was not accomplished gradually by the hand of man, but was planted complete by a god in the midst of the surrounding sand. Though it is said that 360,000 men bestowed their labour on the structure, the work can hardly have been finished in twenty years, and the number of men who erected it must also have removed the mounds of earth and excavated material, and put everything in its original condition. Chemmis was followed by his brother Kephren, who reigned fifty-six years. Other accounts tell us that the kingdom descended on his son, Chabryes, and not on his brother. But all agree that he built the second pyramid, which resembles the first in the art of the execution, though much inferior in size, since on the sides it measures only one stadium (or, according to recent measurement, exactly 700½ Greek feet). And while the money spent in radishes and garden herbs for the builders is inscribed on the larger one, the smaller remains without any inscription. Though both these kings had destined these tombs for their place of burial, neither is buried there. Roused by the burden of their labours, the cruelty and violence of these kings—and in Herodotus also Cheops and Chephren appear as wicked and godless kings—the people threatened to take their bodies out of their graves and insult them. Terrified by this threat, each of the kings in his last moments bade his relations bury him privately in a secret place. After Kephren reigned Mycerinus, whom others call Mencherinus, the son of Chemmis. He built the smallest pyramid. Though less in size, it surpasses the others in the excellence of the work and the beauty of the stone; up to the fifteenth layer it consists of black stone resembling the stone of Thebes; from thence to the top the stone is the same as in the other pyramids. On the north side is written the name of the builder, Mycerinus. Abhorring the cruelty of his predecessors, Mycerinus, as we learn, sought to make his rule moderate and beneficent to his subjects, and did everything to gain the affections of the nation. He paid great attention to the administration of justice; and to the common people who had not received from the tribunals such a sentence as seemed just to him, he made presents. "But as to the building of the pyramids, there is no agreement either among the Egyptians or their historians; some ascribe them to the kings I have mentioned; some to other kings."[138]
The accounts given by Herodotus and Diodorus of the structure of the largest pyramid are completely confirmed by modern researches. Even now it is thought that traces can be recognised of the causeway which served for the transport of the materials from the left bank of the Nile to the plateau.[139] The pyramid itself is built in large regular steps constructed of squares of granite. The yellow lime-stone of the casing must also have been really brought from the Arabian side of the Nile, because better stone of that kind was found there.[140] On the other hand, the account of a subterranean canal round the grave chamber is merely a legend of the people, who desired to adorn with new marvels the structure already so marvellous; it is impossible, simply because the lower chamber, and not only the area of the pyramid, is above the lower level of the Nile. The 100,000 workmen of Herodotus, changed every three months, and the 360,000 of Diodorus—a number formed from the days in the old Egyptian year—have arisen out of the free invention of later times, although the building must certainly have occupied more than a decade of years. Inscriptions are not found now on the external side of the pyramid. If such were in existence at the time of Herodotus, they certainly contained other things than those which the interpreter pretended to read there. The interpreters who served as guides to the travellers of that day in Egypt, as the dragoman does now, could hardly have read the hieroglyphics; they contented themselves with narrating the traditions and stories popularly connected with the great monuments of past time, not without certain exaggerations and additions.[141]
But the names of the builders of the three largest pyramids, which these interpreters mentioned to the Greeks, are confirmed by the monuments. In the deep chamber of the largest pyramid there is no sarcophagus; in the upper of the two chambers which lie in the axis of the pyramid there has been found, it is true, a simple sarcophagus of red granite, but it bears no inscription. Above these chambers, however, there are certain small spaces left open, with a view no doubt of diminishing the pressure of the stone-work upon them, and on the walls of these spaces is written the name, Chufu, Chnemu Chufu, in hieratic characters.[142] The same name frequently recurs in the tombs surrounding this pyramid, in which, according to the inscriptions, the wives, sons, officers, and priests of Chufu were buried; and among them the scribe of the buildings of the kings and the priest of Apis, who was at the same time keeper of the gates and of the palace. In this inscription the pyramid of Chufu is called "Chut." On a monumental stone found in the Apis tombs—now in Cairo—we read, "The living Horus, the King of Egypt, Chufu, has built a temple to Isis near the temple of the Sphinx, north of the temple of Osiris, and has erected his pyramid beside the temple of Isis."[143] Chufu himself is not found in Egypt, but in the peninsula of Sinai he is pictured in relief on the rocks in the Wadi Maghara. He is represented as lifting his war-club against an enemy whom he has forced upon his knee and seized by the head-dress with the left hand.[144] In an inscription in the same valley, the oldest which we possess, his predecessor Snefru claims to have subjugated these regions.
In the second pyramid, in the chamber under the surface, a sarcophagus of granite has been discovered on the floor without any inscription. But in the inscriptions on the graves, especially on the grave of the architect of King Chafra, his pyramid is mentioned as "the great pyramid." Between the paws of the Sphinx which stands to the north of the second pyramid, hewn out of the living rock, is a monumental stone, on which is read the name Chafra,[145] and in the ruins of a temple lying near the Sphinx—the same without doubt which is mentioned in the stone at Cairo—seven statues have been exhumed, the inscriptions on which prove that they represent "the Master and Gold Horus, Chafra, the good god, the lord of the crown," i.e., King Chafra himself.[146] And lastly, the inscriptions on the tomb of a woman whose name is read as Mertitef, prove that she was the chief favourite of Snefru and of Chufu, and had been united to Chafra.[147] Hence Chafra must have succeeded Chufu, and the "great" pyramid built by him can hardly have been any other than that which now holds the second place.
In the sepulchral chamber of the third pyramid, it is known in the inscriptions as "Har," i.e., "the supreme," the sarcophagus of King Menkera with his mummy has been discovered. It is made of blue basalt, and bears the following inscription:—"O Osiris, King Menkera, ever living one; begotten of the sky, carried in the bosom of Nut, scion of Seb (p. 55). Thy mother Nut is outstretched over thee, in her name of the mystery of the sky may she deify thee and destroy thy enemies, King Menkera, ever living one."[148]
It is therefore an ascertained fact that Chufu, Chafra, and Menkera were the builders of the three great pyramids. In the mouth of the Greeks the name Chufu passed into Cheops, and by a farther change into Suphis. The name Chemmis in Diodorus has arisen out of the name Chnemu in the form Chnemu Chufu; from Chafra naturally arose Chephren, Kephren, and Chabryes. In the list of kings in Eratosthenes, the fourteenth successor of Menes is Saophis; Eratosthenes allows him a reign of twenty-nine years. His successor, who has a reign of twenty-seven years, bears the same name. The second Saophis is followed by Moscheres with a reign of thirty-one years. Manetho's list gives the name Suphis to the twenty-seventh king after Menes, and he is said to have reigned sixty-three years. Then follows a second Suphis, with a reign of sixty-six years, and this king is succeeded by Menchres, who reigned sixty-three years. On the first Suphis in Manetho's list the excerpt of Africanus remarks: "This king built the largest pyramid, which Herodotus assigns to the time of Cheops;" in the excerpt of Eusebius, both in the Greek text and the Armenian translation, this remark is made on the
