DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.15#0169
156 THE GREAT PYRAMID.
But here our difficulties begin. Astronomy no
longer lends its aid when we ask why the builder
of the Great Pyramid wanted to have an astro-
nomical observatory as well as a tomb. To begin
with, I suppose Egyptologists are quite clear that a
main purpose of each pyramid was that it should
serve for a tomb. And I suppose, further, that this
being so, it was essential that each pyramid, includ-
ing that one which we have been regarding hitherto
only in its astronomical aspect, should be as nearly
as possible completed before the death of its future
occupant. There may be, for aught I know, some
reason to believe that in the days of the pyramids
an Egyptian king might be able in some way to
assure himself of the bona fides of his successors,
and that they would continue the work which he
had begun and more than half completed. But it
is very difficult to imagine that this really was the
case. Human nature must in those days have
resembled pretty closely human nature in our own
time ; and it seems as unlikely that a king could
trust in his successors so far as to believe they
would expend large sums of money and a great
amount of labour in completing a work in which
they had no direct or actual interest, as that, sup-
posing he trusted them to this degree, their con-
duct after his death would have justified his
But here our difficulties begin. Astronomy no
longer lends its aid when we ask why the builder
of the Great Pyramid wanted to have an astro-
nomical observatory as well as a tomb. To begin
with, I suppose Egyptologists are quite clear that a
main purpose of each pyramid was that it should
serve for a tomb. And I suppose, further, that this
being so, it was essential that each pyramid, includ-
ing that one which we have been regarding hitherto
only in its astronomical aspect, should be as nearly
as possible completed before the death of its future
occupant. There may be, for aught I know, some
reason to believe that in the days of the pyramids
an Egyptian king might be able in some way to
assure himself of the bona fides of his successors,
and that they would continue the work which he
had begun and more than half completed. But it
is very difficult to imagine that this really was the
case. Human nature must in those days have
resembled pretty closely human nature in our own
time ; and it seems as unlikely that a king could
trust in his successors so far as to believe they
would expend large sums of money and a great
amount of labour in completing a work in which
they had no direct or actual interest, as that, sup-
posing he trusted them to this degree, their con-
duct after his death would have justified his