I came near to the spot with a certain fear that we should have to seek to confirm the account of the ancients by the geographical position of the place, that every form of its architectural disposition would be wiped away, and that a shapeless heap of ruins would frighten us from every attempt at investigation; instead of this, there were immediately found, on a cursory view of the districts, a number of confused spaces, as well super as subterranean, and the principal mass of the building, which occupied more than a stadium (Strabo),[32] was distinctly to be seen. Where the French expedition had fruitlessly sought for chambers, we find literally hundreds, by and over each other, little, often very small, by larger and great, supported by diminutive pillars, with thresholds and niches, with remains of pillars and single wall slabs, connected together by corridors, so that the descriptions of Herodotus and Strabo are quite confirmed in this respect; at the same time, the idea, never coincided in by myself, of serpentine, cave-like windings, instead of square rooms, is definitely contradicted.
The disposition of the whole is, that three mighty blocks of buildings, of the breadth of 300 feet, surround a square 600 feet in length and 500 in width; the fourth side is bounded by the pyramid lying behind, which is 300 feet square, and therefore does not quite come up to the side wings of the great buildings. A rather modern canal, which may be jumped over, at least at this season of the year, is diagonally drawn through the ruins, cutting right through the most perfectly-preserved of the Labyrinthic rooms, and a part of the square in the centre, which was once divided into courts. Travellers have not wished to wet their feet, and so remained on this side, where the continuation of the wings of the buildings is certainly much concealed by the rubbish mounds; but even from this, the eastern bank, the chambers on the opposite side, and particularly at the southern point, where the walls rise almost 10 feet above the rubbish, and 20 above the level of the ruins, are very easy to be seen, and when viewed from the heights of the pyramid, the regular plan of the whole lies before one like a map. Erbkam has been employed since our arrival in surveying the place, and inserting in the plan every room and wall, however small; the ruins on the other side are therefore much more difficult in the execution of the plan; here it is easier, as there are fewer chambers, but therefore more difficult to be understood with respect to the original structure. The labyrinth of chambers runs along here to the south. The Aulæ lay between this and the northerly pyramid opposite, but almost all traces of them have disappeared. The dimensions of the place alone allow us to suspect that it was divided into two parts by a wall, to which the twelve Aulæ, no longer to be distinguished with certainty, adjoined on both sides, so that their entrances were turned in opposite directions, and had close before them the innumerable chambers of the Labyrinth. Who was, however, the Maros, Mendes, Imandes, who, according to the reports of the Greeks, erected the labyrinth, or rather the pyramid belonging to it, as his monument? In the Royal Lists of Manetho,[33] we find the builder of the labyrinth towards the end of the twelfth dynasty, the last of the Old Empire shortly before the irruption of the Hyksos. The fragments of the mighty pillars and architraves, that we have dug out in the great square of the Aulæ, give us the cartouches of the sixth king of this twelfth dynasty, Amenemha III.; thus is this important question answered in its historical portion.[34] We have also made excavations on the north side of the pyramid, because we may expect to discover the entrance there; that is, however, not yet done. We have obtained an entry into a chamber covered with piles of rubbish that lay before the pyramid, and here we have also found the name of Amenemha several times. The builder and possessor of the pyramid is therefore determined. But the account of Herodotus, that the construction of the Labyrinth was commenced two hundred years before his time by the Dodecarchs, is not yet confuted. In the ruins of the great masses of chambers surrounding the great square, we have discovered no inscriptions. Later excavations may very probably certify to us that this whole building, and also the arrangement of the twelve courts, really fall in the twenty-sixth dynasty of Manetho, so that the original temple of Amenemha was only included in this mighty erection.[35]
So much for the Labyrinth and its Pyramid. The historical determination of the builder of this structure is by far the most important result that we can expect here. Now something about the other wonder of this province, Lake Mœris.
The obscurity in which it was previously involved seems to be removed by a happy discovery that the excellent Linant, the Pasha’s hydraulic engineer, has lately made. Up to this time it was only agreed that the lake lay somewhere in the Faiûm. As there is at the present time in this remarkable half-oasis only a single lake, the Birqet el Qorn, lying in its most distant part, this was of course taken to be Lake Mœris; there appeared to be no other solution to the question. Now its great fame was expressly founded upon the fact that it was artificial (Herodotus says that it was excavated), and of immense utility, filled at the time of the overflow of the Nile, and at low water running off again by the canal, on one side toward the lands of the Faiûm, on the other, in its backward course, it waters the region of Memphis, and yielding a most lucrative fishery at the double sluices near the end of the Faiûm. Of all these qualities, however, to the annoyance of antiquarians and philologers, the Birqet el Qorn did not possess a single one. It is not artificial, but a natural lake, that is partly fed by the water of the Jussuf canal; its utility is as good as non-existent; no fishing-boat enlivens the hard and desert-circled water mirror, as the brackish water contains scarcely any fish, and is not even favourable to the vegetation at the shores; when the Nile is high and there is plenty of water flowing in, it does swell, but it is by far too deep to allow a drop of the water that flows into it to flow out again; the whole province must be buried beneath the floods ere this could find a passage back again to the valley, as the artificially-deepened rock gorge by the Bahr Jussuf, branching from the Nile at a distance of forty miles to the south, lies higher than the whole oase. The niveau of the Birqet el Qorn now lies seventy feet below the point at which the canal flows in, and can never have risen much higher.[36] This is proved by the ruins of ancient temples lying upon its shores. Just as little do the statements tally that inform us that on its shores were situated the Labyrinth and the metropolis Arsinoë, now Medînet el Faiûm. Linant has discovered mighty mile-long dams, of ancient solid construction, which form the boundary between the upper part of the shell-formed convex basin of the Faiûm, and the more remote and less elevated portion. According to him, these could only be intended to restrain an artificially-constructed lake, which, however, since the dams have long since been broken through, lies perfectly dry; this lake he considers to be Mœris. I must confess that the whole, after his personal information, impressed me with the idea that it was a most fortunate discovery, and one that would save us many fruitless researches; and the examination of the region has now quite solved every doubt of mine as to the accuracy of this judgment; I consider it an immoveable fact, Linant’s essay is now being printed, and I will send it as soon as it is to be got.[37]
Should you, however, ask me what then the name of Mœris has to do with that of Amenemha, I can only reply, nothing. The name Mœris occurs in the monuments or in Manetho; I rather imagine that here again is one of the numerous Greek misunderstandings. The Egyptians called the lake Phiom en mere, “the Lake of the Nile flood (Koptic,
, inundatio).” The Greeks made out of mere, the water that formed the lake, a King Mœris, who laid out the lake, and troubled themselves no more about the real originator of it, Amenemha. At a later period, the whole province obtained the name of
, Phiom, the Lake, from which arises the present name Faiûm.