Chapter XIV: Part 14

The relation of the individual to his possessions led men at first to place movable property in graves, in order that it might be of service to the departed owner during the life beyond; hence the universal custom of burning on funeral pyres, not only weapons and utensils, but animals, slaves, and even wives. In later times men were satisfied with symbolic immolations, or possessions were released from the ban of death and put into further use. The property of the deceased reverted to his family, and thus the right of inheritance arose. There was no right of inheritance during the days of communism; on the death of a member of the family a mere general consolidation of property resulted; with individual property arose the reversion of possessions to the family from which they had been temporarily separated. Thus property either reverted to the family taken as a whole, or to single heirs, certain members of the family; hence a great variety of procedure arose. Up to the present day inheritance by all the children, or inheritance by one alone, exists in Eastern Asia as in Western nations.

In like manner criminal responsibility was originally collective; the family or clan was held responsible for the actions of all its individual members except those who were renounced and made outcasts. Such methods of collective surety still exist among many exceedingly developed peoples; but the system is gradually dying away, the tendency being for the entire responsibility to rest upon the individual alone.

[Sidenote: Beginning of the Community]

The state is a development of tribal, or patriarchal, society. The tribal group is a community of intermarried families, all claiming descent from a common ancestor. From tribal organisation the principle is developed that participation in the community is open only to such individuals as belong to one or other of the families of which it is composed; and the political body thus made up of individuals related either by blood or through marriage is called a patriarchal, or tribal, state. This form of community was enlarged even in very early times, advantage being taken of the possibility of adopting strangers into the circle of related families, and of amalgamating with them. Still, the fundamental idea that the community is composed of related families always remains uppermost in the minds of uncivilised peoples. The tribal state gradually develops into the territorial state. The connection of the community with a definite region becomes closer; strange tribes settle in the same district; they are permitted to remain provided tribute is paid and services are performed, and are gradually absorbed into the community, the strangers and the original inhabitants--plebeians and patricians--united together into one aggregate. Thus arises the conception of a state which any man may join without his being a member of any one of the original clans or families.

[Sidenote: Growth of the Idea of a State]

In this way the idea of a state becomes distinct from that of a people bound together by kinship, the latter being especially distinguished by a certain unity of external appearance, custom, character, and manner of thought. This is not intended to suggest that an amalgamation of different race elements in a state and an assimilation of different modes of thought and of feeling are not desirable, or that a spirit analogous to the sense of unity in members of the same family is not to be sought for; such a condition is most likely to be attained if a certain tribe or clan take precedence of the others, as the most progressive, to which the various elements of the people annex themselves.

These pictures represent: 1. Roman gaolers cutting off a
Christian’s ears. 2. The cangue as still used in China. 3. A
prisoner on the rack in Mediæval England. 4. Torture of the Iron
Chair. 5. The ordeal of fire and branding.
]

[Sidenote: Tribes and their Chiefs]

The tribal state has a fixed form of government. The chiefs or patriarchs of the various families stand at the head of affairs, the position of chief being either hereditary or elective. In most cases, however, it is determined by a combination of both methods, a blood descendant being chosen provided he is able to give proof of his competence. In addition there is often the popular assembly. In later times many innovations are introduced. Passion for power united to a strong personality often leads to a chieftainship in which all rights and privileges are absorbed or united in the person of one individual; so that he appears as the possessor of all prerogatives and titles, those of other men being entirely secondary, and all being more or less dependent upon his will. Religious conceptions, especially, have had great influence in this connection. Nowhere is this so clearly shown as in “teknonymy,” an institution formerly prevalent in the South Pacific islands, according to which the soul of the father is supposed to enter the body of his eldest son at the birth of the latter, and that therefore, immediately from his birth, the son becomes master, the father continuing the management of affairs merely as his proxy. Other peoples have avoided such consequences as these by supposing the child to be possessed by the soul of his grandfather, therefore naming first-born males after their grandfathers instead of after their fathers. Another outcome of the institution of chieftainship is the chaotic order of affairs which rules among many peoples on the death of the chieftain, continuing until a successor is seated on the throne--a lawless interval of anarchy followed by a regency.

