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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.— SUPPLEMENT. 



the throne, left as a monument of his reign a 

 pyramid of brick." 



This account is so suggestive, as will present- 

 ly be shown, that it may be well to inquire wheth- 

 er it can be relied on. Now, although there can 

 be no doubt that Herodotus misunderstood the 

 Egyptians in some matters, and in particular as 

 to the chronological order of the dynasties, plac- 

 ing the Pyramid-kings far too late, yet in other 

 respects he seems not only to have understood 

 them correctly, but also to have received a cor- 

 rect account from them. The order of the kings 

 above named corresponds with the sequence 

 given by Manetho, and also found in monumental 

 and hieroglyphic records. Manetho gives the names 

 Suphis I., Suphis II., and Meneheres, instead of 

 Cheops, Chephren, and Mycerinus ; while, accord- 

 ing to the modern Egyptologists, Herodotus's 

 Cheops was Shofo, Shufu, or Koufou ; Chephren 

 was Shafre, while he was also called Nou-Shofo 

 or Noum-Shufu as the brother of Shofo ; and 

 Mycerinus was Menhere or Menkerre. But the 

 identity of these kings is not questioned. As to 

 the true dates, there is much doubt, and it is 

 probable that the question will long continue 

 open ; but the determination of the exact epochs 

 when the several pyramids were built is not very 

 important in connection with our present inquiry. 

 We may, on the whole, fairly take the points 

 quoted above from Herodotus, and proceed to 

 consider the significance of the narrative, with 

 sufficient confidence that in all essential respects 

 it is trustworthy. 



There are several very strange features in the 

 account. 



In the first place, it is manifest that Cheops 

 (to call the first king by the name most familiar 

 to the general reader) attached great importance 

 to the building of his pyramid. It has been said, 

 and perhaps justly, that it would be more inter- 

 esting to know the plan of the architect who de- 

 vised the pyramid than the purpose of the king 

 who built it. But the two things are closely con- 

 nected. The architect must have satisfied the 

 king that some highly -important purpose, in 

 which the king himself was interested, would be 

 subserved by the structure. Whether the king 

 was persuaded to undertake the work as a matter 

 of duty, or only to advance his own interests, 

 may not be so clear. But that the king was 

 most thoroughly in earnest about the work is cer- 

 tain. A monarch in those times would assuredly 

 not have devoted an enormous amount of labor 

 and material to such a scheme unless he was 

 thoroughly convinced of its great importance. 



That the welfare of his people was not considered 

 by Cheops in building the Great Pyramid is al- 

 most equally certain. He might, indeed, have 

 had a scheme for their good which either he 

 did not care to explain to them or which they 

 could not understand. But the most natural in- 

 ference from the narrative is that his purpose 

 had no reference whatever to their welfare. For 

 though one could understand his own subjects 

 hating him while he was all the time working for 

 their good, it is obvious that his memory would 

 not have been hated if some important good had 

 eventually been gained from his scheme. Many 

 a far-seeing ruler has been hated while living on 

 account of the very work for which his memory 

 hes been revered. But the memory of Cheops 

 and his successors was held in detestation. 



May we, however, suppose that, though Che- 

 ops had not the welfare of his own people in his 

 thoughts, his purpose was nevertheless not selfish, 

 but intended in some way to promote the welfare 

 of the human race? I say his purpose, because, 

 whoever originated the scheme, Cheops carried 

 it out ; it was by means of his wealth and 

 through his power that the pyramid was built. 

 This is the view adopted by Prof. Piazzi Smyth 

 and others, in our own time, and first suggested 

 by John Taylor. " Whereas other writers," says 

 Smyth, " have generally esteemed that the mys- 

 terious persons who directed the building of the 

 Great Pyramid (and to whom the Egyptians, in 

 their traditions, and for ages afterward, gave an 

 immoral and even abominable character) must 

 therefore have been very bad indeed, so that the 

 world at large has always been fond of standing 

 on, kicking, and insulting that dead lion, whom 

 they really knew not : he, Mr. John Taylor, see- 

 ing how religiously bad the Egyptians themselves 

 were, was led to conclude, on the contrary, that 

 those they hated (and could never sufficiently 

 abuse) might, perhaps, have been preeminently 

 good ; or were, at all events, of different religious 

 faith from themselves. . . . Combining this with 

 certain unmistakable historical facts," Mr. Taylor 

 deduced reasons for believing that the directors of 

 the building designed to record in its proportions, 

 and in its interior features, certain important re- 

 ligious and scientific truths, not for the people 

 then living, but for men who were to come four 

 thousand years or so after. 



Although I do not propose to discuss here 

 the evidence on which- this strange theory rests, 

 there are certain matters connecting it with the 

 above narrative that must here be mentioned. 

 The mention of the shepherd Philition, who fed 



