DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.9059#0093
88 THE MONUMENTS OF UPPER EGYPT.
I.-HEUOPOLIS.
A carriage-road ]eads from Cairo to Heliopolis,
passing by the palace of the Abbassieh, one of
the residences of the Khedive, and by Matarieh,
a village rendered famous by a miraculous well
and a sycamore, known by the name of the
Virgin s tree.
Matarieh is distant eight kilometres, or five
English miles, from Cairo, and about half a
mile further on are the ruins of Heliopolis.
Heliopolis was called An in Egyptian, or On
in Hebrew. It was pre-eminently the city of
Ra, or the city of the Sun; hence its Greek
appellation. In ancient classical times Heli-
opolis enjoyed the reputation of being a sacer-
dotal city, celebrated for its college of priests.
Solon, Plato, and Eudoxus studied there. Not
that Heliopolis was either an extensive or a
populous city, although a census taken under
Rameses III. ascribes to one only of its temples
a population of twelve thousand inhabitants.
The history of Heliopolis may be written in
a few lines. The edifice " of barbarous con-
struction," of which Strabo speaks, must have
resembled in its architecture the temple of Har-
machis at the Pyramids of Geezeh, which proves
I.-HEUOPOLIS.
A carriage-road ]eads from Cairo to Heliopolis,
passing by the palace of the Abbassieh, one of
the residences of the Khedive, and by Matarieh,
a village rendered famous by a miraculous well
and a sycamore, known by the name of the
Virgin s tree.
Matarieh is distant eight kilometres, or five
English miles, from Cairo, and about half a
mile further on are the ruins of Heliopolis.
Heliopolis was called An in Egyptian, or On
in Hebrew. It was pre-eminently the city of
Ra, or the city of the Sun; hence its Greek
appellation. In ancient classical times Heli-
opolis enjoyed the reputation of being a sacer-
dotal city, celebrated for its college of priests.
Solon, Plato, and Eudoxus studied there. Not
that Heliopolis was either an extensive or a
populous city, although a census taken under
Rameses III. ascribes to one only of its temples
a population of twelve thousand inhabitants.
The history of Heliopolis may be written in
a few lines. The edifice " of barbarous con-
struction," of which Strabo speaks, must have
resembled in its architecture the temple of Har-
machis at the Pyramids of Geezeh, which proves