112 Study of the Neio York Obelisk as a Decayed Boulder. 



in this, the King and the God are represented holding stakes upright 

 between them, around which a looped cord is drawn tightly, so as 

 to indicate a definite direction ; along the line then shown by the 

 stakes, driven into the ground, a boundary wall of the new temple 

 was erected. In an inscription dating over 2000 years B. C, this 

 ceremonial is related concerning the foundation of this very Sun 

 Temple at An, by the founder of the Xllth dynasty, Amenenihat I, 

 and his son and co-regent, Usertesen I, who afterwards set up the 

 present Obelisk of An : 



"Arose the King, attired in His necklace and the feather-crown ; 

 All the world followed Him, and the Majesty of Amenenihat. 

 The Kolchyt read the sacred text, during the stretching of the 



measuring-cord and the laying of the foundation-stone on 



the piece of ground selected for this temple. 

 Then withdrew His Majesty Amenemhrit; 

 And King Usertesen wrote it down before the people." 



As to the intent of the particular direction given to the measuring- 

 cord, w'e now have a satisfactory explanation through the investiga- 

 tions of Nissen, in 1885,' and of Lockyer (op. cit.) in 1891. The 

 varying courses of the axes of different Egyptian temples appear 

 to have been directed to points on the horizon which marked the 

 periodical rising or setting of the sun, moon, or certain stars, par- 

 ticularly at the summer and winter solstices. The apertures in the 

 huge pylons and in the series of separating walls and portals bej'ond, 

 toward the Holy Place, exactly represent the diaphragms in the 

 modern telescope, and were intended to keep the light pure, from 

 the luminary rising or setting on the horizon, and so lead it directly 

 into the sanctuary at a definite moment, A solar temple was there- 

 fore so oriented to the horizon, at a solstice, that, either at sunrise 

 or at snnset, the light of the sun should pour along the axis from 

 end to end. Several of the solar temples were thus directed toward 

 the point of the setting sun at the summer solstice, when the day 

 was longest ; and to this class, of course, must have belonged the 

 Sun Temple of Atum-Ra at An. There, once a year, past its double 

 emblem before the pylon, the pairs of obelisks, the sunbeam sped 

 through the huge portal, through the double line of sphynxes and 

 the colonnade of temple-columns, through opened doorways and 

 parted curtains, and flashed through the portal of the dark Holy of 



1 Rheinisches Museum fiir Philologie, 1885. 



