Position 47 - Across The Plain Of Thebes And Past The Memnon Statues, From The Western Cliffs Toward Luxor

This is the plain of Thebes. Can you conceive that out there on those vacant levels the mighty city stretched its vast length across the plain? The onetime mistress of the world, the theme of Homer's song, the wonder and the admiration of all the nations, the queen of the Nile; all this she was, and more than all the wealth of ancient song or modern rhetoric ever can convey. And yet you sweep the plain with searching eye and are able to discern only here and there what may be a mass of ruins like this near us on our left, or a group of palms sheltering some little village of mud huts, and dotting the plain with increasing frequency as the eye rises to the horizon.

For of all the glory of ancient Thebes, there remain only such desolate ruins as this one which you have noticed, and over the ground once occupied by its busy streets are now scattered the villages of the peasants, whose forefather may have been the citizens of the vanished metropolis; and yet in spite of this fact there are no buildings ancient or modern which can compare in size with the colossal ruins on this marvelous plain. As you know, we are standing on the western cliffs and are looking southeast.

We see the river as a light gray band, clearest in the middle of our outlook, some two miles distant. Its course is obscured for us in our present station by the islands which nearly fill the channel (Map 8), and merge with its banks in the background. See how the noble cliffs sweep away from the river there on the east side. We shall later take up our position down there and look up at these western cliffs upon which we now stand, and we shall then see how they also retreat from the river in a wide curve.

All the beautiful verdure-clad valley between them is the site of ancient Thebes. It was a city of two quarters, or better, it was two cities, a city of the dead on this western plain and a city of the living on the other, the eastern plain. We know nothing of Thebes in the Old Kingdom, when the pyramids of Gizeh were being built, but the tombs of the local barons who ruled here as the Old Kingdom was passing away, have been found within half an hour's walk of this point. Then you remember how we saw at Assiut the cliff tombs of the barons there who fought against the Theban nobles, in defense of the Pharaohs of the 9th and 10th Dynasties, who lived at Heracleopolis.

By the 22nd century B. C. these Theban barons had beaten the Heracleopolitans and their Assiut defenders and set up a new dynasty here, the 11th, which was then succeeded by the 12th, likewise of Theban birth, in 2000 B. C. But the Theban Pharaohs of the 12th Dynasty, unfortunately for Thebes, did not reside here, and the little provincial town, which it then was, gained but slightly by the prominence of its lords.

Over there where you see those white buildings, the modern hotels of Luxor, on the east bank, there was a small town called Southern Opet, while just out of range on the left was another named “Opet of the Thrones.” Each had its modest temple, the nuclei of the great sanctuaries, which were later to rise there. Southern Opet, as I have intimated, is now Luxor, and its neighbor on the left, “Opet of the Thrones,” is now Karnak (Map 8).

The old god of the place was Montu, who later became the war god of Egypt; but there was another local god, unknown and obscure in the Old Kingdom, Amon, who now appeared in the names of the greatest Pharaohs of the 12th Dynasty, the Amenemhets. But with the expulsion of the Hyksos, about 1580 B. C., it was again a Theban family which assumed the leading rôle, and the city which once stood on this plain below us rapidly rose to a splendor and magnificence unknown before in the history of any city in this ancient land.

Laden with the spoils of Asia and Nubia, the conquerors of the 18th and 19th Dynasties returned to this lovely cliff-encircled plain, to adorn it with the mightiest temples that have ever risen by human hands. Thus it became the first great monumental city in the history of the world. It continued to be embellished by further buildings or additions to the old ones until Roman times. In the height of its glory its fame had penetrated to the remotest peoples.

Homer sang of it in the well-known lines:

“Not all proud Thebes' unrivalled walls contain, (The world's great empress on the Egyptian plain, That spreads her conquests o'er a thousand states, And pours her heroes through a hundred gates, Two hundred horsemen and two hundred cars From each wide portal issuing to the wars); Though bribes were heaped on bribes, in number more Than dust in fields, or sands along the shore; Should all these offers for my friendship call.”

(Iliad ix, 500-508.)Its wealth and splendor had thus become proverbial. The ancient villages of Southern Opet and “Opet of the Thrones” had long since been joined by intervening buildings, and the giant city had spread far and wide. It must then have been a vast metropolis filling all this plain before us and wide stretches now out of our range of vision on the left, on both sides of the river.

As the nation declined and the seat of power passed to the Delta, the city fell into decay. It was, however, with the invasion of the Assyrians in the 7th century B. C. that its colossal temples fell a prey to fire and sword in a destruction so appalling that it reached the ears of the Hebrew prophet Nahum, who later addressed Nineveh, the already doomed city of the Assyrians, with a warning reminding her of the fate to which she had consigned Thebes; for he says to her: “Art thou better than No-Amon (Thebes), that was situate among the rivers, that had the waters round about her; whose rampart was the sea, and her wall was of the sea? Ethiopia and Egypt were her strength, and it was infinite; Put and Libya were thy helpers.

Yet was she carried away, and she went into captivity: her young children also were dashed in pieces at the top of all the streets: and they cast lots for her honorable men, and all her great men were bound in chains” (Nahum iii, 8-10). The proud city was, however, not annihilated, and headed insurrection after insurrection, until in resisting the institution of the Roman authority under Augustus, the city was taken by the Romans, who laid it utterly waste (30-29 B. C.).

It then rapidly degenerated into a mere group of scattered villages, such you now see sprinkled over the plain. Of these, the village of Luxor, already pointed out on the east shore at the left, is the largest, having about 11,000 inhabitants; but that of Karnak, which has given its name to the neighboring temple of Amon, is for this reason the better known.

In visiting the ruins of this place, we shall go first to Luxor, then to Karnak, out of range on the left; we shall then return to this western shore and visit the two colossal statues of Memnon, which you see out on the plain on our extreme right.

Leaving these, we shall pass to the temple of Ramses II, known as the Ramesseum, “which we have had in clear view ever since we have stood on these western cliffs, down yonder on the left of the acacia grove, where the cultivated fields merge into the sand, which has blown over these cliffs into the valley below. Locate the right corner of the tall piece of wall at the further end of this temple, for we shall later stand there and look up toward our present standpoint on the cliffs.

One of the tombs in this very cliff will then be visited, after which we shall proceed to the temple of Der el-Bahri, which is in a bay of the cliffs on our left. Having then climbed up here again, to reconsider the relation of all the main points on the plain, and to discuss some details, which we cannot yet take up, we shall turn sharp about and look with backs to the river, into the valley, where the kings of the great Theban period were buried.

After inspecting one of these tombs, we shall view the temple of Kurna, then return along the cliffs, where from a point on our right here, but now out of range, we shall look down upon the temple of Medinet Habu, and then descend to visit it. Our itinerary of Thebes will terminate at that point. If you will trace this itinerary on the maps (Nos. 8 and 9) repeatedly until you are familiar with the entire route, it will greatly help you to enter into each of the situations, as you approach them, one after another.

Now glance again across the plain to the white hotels of modern Luxor. We are to begin with the temple beside which those modern buildings have grown up. As it is now much sunken in débris and rubbish, and is over three miles distant from our present eyrie on the western bluffs, we are unable to distinguish it.

This next position is given on two maps. First you should find it on Map 8, which we have been using. Find Luxor in the lower margin of the map, on the very bank of the river. The red lines there numbered 48 enclose the summary black outline of the temple plan. The plan of this temple is given on a larger scale on Plan 10. Find there also the red lines numbered 48, which show our next position, and what part of the temple we are to see.