GENERAL VIEW OF KARNAK, LOOKING TOWARDS BABAN- 
EL-MOLOOK. 
In this view, looking towai'ds the north, the eye commands the whole of the ruins of 
the Great Temple of Karnak, and ranges from the farthest extremity, beyond the wall 
of circumvallation, over its most sacred precincts, to the entrance facing the Nile; 
passing by its obelisks, through its stupendous Hall of Columns, and across its vast 
courts, to the enormous masses of masonry which compose its great propyl on: beyond 
this lies the intervening plain to the river. Then across the Nile the eye stretches 
over the plains of Medinet-Abou and Goorna, to where it is bounded by the Libyan 
Mountains, within v liich lies the valley known as Baban-el-Molook, where are the 
tombs of the kings of Thebes, or Diospolis, the city of Amnion. 
It is difficult for the mind to conceive a scene of more impressive interest. Where 
busy millions have trod, all is now decayed and desolate: leaving only as a record 
of the greatness of its Pharaohs, structures so vast, even in their ruins, that nothing 
exists in any other country, within thousands of years of the age of their erection, 
to mark such power and greatness in any other former age and people. Everywhere 
around the spectator lies evidence of the immense buildings which covered the plains 
of Thebes. Bases of columns, substructures of temples, and enormous masses, of which 
it would be difficult to trace the purport, are everywhere seen. The large lake on 
the left, formerly inclosed as a reservoir, will enable the observer to connect this 
scene with the other General View of Karnak in this work, in which the lake is seen 
on the right, and where the lateral view of the Temple in its entire length lies before 
the spectator, from the great propylon to the southern gate in the wall of circumvallation. 
“ Endless it would be,” says Warburton, "to enter into details of this marvellous 
pile; suffice it to say, that the Temple is about one mile and three-quarters in 
circumference, the walls eighty feet high and twenty-five thick. With astonishment, 
and almost with awe, I rode on through labyrinths of courts, cloisters, and chambers, 
and only dismounted where a mass of masonry had lately fallen in, owing to its 
pillars having been removed to build the Pacha’s powder manufactory. Among the 
infinite variety of objects of art that crowd this Temple, the Obelisks are not the 
least interesting. Those who have only seen them at Rome, or Paris, can form no 
conception of their effect where all around is in keeping with them. The eye follows 
upward the finely tapering shaft, till suddenly it seems not to terminate but to melt 
away and lose itself in the dazzling sunshine of its native skies. The very walls of 
outer inclosures were deeply sculptured with whole histories of great wars and triumphs, 
by figures that seem to live again. In some places these walls were poured down 
like an avalanche, not fallen: no mortar had been ever needed to connect the cliff¬ 
like masses of which they were composed, so accurately was each fitted to the place 
it was destined to occupy. 
“ From the desert to the river, from within or without, by sunshine or by 
moon- 
