With the decline of the royal power at the close of the XIIth Dynasty, the age of the pyramid-builders closes. Already the taste for these huge structures was being modified, as it was continually found how powerless they were to accomplish the great end for which they were designed--the protection of the dead body of the king from the hatred of his enemies or the greed of the professional tomb-robber. The decay of the royal power which is so marked even in the beginnings of the dark period which now ensues no doubt completed a process which disillusionment had already begun; and when Egypt once more found herself under a strong and stable government, the Theban kings who delivered her from the Hyksos tyranny had recourse to another device for securing the continuity of existence after death, and instead of piling mountains of stone or brick above their sepulchral chambers, were hewing in the Valley of the Kings the galleries and halls which have been yielding up their secrets in our time for the wonder and instruction of the world. CHAPTER V WORK AMONG THE TEMPLES Scarcely less famous than the pyramids, and of far greater beauty, are the splendid temples whose ruins extend from Heliopolis, close to the Delta, to Philæ, where the beautiful shrines of Isis, exquisite in their setting, even if of late date for Egypt, are now becoming only memories of a beauty which has had to yield to the claims of present-day life. Egypt, almost equally with Greece, may claim to be the Land of Temples; and certainly no other land of the ancient East can rival her in the number, the scale, and the magnificence of the shrines which she reared to her innumerable gods. The claim of the Greek to be the supreme temple-builder of the ancient world is, of course, unquestioned, and nothing in Egypt can bear comparison with the serene beauty of the Parthenon; but, though the Egyptian architect knew nothing of that exquisite balance and harmony of proportion which has made Greek architecture the crown of human effort in sacred building, the temples of Egypt have a grandeur and impressiveness of their own which make a profound appeal to the mind; and the contribution of the Egyptian to the sum of human achievement in this respect is coming to be more and more appreciated every day.