Page:A History of Art in Ancient Egypt Vol 1.djvu/291

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The Tomb under the Ancient Empire.

201

the study of those monuments and from a comparison of the constructive processes made use of by the architects of the pyramids.^[1]

The author of Bædeker's Guide has not been content with believing, like Perring, Lepsius, and Mariette, that the pyramid grew by the application of successive envelopes of stone round the central mass, either in horizontal courses or in courses sloping towards the axis of the building. He has brought forward an elaborate theory of construction, which, though very ingenious, encounters several grave objections. We shall point out those objections while we endeavour to explain the system itself by the help of special illustrations drawn for us by the author of the Guide in question.^[2]

Fig. 130.—The three great pyramids; from the south.

When Cheops first began to think about building his tomb, he could not have counted upon giving it the colossal dimensions which it presents even in its actual injured condition. The area of the great pyramid is more than double that of Saint Peter's at Rome. If we deduct from its total volume the core of rock which it incloses^[3] and the openings which it contains, the masonry

↑ Lepsius, Briefe aus Ægypten, pp. 41, 42 (in speaking of the Pyramid of Meidoum, from which he received the first hint of this explanation). See also his paper entitled Ueber den Bau der Pyramiden, in the Monatsbericht of the Berlin Academy, 1843, pp. 177-203.
↑ Ægypten, First part, 1878, p. 341.
↑ It has been suggested by Mr. Cope Whitehouse that the nucleus of rock under the great pyramids was originally much more important than is commonly supposed. During his expedition in March, 1882, he ascertained that a profile from the Mokattam across the Nile valley into the western desert would present the contours shown in the annexed woodcut. He concludes that a large part of the material of those pyramids was obtained upon their sites, and quarried above the level at which the stones were finally placed. He cites Herodotus (ii. 125) as conveying in an imperfect form the tradition that the pyramids were "constructed from above."

[1] Lepsius, Briefe aus Ægypten, pp. 41, 42 (in speaking of the Pyramid of Meidoum, from which he received the first hint of this explanation). See also his paper entitled Ueber den Bau der Pyramiden, in the Monatsbericht of the Berlin Academy, 1843, pp. 177-203.

[2] Ægypten, First part, 1878, p. 341.

[3] It has been suggested by Mr. Cope Whitehouse that the nucleus of rock under the great pyramids was originally much more important than is commonly supposed. During his expedition in March, 1882, he ascertained that a profile from the Mokattam across the Nile valley into the western desert would present the contours shown in the annexed woodcut. He concludes that a large part of the material of those pyramids was obtained upon their sites, and quarried above the level at which the stones were finally placed. He cites Herodotus (ii. 125) as conveying in an imperfect form the tradition that the pyramids were "constructed from above."

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