Cleopatra's needle

by Sir Erasmus Wilson

We have, therefore, brought under our notice a list of thirteen Egyptian Pharaohs (including one Queen), who have left behind them proofs of their taste in the construction of obelisks; namely:—

I. Usertesen I.; three, including the monolith at Biggig; one being lost, one broken, and one remaining entire at Heliopolis.

II. Thothmes I.; two, one broken, the other entire, and known as the small obelisk, at Karnak.

III. Hatasou, Queen; four, one broken, two lost, and one, the great obelisk, standing at Karnak.

IV. Thothmes III.; four, all standing, the four Needles; one each in Constantinople, Rome, Alexandria, and London.

V. Amenophis II.; one, the Alnwick obelisk, at Syon House, Isleworth.

VI. Amenophis III.; two, both broken and lost in the ruins of his temple at Karnak.

VII. Seti I., or Osirei, the blind king; two, both in Rome, the Flaminian and that of Trinita de Monti.

VIII. Rameses II.; fourteen, one each at Luxor and Paris; two in Rome, in front of the Pantheon and in the garden of the Villa Mattei; and ten lost at San, amid the ruins of the “field of Zoan.”

IX. Menephtah; one, at Rome, the Vatican, before the church of St. Peter; uninscribed.