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with those of the Egyptians. And as some of the figures, as has been proved, were not invented until the time of Pindar, it follows that the construction of the Zodiac could not be earlier than the age in which he florished.

In the fourth place, the antiquity of the Zodiac is contradicted by the style and condition of the Egyptian temples.

The Ptolemies and Roman emperors successively adorned Egypt with numerous and magnificent edifices, which recent researches have identified with those which subsist at present. Granger, in speaking of the ruins of two palaces which made part of the ruins of ancient Thebes, says of the one, that the columns which supported the roof were of the Corinthian order; and that the chapiters of the columns of the other were of the Composite.

Of Tentyra Denon says, "After having seen all the other Egyptian monuments, this still appeared the most perfect in its execution, and constructed at the happiest period of the arts and sciences.'

Belzoni mentions that in the ancient temple of Gyrshe in Nubia may be seen how the sculpture of primitive ages differs from that of the mere modern school. The colossi in it, indicate that the artist meant to represent men, but this is all; their legs are mere shapeless columns, and their bodies out of all proportion; their faces are as bad as the artist could make them from the model of an Ethiopian.

He farther observes that, "from the good state of preservation, and superiority of the workmanship, the temple of Tentyra is probably of the time of the Ptolemies." "The circular form of the Zodiac in the inner apartment," he adds, "led me to suppose in some measure, that this temple was built at a later period than the rest, as nothing like it is seen any where else. The eastern wall of the great temple, is richly adorned with figures in intaglio relevato, which are perfectly finished." "The temple of Edfu," he continues, "may be compared to Tentyra in point of preservation, and is superior in magnitude. The propylæon is the largest and most perfect of any in Egypt, covered on all sides with colossal figures in intaglio relevato. At El Kalabshe are the ruins of a temple evidently of a later date than any other in Nubia; for it appeared to be thrown down by violence, as there was not that decay in its materials, which I have observed in other edifices. There are two columns, and one pedestal, on each of the doors into the pronaos. They are joined by a wall raised nearly half their height; which proves the late period when this temple was erected, as such a wall is clearly seen in all other temples of later date; and I would not hesitate to say, that Tentyra, Philoe, Edfu, and this temple, were erected by the Ptolemies; for

! Vol. ii. ch. 17.

though there is a great similitude in all the Egyptian temples, yet there is a certain elegance in the forms of the more recent, that distinguishes them from the older massy works, whence they appear to me to have been executed by Egyptians under the direction of the Greeks."

On a MS. map of the course of the Nile, from Essouan to the confines of Dongola, constructed by Colonel Leake, chiefly from the journal of Mr. Burckhardt, we have read, says the reviewer of Light's Travels in Egypt and Nubia, the following

note:1

"The ancient temples above Philoe are of two very different kinds : those excavated in the rock of Gyrshe and Ebsambul, rival some of the grandest works of the Egyptians, and may be supposed at least coeval with the ancient monarchy of Thebes. The temples constructed in masonry, on the other hand, are not to be compared with those of Egypt, either in size or in the costly decorations of sculpture and painting; they are probably the works of a much later age.”

Mr. Davison found the colors in Tentyra, Thebes and Diospolis still fresh and vivid.

In another part of Belzoni's work he says, "I observed the figure of Harpocrates which is described by Mr. Hamilton, seated on a full-blown lotus, with his finger on his lips, on the side wall of the pronaos of the temple of Edfu, as in the minor temple of Tentyra. On the propylæon of the temple of Dakke, are several Egyptian, Coptic, and Greek inscriptions. In the granite quarries 24 hours south-east of Assouan, I found a column lying on the ground with a Latin inscription. Captain Chilia, in uncovering the ground in front of the great Sphinx near the pyramids, found at the bottom of a stair-case of 32 steps, an altar, with a Greek inscription, of the time of the Ptolemies. Forty-five feet from this he found another, with an inscription alluding to the Emperor Septimius Severus; and near to the first step was a stone, with another Greek inscription alluding to Antoninus."

