197 

 ARCHITECTURE. (1) 



THE PYRAMIDS. 



The number of pyramids in Egypt is very great; but the most 

 remarkable are those at Djizeh, Sakhara, and Dashour. The great 

 pyramid (that of Cheops) may be assumed to have the following 

 admeasurement viz., four hundred and eighty feet high, on a base of 

 seven hundred and fifty in length, or as covering an area of about eleven 

 acres, and rising to an elevation of one hundred and twenty-seven feet 

 above the cross of St. Paul's Cathedral. 



Herodotus ascribes the great pryamid to Cheops, 2095 years B. C., 

 an arbitrary and savage monarch; one of the " Shepherd Kings" who 

 are supposed to have occupied the throne of the Pharoahs some time 

 between the birth of Abraham and the captivity of Joseph. This 

 account is so graphic, and has been confirmed by all modern writers, 

 that we shall at once copy it. Speaking of Cheops, he says, " He barred 

 the avenues to every temple, and forbade the Egyptians to offer sacrifice 

 to the Gods, after which he compelled the people at large to perform the 

 work of slaves. Some he condemned to hew stones out of the Arabian 

 mountains, and drag them to the banks of the Nile ; others were 

 stationed to receive the same in vessels, and transport them to the edge 

 of the Libyan Desert. In this service one hundred thousand men were 

 employed, who were relieved every three months; ten years were spent 

 in the hard labor of forming the road on which these stones were to be 

 drawn, a work of no less difficulty, I think, than the erection of the 

 pyramid itself. This causeway is five stadia in length, forty cubits wide, 

 and its greatest height thirty-two cubits. Ten years, as I have observed, 

 were consumed in forming this pavement, in preparing the hill on which 

 the pyramids were raised, and in excavating chambers under the 

 ground. The pyramid itself was a work of twenty years; it is of a 

 square form, every side being eight plethra in length, and as many 

 in height. The stones are very skilfully cemented, and none of them of 

 less dimensions than thirty feet. 



The ascent to the pyramid was regularly graduated, by what some call 

 steps, and others altars. Having finished the first tier, they elevated 

 the stones to the second by means of machines, constructed of short 

 pieces of wood; from the second, by a similar engine, they were raised 

 to a third, and so on, to the summit. Thus, there was as many machines 

 as there was courses in the structure of the pyramid, though there might 



