The glory of the PharaohsWeigall, Arthur E. P. Brome (Arthur Edward Pearse Brome)
History
The glory of the Pharaohs
Weigall, Arthur E. P. Brome (Arthur Edward Pearse Brome)
Egypt -- Antiquities
“O, brother, husband, friend,” she says, “thy desire to drink and
to eat has not ceased. Therefore be drunken, enjoy the love of
women--make holiday. Follow thy desire by night and by day. Put not
care within thy heart. Lo! are not these the years of thy life upon
earth? For as for the Underworld, it is a land of slumber and heavy
darkness, a resting-place for those who have passed within. Each
sleepeth there in his own form, they never awake to see their
fellows, they behold not their fathers nor their mothers, their
heart is careless of their wives and children.”
She knows that she will be too deeply steeped in the stupor of the
Underworld to remember her husband, and unselfishly she urges him to
continue to be happy after the manner of his nation. Then, in a passage
which rings down the years in its terrible beauty, she tells of her
utter despair, lying in the gloomy Underworld, suffocated with the mummy
bandages, and craving for the light, the laughter, and the coolness of
the day.
“The water of life,” she cries, “with which every mouth is
moistened, is corruption to me, the water that is by me corrupteth
me. I know not what to do since I came into this valley. Give me
running water; say to me, ‘Water shall not cease to be brought to
thee.’ Turn my face to the north wind upon the edge of the water.
Verily thus shall my heart be cooled and refreshed from its pain.”
It is, however, the glory of life, rather than the horror of death which
is the dominant note in the inscriptions and reliefs. The scenes in the
tomb decorations seem to cry out for very joy. The artist has imprisoned
in his representations as much sheer happiness as was ever infused into
cold stone. One sees there the gazelle leaping over the hills as the sun
rises, the birds flapping their wings and singing, the wild duck rising
from the marshes, and the butterflies flashing overhead. The fundamental
joy of living--the gaiety of life which the human being may feel in
common with the animals--is shown in these scenes as clearly as is the
merriment in the representations of feasts and dancing. In these
paintings and reliefs one finds an exact illustration to the joyful
exhortation of the Psalmist as he cries, “Let the heavens rejoice, and
let the earth be glad; ... let the fields be joyful, and all that is
therein.” In a land where, to quote one of their own poems, “the tanks
are full of water and the earth overflows with love,” where “the cool
north wind” blows merrily over the fields, and the sun never ceases to
shine, it would be a remarkable phenomenon if the ancient Egyptians had
not developed the sanguine temperament. The foregoing pages have shown
them at their feasts, in their daily occupations, and in their sports,
and the reader will find that it is not difficult to describe them, in
the borrowed words of the old geographer, as a people always gay and
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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