-day will confirm this early impression, for in Egypt nothing gives one a more vivid idea of the enormous pains taken by the Pharaohs to preserve their dead from desecration than do these tombs. Here for several miles in the flanks of these mountains—sterile, desolate beyond any region that I have ever seen—are scattered the rock-hewn tombs of the monarchs who carried the arms of Egypt to all parts of the known world of their day. Like their temples, the Egyptians built their tombs after a uniform plan—the only variation was in the arrangement of the minor chambers and in the inscriptions which told of the history of the king whose mummy reposed in the vault.
Seven miles across the river the Pharaohs chose the site of their tombs. Imagination could not conceive a greater abomination of desolation than the rocky mountainside in which these tombs are carved; but fortunes were lavished on the construction of these resting places of the dead. Historians and travelers have told of the great city which grew up about the tombs of the Egyptian kings—the temples, the homes of priests and the huge settlements of thousands of workmen who spent years in the laborious carving and decoration of these burial places. But to-day nothing remains of these cities, and of the temples only a few columns, pillars and broken statues bear witness to their former grandeur. Yet the tombs have resisted the destroying hand of the centuries, and the walls of several of them actually retain the brilliant colors laid on by the painters over four thousand years ago. When you go down the roughly-hewn steps into the mortuary chambers, carved out of the solid rock, it is borne in upon you that here time has stood still; that during all the ages that have seen the rise of Christianity and the growth of empires greater than Thebes ever dreamed of, the mummies of these Pharaohs reposed here undisturbed. Now by the aid of skilfully arranged electric lights you may descend into most of these tombs, marvel at the beauty of the decorative inscriptions on the walls, gaze upon the massive granite sarcophagi in which the mummies were placed, and get a genuine taste of the antiquity that you have read about but never fully realized before. This is the service of the tombs of the kings—the actual turning back of the centuries so that one feels the touch of the ancient days as vividly as he feels the hot, dust-laden, oppressive air of the mausoleum.
The excursion from Luxor to the tombs of the kings and the Colossi of Memnon, not far away, is a hard day's trip. The tourist crosses the Nile in a small boat and takes a donkey or a carriage. The road leads along a large canal, passing the remains of the great temple of Seti I at Kurna, and thence winds around through two desert valleys into a gorge lined on both sides with naked, sun-baked rocks that give back the heat like the open doors of a furnace. Bare of any scrap of verdure, desolate beyond expression, these rocky walls that shut in this gorge form a fitting introduction to the tombs of the kings. The road finally turns to the left and enters a small valley, encircled by huge rocks, cut by ravines. Here one may see in the sides of the mountain wall the first of the rock-hewn tombs, which happens to be that of Rameses IV. One enters the large gateway and passes down an ancient staircase cut in the solid rock, at an angle of forty-five degrees. Three corridors and an ante-room, all carved out of rock, lead to the main chamber, which contains the mammoth granite sarcophagus of the king (ten feet long, eight feet high and seven feet wide), beautifully decorated with inscriptions. Four other rooms follow, the walls of each being covered with inscriptions. Recesses are found in the main hall for the storage of the furniture of the dead and in several of the other rooms.
The theory of the Egyptians in the arrangement of these tombs was that the dead king, guided by the great sun-god, voyaged through the underworld every night in a boat. Hence he must have careful guidance in regard to his route. This was furnished by elaborate extracts from two sacred books of the Egyptians. One was entitled The Book of Him Who Is in the Underworld and the other was the Book of the Portals.
The walls of these tombs reveal extracts from the sacred books in great variety, but all designed to serve as a guide to the dead kings. The best tombs are those of Amenophis II, Rameses III, Seti I and Thotmes III. They are all of similar design but the tomb of Seti I (discovered by the Italian savant, Belzoni) is finer than any of the others. It includes fourteen rooms, most of which are richly adorned with inscriptions and designs from the sacred books. The sculptures on the walls are executed with great skill and the decorations of the ceilings show much artistic taste. In the tenth room are many curious decorations, the ceiling, which is finely vaulted, being covered with astronomical figures and lists of stars and constellations. From this room an incline leads to the mummy shaft. The mummy of Seti I is in the Cairo Museum, while the fine alabaster sarcophagus is in the Soane Museum in London. The tomb of Amenophis II is noteworthy as the only one which contains the royal mummy. In a crypt with blue ceiling, spangled with yellow stars and with yellow walls to represent papyrus, is the great sandstone sarcophagus of the king. Under a strong electric light is shown the mummy-shaped coffin with the body of the king, its arms crossed and the funeral garlands still resting in the case. The effectiveness of this mummy makes one regret that the others have been removed to the Cairo Museum, instead of being restored to their original places in these tombs. Most of these royal mummies were removed to a shaft at Deir-el-Bahri to save them from desecration by the invading Persians, but when the mummies were found it would have been wise to replace them in these tombs rather than to group them, as was done, in the Cairo Museum. One or two mummies in that museum would have been as effective as two dozen.
Not far from these tombs is the fine temple of Queen Hatasu at Deir-el-Bahri. This queen was the sister and wife of King Thotmes III, and for a part of his reign was co-regent. The temple, which was left unfinished, was completed by Rameses II. A short ride from this temple brings one to the Ramessium, the large temple (which is badly preserved) erected by Rameses II and dedicated to the god Ammon. The pylon is ruined, but one can still decipher some of the inscriptions that tell of Rameses' campaign against the Hittites. The first court is a mass of ruined masonry, but it contains fragments of a colossal statue of Rameses, the largest ever found in Egypt. It probably measured fifty-seven and one-third feet in height, as the various parts show that it was twenty-two and one-half feet from shoulder to shoulder. The colossal head of another statue of Rameses was found near by. The great hall had many fine columns, of which eighteen are still standing. These columns are very impressive and give one some idea of the majesty of the temple when it was complete. Not far away are the tombs of the queens, including the fine mausoleum of the consort of Rameses II, part of whose name was Mi-an-Mut.
A half mile from the Ramessium brings one to the Colossi of Memnon, the two huge seated figures of stone, which were long included among the seven wonders of the world. These figures were statues of King Amenophis III and were placed in front of a great temple that he built at this place; but time has dealt hardly with the temple, as scarcely a trace of it remains. The figures with the pedestals are about sixty-five feet high and, as they are on the level plain near the banks of the Nile, they can be seen from a great distance. Though carved from hard sandstone these figures have suffered severely from the elements, so that the faces bear little trace of human features; still they are impressive from their mere size and from the fact that they have come down to us across the centuries with so little change.