Universitätsbibliothek HeidelbergUniversitätsbibliothek Heidelberg
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Edwards, Amelia B.
A thousand miles up the Nile — New York, [1888]

DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4393#0374

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350 A THOUSAND MILKS UP THE NILE.

of girls coming down to the river side with their water-jars
on their heads. Those Arab maidens, when they stand
with garments tightly tucked up and just their feet in the
water, dipping the goolah at arm's length in the fresher
gush of the current, almost tempt one's pencil into the for-
bidden paths of caricature.

Kom Ombo is a magnificent torso. It was as large once
as Denderah—perhaps larger; for, being on the same grand
scale, it was a double temple and dedicated to two gods,
Horus and Sebek;* the hawk and the crocodile. Now
there remain only a few giant columns, buried to within
eight or ten feet of their gorgeous capitals; a superb frag-
ment of architrave; one broken wave of sculptured cor-
nice and some fallen blocks graven with the names of
Ptolemies and Cleopatras.

A great double doorway, a hall of columns and a double
sanctuary are said to be yet perfect, though no longer ac-
cessible. The roofing-blocks of three halls, one behind the
other, and a few capitals are yet visible behind the portico.

What more may lie buried below the surface none can
tell. We only know that an ancient city and a mediaeval
hamlet have been slowly engulfed; and that an early tem-
ple, contemporary with the Temple of Amada, once stood
within the sacred inolosure. The sand here has been ac-
cumulating for two thousand years. It lies forty feet deep,
and has never been excavated. It will never be excavated
now, for the Nile is gradually sapping the bank and carry-
ing away piecemeal from below what the desert has
buried from above. Half of one noble pylon—a cataract
of sculptured blocks—-strews the steep slope from top to
bottom. The other half hangs suspended on the brink of
the precipice. It cannot hang so much longer. A day
must soon come when it will collapse with a crash and
thunder down like its fellow.

Between Kom Ombo and Silsilis, we lost our painter.
Not that he either strayed or was stolen; but that, having
accomplished the main object of his journey, he was glad
to seize the first opportunity of getting back quickly to

* " Sebek est un (lieu solaire. Dans un papyrus de Vjouliik, il est
appele fils d'Isis, et il combat les enemis d'Osiris; c'est une assimila-
tion complete a Horus, et c'est it ce titre qu'il uta.it adOl'e il Ombos,"
—"Pic. Arch." P. Pierret, Paris, lb"75-
 
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