Position 45 - Sethos I And His Son Ramses Ii Worshiping Their Ancestors In Sethos' Great Temple, Abydos

We are now standing in the narrow hall, which opens directly behind our former station. This hall is part of a great addition to the temple proper, extending southeastward from the rear of the main building and forming the short leg of an L (Plan 7). Now, when we have examined the wall relief before us, and noted some other facts in connection with this side building, we shall find that it had a peculiar character and purpose of its own.

This relief shows us the tall figure of the king, Sethos I (whom we have seen in the flesh at Cairo), as he stands with extended arm, holding in the other hand a censer, in which we see the flame of the burning incense. He wears the royal helmet with the curling uraeus serpent, the symbol of the goddess Buto, the Pharaoh's protectress, on its front.

A necklace and a short kilt, worn over a longer transparent skirt, with a lion's tail attached behind, complete his costume. His son, the prince, who afterward became Ramses II, stands before him, reading from a double roll of papyrus, which he holds in his hands. The heavily plaited side lock of youth falls over the right ear, but he wears no head covering. His body is clothed in a long transparent linen garment, which hangs over one shoulder and drops to his ankles.

What are these two doing? What is the ceremonial in which they seem to be engaged? That little column of hieroglyphs before Ramses just under his hands, reads: “Recitation of the praises by the king's son, the hereditary prince, the first born of his body, the beloved, Ramses.” Whose praises is he reciting? In the ruled column before him you notice a number of ovals. These ovals, frequently called cartouches, contain kings' names wherever you see them on the monuments.

Here there are three long rows of them, of which the top one is out of our range of vision; the lowermost one contains only the name of Sethos I over and over repeated; but the upper two rows contain the names of the kings of Egypt before his time. Including his own name, there are seventy-six kings in all! Sethos and his son are therefore pronouncing a sacrificial ritual for the benefit of their great predecessors on the throne. This list which they intended for pious purposes alone, is now one of the most important documents known, for the reconstruction of Egyptian history.

It begins with Menes, the first king of the 1st Dynasty, at least 3400 years B.C., and ends with Sethos I, in the 14th century B. C. It thus covers some two thousand years of history, although it stops at a point over three thousand years behind us. Thus you see that this part of the temple was added to the main building as a kind of chapel sacred to the departed Pharaohs—a chapel which was not different in its function and purpose from those chapels which you saw in front of the pyramid and on the east side of the mastabas.

They were intended as places where the dead should ever receive food and drink and clothing, and all that they needed for their life in the hereafter. Now a line of inscription over this list of kings before us states that Sethos is here presenting to his great ancestors on the throne, offerings of bread, beer, oxen, fowl, incense, ointment, fine linen, clothing, wine and divine offerings from his temple income.

A chapel with a similar intent was attached to the great temple of Amon at Karnak, and the three walls bearing a similar list of ancient kings, to whom Thutmosis III is offering, were removed to Paris, where they now are, in the National Library. But this chapel, in which we stand, is of especial propriety at this place, for behind this temple in the desert the kings of the earliest dynasties were buried, and behind this temple there is a pylon or façade, facing their tombs, and a causeway leading out to them. There they have lain for five thousand years; and two thousand years before the Christian era, the tomb of one of them was mistaken for the tomb of Osiris, so that pilgrimages and offerings were made to it, and it was covered with votive jars.

You ought now to give a moment's thought, beyond the purpose and function of these reliefs which have just occupied us, to their artistic excellence. The reliefs in this temple are among the most beautiful in Egypt. Some of them are unsurpassed by any to be found elsewhere. These figures before us, while not the best in the temple, are still beautiful specimens of Egyptian relief, as such sculpture was practiced by the court sculptors of Sethos I's time.

You notice how they place a front view of the shoulders upon a side view of the trunk and lower limbs, producing that appearance of disproportionately broad shoulders, which so strikes the visitor on his first acquaintance with Egyptian reliefs. The faces have been much mutilated; also the feet of Ramses, but you can plainly see the beautiful modeling of the knees as the sculptor brings out their bony formation.

The hands are not very well done from our point of view, and the feet, while often beautifully sculptured, are in Sethos' figure modeled from one foot in both cases, giving him two left feet! But we are dealing with an art which has inherited certain conventionalities, which the artists traditionally respected and would not disregard, although they were the faults of a primitive age then long since past.

From Abydos we now go to Denderah. On the general Map 3 you find Denderah, about sixty-five miles east of Abydos, and on the same side of the river. The red lines numbered 46 show that we are to stand with our backs to the river and look south.