"We thus find," says Mr. Burckhardt, "in Nubia specimens of all the different æras of Egyptian architecture, the history of which indeed can only be traced in Nubia; for all the remaining temples in Egypt (that of Gorne, perhaps, excepted)appear to have been erected in an age when the science of architecture had nearly attained to perfection. If I were to class the Nubian temples according to the probable order of their erection, it would be as follows. 1st. Ebsambul; 2nd. Gyrshe; 3d. Derr; 4th. Samne, &c." (Mr. Burckhardt enumerating downwards to Tafa, the 14th in his order of succession.)

Such is the information afforded upon this subject by some of the most recent and respectable travellers in that country, from an attentive consideration of which there appears strong evidence against the high antiquity of those magnificent fabrics. The first part of the evidence worthy of particular notice, is the existence

Quarterly Review, Vol. 19.

of two of the orders of architecture among the ruins of Thebes; the Corinthian and the Composite.

The orders of architecture were unknown in ancient Egypt, Assyria, Babylonia, Persia, India, and China. Their invention is ascribed to the Asiatic Greeks who florished in the vicinity of Phrygia and Lydia. The silence of Homer respecting them in his architectural descriptions, particularly of the palaces of Alcinous and Ulysses, is the argument upon which the opinion is founded that they were not known in his time. Perhaps their earliest appearance was in the temples of Jupiter at Olympia, and of Diana at Ephesus, raised respectively about the years 630 and 560 B. C. Scopas, of Ephesus, who florished about the year 450 B. C., employed the three Grecian orders in the second temple of Minerva at Tegea in Arcadia. The art of cutting marble, which afterwards furnished Grecian ingenuity with the materials of those inimitable productions which are still the wonder of the world, was unknown at the era of the Trojan war; for in the description of the palace of Alcinous, which is represented as shining with gold, silver, brass, and amber, there is no mention of that substance.

The Doric, or, as it is emphatically called, the Grecian order was the first-born of architecture, and in its composition seems to bear authentic marks of its legitimate origin in wooden construction transferred to stone. It is probable that the earliest Greek temples were of wood, since so many of them were consumed during the invasion of Xerxes. The temple of Jerusalem was surrounded with columns of cedar; and Vitruvius informs us, that the ancient Tuscan temples were constructed with wooden architraves. Four centuries from the Homeric times we find the Greeks arrived at the highest excellence in the polite arts. The progress and improvement in architecture appears to have occupied a period of 300 years, beginning from the time when the temple of Jupiter at Olympia, and those of Samos, Priene, Ephesus, and Magnesia, were begun, until the time of Pericles, when the ornamental style of the Greeks attained its utmost beauty and perfection in the Parthenon of Athens. All the varieties and ornaments in architecture, together with the Ionic and Corinthian orders, were invented within this space of time;whether all this was their own invention, and by what steps they made such progress, is not mentioned; but the following observations may help us considerably in this difficulty.

"While ancient Greece was harassed by intestine dissensions, and its northern frontier exposed to the hostility of neighboring barbarians, the eastern colonies enjoyed profound peace, and йorished in the vicinity

of Phrygia and Lydia, the best cultivated and most wealthy provinces of Lower Asia, and perhaps of the ancient world. History and Poetry alike extol the golden treasures of the Phrygian and Lydian kings. Their subjects wrought mines of gold, melted the ore, moulded figures in bronze, dyed wool, cultivated music, enjoyed the amusements of leisure and indulged the demands of luxury, when the neighboring countries of Cappadocia and Armenia remained equally ignorant of laws and arts, and when the Medes and Persians lived in scattered villages, subsisted by hunting, pasturage or robbery, and were clothed with the skins of wild beasts. Through the supine neglect of their neighbors respecting maritime affairs, the Asiatic Greeks acquired without contest and enjoyed without molestation, besides several valuable islands, the whole western coast of the continent to the extent of 600 miles. The Ioniaus possessing the mouths of great rivers, having convenient and copious harbors before them, and behind, the wealthy and populous nations of Asia, whose commerce they enjoyed and engrossed, attained such early and rapid proficiency in the arts of navigation and traffic as raised the cities of Miletus, Colophon, and Phocæa to an extraordinary pitch of wealth and grandeur, and who, as their population and prosperity increased, diffused new colonies every where around them. Such multiplied advantages could not languish in the hands of men who had genius to conceive, and courage to execute, the most arduous designs. With the utmost industry and perseverance, they improved and ennobled the useful or elegant arts, which they found already practised among the Phrygians and Lydians. They incorporated the music of those nations with their own. Their poetry far excelled whatever Pagan antiquity could boast most precious. They rivalled the skill of their neighbors in moulding clay and casting brass. They appear to have been the first people who made statues of marble. The Doric and Ionic orders perpetuate in their names, the honor of their inventors. Painting was first reduced to rule, and practised with success among the Greeks; and we may be assured that during the seventh century before Christ, the Ionians surpassed all their neighbors, and even the Phenicians, in the arts of design, since the magnificent presents which the Oracle of Delphi received from the Lydian kings, were chiefly the productions of Ioniair artists."

