§ 7. Of the place held in this work by the monuments of the Memphite period, and of the limits of our inquiry.
It will be found that a very large space in the present work, some may say too large a space, is devoted to the pre-conventional art of the ancient empire. We had reasons for taking such a course, and reasons that may be easily divined.
This early art is much less known than that of the later epochs. While the great museums of Europe are filled with statues and reliefs from Thebes, or, at least, contemporary with the Theban and Sait dynasties, monuments from the Memphite period are still rare out of Egypt. Thanks to Mariette and Lepsius, Paris and Berlin are not without remarkable examples of the art in question, but it is in Egypt itself, at the Boulak museum, that any detailed study must be made. It is there that the masterpieces of an art whose very existence was unsuspected by Champollion, are to be found; the Chephren, the two statues from Meidoum, the bas-reliefs from the tomb of Ti, and many others of similar style and value. These figures have been drawn for our readers by two skilful artists, MM. Bourgoin and Bénédite. They have rendered with fidelity and sincerity more than one object which had never before been reproduced, either by photography or otherwise. A few specimens of these treasures, selected by him who had been the means of bringing them to light and whom we now mourn, were seen at the Universal Exhibitions of 1867 and 1878, but they soon returned to Cairo, and western archæologists had but slight opportunity to become acquainted with their characteristics.
The art of the early dynasties has thus been practically ignored by those who have never visited Egypt. The lifelike and enthusiastic descriptions of M. Eugene Melchior de Vogüé and others have done something to arouse the attention of connoisseurs; but in such a matter the slightest sketch, provided it be correct so far as it goes, is of more value, as a definition of style, than the most picturesque or eloquent writing.
These reflections would by themselves justify our efforts to incorporate in our pages, reproductions of all the more important objects with which the necropolis at Memphis has enriched the museum at Boulak; but we were impelled by other motives also. The extant monuments of the ancient empire are less numerous than those of the Theban and Sait dynasties; they are of comparatively modest dimensions, and, with rare exceptions they all belong to one category, that of works relating to death and burial. They also have a special interest of their own. They enable us to protest, and to give tangible justification for our protestations, against a prejudice which dates back to a remote antiquity; even if all evidence had perished the critic would have no great difficulty in casting doubt upon assertions which were in themselves extremely improbable, but his task is rendered much easier when he is able to point to existing monuments in support of his contention, and his pleasure is great in seeing the certainty of his critical methods borne out, and Egyptian art replacing itself, as if of its own motion, under the normal conditions of historic development.
Fig. 56.—Chephren.
Sketched by Bourgoin.
See also Fig. 460.
This volume, then, will treat of the remains of early Egyptian art at a length which would seem at first sight out of due proportion to their number, but later ages will also be represented by a series of monuments, which will bring us down to the Persian conquest. This limit will hardly be over-passed in our choice of examples for study, and that for two reasons.
The first is, that at the latter period the evolution of Egyptian art was complete, it had created all that it could and had become a slave to its own past. Disposing under the Ptolemies of all the resources of a great empire, it indeed introduced certain architectural changes which do not seem to have been borrowed from previous buildings, but those changes were of no very great importance and were mostly in matters of detail. In sculpture and painting we can easily see that it abandoned itself to mere copying, to the repetition of a lesson learnt by rote. Whatever had to be done, was done in accordance with fixed tradition, and one monument only differed from another in the amount of care and manual dexterity bestowed upon it.