DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.12249#0168
132
A EUKIAL-PLACE OP THE TOOK.
and carried down until they confront us even now.
Nor are these the only breaches in uniformity which
their graves present. There are likewise the diver-
gences of locality and of age; hut running through
all, there is still the one obvious classifying distinction,
■—the difference in rank or wealth. Erom the great
king imbedded in his vast pyramid, as at Memphis,
or deep in the heart of a rocky mountain, as at Thebes,
reposing in a sarcophagus of alabaster, surrounded
by we know not what accompaniments in the halls
of his splendid sepulchre, and adorned with we know
not what jewels, if we may conjecture how rich they
were from the beauty of those in the coffin of a princess
recently discovered by M. Mariette, with his former
good fortune, — from an embodiment like this of royal
status, there were, not merely in tombs, but in indi-
vidual personality and all its adjuncts, infinite descend-
ing grades, down to such an exemplification of poverty
as was manifested in the burial-place which this chapter
describes. In ancient times at least, bodies of the
humbler classes Avere, at Thebes, deposited in large
catacombs, in which they have been found more or
less carefully mummied and bandaged, although not
usually coffined, and piled together to the number, it
is said, of hundreds. These were accompanied in many
instances by such tools, implements, and appliances as
form so interesting a feature in our collections, and
which, according as they were observed beside res-
pective mummies, were not unreasonably supposed
to define the trade or profession which these had
A EUKIAL-PLACE OP THE TOOK.
and carried down until they confront us even now.
Nor are these the only breaches in uniformity which
their graves present. There are likewise the diver-
gences of locality and of age; hut running through
all, there is still the one obvious classifying distinction,
■—the difference in rank or wealth. Erom the great
king imbedded in his vast pyramid, as at Memphis,
or deep in the heart of a rocky mountain, as at Thebes,
reposing in a sarcophagus of alabaster, surrounded
by we know not what accompaniments in the halls
of his splendid sepulchre, and adorned with we know
not what jewels, if we may conjecture how rich they
were from the beauty of those in the coffin of a princess
recently discovered by M. Mariette, with his former
good fortune, — from an embodiment like this of royal
status, there were, not merely in tombs, but in indi-
vidual personality and all its adjuncts, infinite descend-
ing grades, down to such an exemplification of poverty
as was manifested in the burial-place which this chapter
describes. In ancient times at least, bodies of the
humbler classes Avere, at Thebes, deposited in large
catacombs, in which they have been found more or
less carefully mummied and bandaged, although not
usually coffined, and piled together to the number, it
is said, of hundreds. These were accompanied in many
instances by such tools, implements, and appliances as
form so interesting a feature in our collections, and
which, according as they were observed beside res-
pective mummies, were not unreasonably supposed
to define the trade or profession which these had