ori writes to another called Amenemope, accusing him of being unable to calculate the number of men required to transport an obelisk of given dimensions. He says: “An obelisk has been newly made . . . . . of 110 cubits in length of shaft; its pedestal 10 cubits square, the block of its base making 7 cubits in every direction; it goes in a slope (?) towards the summit (?), one cubit one finger, its pyramidion one cubit in height its point measuring two fingers. Add them together (?) so as to make them into a list (??), so that thou mayest appoint every man needed to drag it . . . ”
Here the obelisk is very long and thin and has an impossibly short pyramidion, but in any case such a problem can only be solved by one who has had previous experience, not only of the friction to be overcome in the transport of large blocks, but of the nature of the ground to be traversed. The figures given are only sufficient to determine the weight of the obelisk.
(29) The largest transportation on land, of which a scene has come down to us, is that of the winged bull of Nineveh. This is published in LAYARD, Discoveries, pls. X–XVII. The bull is drawn by men pulling on four cables, and a line of men keeps on placing rollers under the front of the sleds on which the colossus is attached. Behind it men assist the overcoming of the initial friction with large handspikes.
Another scene, this time from Egypt, is the transport of a statue of one called D
ut
otpe (LEPSIUS, Denkmäler, II, 134, and BREASTED, Ancient Records, I, 309–312). The method used here is that of a sled, whose runners are wetted or greased, pulled on sleepers. Though the statue was only about 22 feet high and weighed some 60 tons, it appears to have required 172 men to move it; we can therefore safely rule this method out as applying to a 1170‐ton obelisk. If a sled was used, it must have been in conjunction with rollers.
Greek and Roman writers throw very little light on ancient methods of transportation. Herodotus, in book II, chap. 175, remarks: But of these, that which I not the least, rather the most admire, is this: he (King Amasis) brought a building of one stone from the city of Elephantine, and 2000 men, who were appointed to convey it, were occupied three whole years in its transport, and these men were all pilots. The length of this chamber, outside, is 21 cubits, the breadth 14, and the height 8. This is the measure of the outside of the one-stoned chamber. But inside the length is 18 cubits 20 digits, and the width 12 cubits, and the height 5 cubits.
Gorringe, in his Egyptian Obelisks, gives an almost complete collection of the accounts of transportation, erection, etc., by ancient authors. Many of these accounts are so vague or improbable as to be hardly worth including here. {31}