The power of a chieftain is, however, usually limited by class rights; that is, by the rights of sub-chieftains of especially distinguished families, and of the popular assembly, among which elements the division of power and of jurisdiction is exceedingly varied. These primitive institutions are rude prototypes of future varieties of coercive government, of kingship, either of aristocratic or of republican form, in which the primitive idea of chieftainship as the absorption of all private privileges is given up, and in its place the various principles of rights and duties of government enter.

[Sidenote: Growth of Military Classes]

Class-differentiation with attendant privileges and prerogatives is especially developed in warlike races, and in nations which must be ever prepared to resist the attacks of enemies, by the establishment of a militant class. The militant class occupies an intermediate position between the governing, priest, and scholar classes on the one hand, and the industrial class--agriculturists, craftsmen, merchants--on the other. Employment in warfare, necessary discipline, near association with the chieftain, and the holding of fiefs for material support give to this class a unique position. Thus the warrior castes developed in India, the feudal and military nobility in Japan, the nobility in Germany, with obligations and service to feudal superiors and to the Court. This system survives for many years, until at last feudal tenure gradually disappears, and its attendant prerogatives are swallowed up by all classes through a universal subjection to military service; although even yet a distinct class of professional soldiers remains at the head of military affairs and operations, and will continue to do so as long as there is a possibility of internal or external warfare. However, here too the militant class is absorbed into a general body of officials. Officials are citizens who not only occupy the usual position of members of the state, but to whom in addition is appointed the execution of the life functions of the nation, as its organs; in other words, such functions as are peculiar to the civic organisation in contradistinction to the general functions exercised and actions performed by individual citizens as independent units. Officialism includes to a special degree duty to its calling and to the public trust, and there are also special privileges granted to officials within the sphere appointed for them.

[Sidenote: The Birth of Parliaments]

In a society governed by a chieftain, as well as in a monarchy, there is a popular assembly or consultative body; either an unorganised meeting of individuals, or an organised convention of estates founded on class right. A modern development, that certainly had its prototype in the patriarchal state, is the representative assembly, an assembly of individuals chosen to represent the people in place of the popular gathering. The English Government, with its representative legislative bodies, is a typical example in modern civilisation.

One of the chief problems encountered not only in a society ruled by a chieftain, but also in states of later development, whether governed by a potentate or by an aristocracy, is the relation of temporal to spiritual power. Sometimes both are united in the head of the state, as in the cases of the Incas of Peru and of the Caliphate. Sometimes the spiritual head is distinct and separate from the temporal; frequently the two forces are nearly associated, a member of the imperial family being chosen for the office of high-priest, as among the Aztecs. Often, however, the two functions are completely independent of each other, as among many African races, the medicine-man occupying a position entirely independent of the chieftain. Such separation may, of course, lead to friction and civil war; it may also become an element furthering to civilisation, a source of new ideas, opening the way to alliances between nations, and setting bounds to the tyranny of individuals, as exemplified in the relation of the Papacy to the Holy Roman Empire.

[Sidenote: State Justice a Momentous Step Forward]

The form of state in which the functions of government are exercised by a chieftain contributes greatly to state control and enforcement of justice. The realisation of right had been from the first a social function; but its enforcement was incumbent on the unit group of individuals (families or tribes bound together by friendship). The acquisition by the state of the power to dispense justice and to make and enforce law is one of the greatest events of the world’s history. The idea of all right being incorporated in the chieftain (and social classes) played an important part in bringing about this condition of affairs; for as soon as this conception receives general acceptance, the chieftain, and with him the state, become interested in the preservation and enforcement of justice, even in its lower forms in the common rights of the subjects. On the other hand, not only the interests of chieftainship, but also those of agriculture and commerce, are furthered by the preservation of internal peace; and internal peace calls for state control of justice and enforcement of law.

