of Thebes in Egypt. 409 
louring with which the bas-reliefs are adorned. The dimensions 
of this building admit of our taking in the whole at a single 
glance, and of judging with more certainty of the effect pro- 
duced by those ornaments. M. Denon takes this occasion to 
remark, that “ in this case the union of sculpture and painting, 
which might appear strange, presents nothing disgusting at first 
sight. The eye is rather pleased with the sensations which it 
excites.’” 
The bas-reliefs refer to religious subjects: the most curious of 
the whole is a judgement of the dead, as it is painted on several 
monuments*. It is very probable that this temple served at 
the same time for a burial-place. 
On proceeding from this monument of the palace of Osy- 
mandyas northward, we find ourselves in the midst of an alley of 
pedestals which is only interrupted to begin once more. Ri- 
gorous inquiries have proved that this was an alley of sphinxes 
to the number of two hundred, all of colossal size, if we may 
judge by the pedestals, which are six feet broad by twelve long. 
The breadth of the alley was forty feet, the distance of the 
statues seven. What must have been the size of the edifice to 
which this alley led! We find enormous ruins of buttresses, 
walls, and stair-cases; but nothing entire. What is also re- 
markable is a building which presents the form of a vault, with- 
out there being one actually, as the most scrutinous inquiries 
have demonstrated ; a new proof that arches were entirely un- 
known to the Egyptians. 
There still remains on this side of the Nile the building north- 
west of Thebes, near the village of Kurnu, the name of which 
it also bears. The Palace of Kurnu, (El Gurnu according to 
Sir W. Hamilton,) although not among the number of the mag- 
nificent monuments of this ancient residence, is nevertheless too 
large to entitle us to suppose that it was the residence of an in- 
dividual. This monument is the more remarkable (not being a 
temple), as it seems to offer a medium between the vast palaces 
of the kings and the houses of individuals. We find here neither 
sphinxes, nor obelisks, nor those enormous buttresses, nor a co- 
* In the Idées sur lu Politique des Peuples de l’ Afrique, t.ii. p. 655, we 
find this passage: ‘* We see in this picture the god Osiris seated, judging 
the dead. He is known by his ordinary attributes. Before him is the 
flower of the lotus, the symbol of life eternal, and a lion apparently as if 
guarding the infernal regions. A small figure is placed in a large balance 
hy two genii with the heads of animals; the one has the head of a dog, the 
symbol of gross sensuality; the other has the head of a stag, the common 
symbol of purity, religious and moral. The two genii raise their hands to 
the balance, and seem to make representations to Osiris, Before this god 
is Hermes with a bead of Ibis, with tablets in bis hand to mark the virtues 
and vices of the defunct.” 
Jonnade: 
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