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Thus we find that when the Asiatic Greeks first sent a colony to Egypt, they had made greater progress in the arts, particularly architecture, than the Egyptians appear to have made in any period of their history. A proof of their high civilization at this time, is, that in the very next century Ionia gave birth to philosophy. At a very early period also, we find not only that the leading states of Greece, such as Athens, and Corinth, but little obscure republics of Magna Græcia whose names alone can be gleaned from history by the careful antiquary, such as Pæstum, Segesta, and Selinus, erected works which would be a considerable enterprise for the greatest nations of modern times. The

'Gillies' History of Greece, vol. i. ch. 7.

portico of the great temple of Seliņus in Sicily, which is one of the six still remaining, though prostrate and in ruins, on the site of that city, consisted of a double peristyle of eight columns in front and seventeen in depth, each of which was 10 feet diameter and 50 high.

Let us now look at the state of Egypt about the same time. "At the invasion of Sabhæon," says Mr. Bryant, "the Egyptians were divided by factions and under many petty princes; and when the Ethiopic government ceased, they again lapsed into a state of misrule. Of these commotions the prophet Isaiah speaks, ch. 19. v. 2. where he predicts the destruction of Egypt. From Sabbæon to Apries there is great uncertainty and confusion, owing to the feuds and commotions, and to the final dispersion of the people, which was attended with the ruin of their temples and colleges. In the time of Pharaoh-Necho, Nebuchadnezzar visited this country with such severity as almost to extirpate the nation. What Egypt then suffered may be learned from what was predicted by Jeremiah, ch. 46. and Ezekiel, ch. 29. According to the last prophecy, the desolation of the country and dispersion of the people was to continue 40 years." "The accounts in the Egyptian histories conceruing these times are very dark and inconsistent. So much we learn, that there were great commotions and migrations of people when Pharaoh-Necho and Psammetichus are supposed to have reigned. And both these and the subsequent kings are represented as admitting the Carians and other nations into Egypt, and hiring mercenaries for the defence of the country. Most writers mention an interval about this time of eleven years which is styled Chronos Abasileuthos, which Sir J. Marsham thinks relates to the anarchy brought on by Nebuchadnezzar." "In the 27th year of the captivity, Egypt was again desolated by the Babylonian monarch, according to the predictions of Jeremiah, chapters 30, 43, 44.; and of Ezekiel, ch. 29. This is supposed to have happened in the time of Apries, the Pharaoh-Hophra of the Septuagint, and was also to continue 40 years.""

This shows the great obscurity in which the transactions of the Egyptians are enveloped, in times subsequent to that assigned by Herodotus for the commencement of the authentic history of that people, which he informs us dates from the accession of Psammetichus. What he related, upon the authority of the priests, respecting events prior to this æra are palpable fictions, and all that we know of them is derived from glimpses afforded by the sacred writings.

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2

Analysis, vol. vi. pp. 390 et seq.

2 "The ancient Egyptians," says Mr. P. Knight, "would never reveal any thing concerning their sacred symbols, unless under the usual ties of secrecy; wherefore Herodotus, who was initiated and consequently understood them, declines entering into the subject. In the time of Diodorus the priests pretended to have some secret concerning them; but they probably pretended to more science than they really possessed, in this,

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