Mansell

AN EARLY EGYPTIAN REPRESENTATION OF JUSTICE

“The Judgment of the Dead” as illustrated by innumerable paintings
on the walls of Egyptian temples and tombs.
]

Moreover the religious element worked to the same end. Wickedness was held to be an injury to the deity, whose anger would be visited upon the entire land--a conception that lasted far into the Middle Ages, and according to which the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah was held to be typical of the effect of the curse of God. Already in primitive times religion led to a strange idea of justice--secret societies consecrated by the deity took upon themselves the function of enforcing right, instituting reigns of terror in their districts, maintaining order in society, and claiming authorisation from the god with whose spirit they were permeated. Later, influenced by all these causes, the social aggregate took over the control of justice. It was already considered to be the upholder of right, the servant of the deity, the maintainer of public peace, the dispenser of atoning sacrifices, etc.; and so the various elements conceived of as justice, which had previously been distributed among the single families, tribes, associations, and societies, were combined, and placed under state control.

Reproduced from the picture by the French artist, Nicolas Poussin,
who flourished in the first half of the seventeenth century.
]

From the fresco by Gerald Moira in the New Central Criminal Court,
London. Most of the figures are studies from well-known public men
of recent years.
]

[Sidenote: Terror & Tyranny of Religion]

[Sidenote: The Ordeal and the Curse]

Certain forms for the dispensation of justice, judging of crimes, and determining of punishments were developed. Thus arose the different forms of judicial procedure, which, for a long time bore a religious character. The deity was called upon to decide as to right and wrong--divinity in the form of natural forces. Hence the judgments of God through trial by water, fire, poison, serpents, scales, or--especially in Germany during the Middle Ages--combat, or decision by the divining eye, that was closely allied to the so-called trial by hazard. A peculiar variety of ordeal is that of the bier, according to which the body of a murdered man is called into requisition, the soul of the victim assisting in the discovery of the murderer. Ordeals are undergone sometimes by one individual, sometimes by two. An advance in progress is the curse, which takes the place of the ordeal, the curse of God being called down upon an individual and his family in case of wrongdoing or of perjury. The curse may be uttered by an individual in co-operation with the members of families. Thus arise ordeals by invocation and by oath with compurgators. Originally a certain period of time was allowed to pass--a month, for example--for the fulfilment of the curse. In later times, whoever took the oath--oath of innocence--was held guiltless. Witnesses succeeded to conjurers; divining looks were replaced by circumstantial evidence; and, instead of a mystic, a rational method of obtaining testimony was adopted. The development was not attained without certain attendant abuses; and the abolition of ordeal by God was among many peoples--notably the inhabitants of Eastern Asia, the American Indians, and the Germans of the Middle Ages--succeeded by the introduction of torture. In many lands torture stood in close connection with the judgment of God; in others it originated either directly or indirectly in slavery. According to the method of obtaining evidence by torture, the accused was forced through physical pain to disclosures concerning himself and his companions, and, in case he himself were considered guilty, to a confession. However barbarous and irrational, this system was employed in Latin and Germanic nations excepting England, until the eighteenth century, in some instances even until the nineteenth.

[Sidenote: The Slow Building up of Law]

[Sidenote: Evolution of the Modern State]

Judgment was first pronounced in the name of God; in later times, in the name of the people or of the ruler who appeared as the representative of God. The principles of justice, the validity of which at first depends upon custom, are in later times proclaimed and fixed as commands of God. Thus systems of fixed right come into being first in the form of sacred justice, then as commands of God, and finally as law. Law is a conception of justice expressed in certain rules and principles. Originally there were no laws; the standard for justice was furnished to each individual by his own feelings; only isolated cases were recorded. As time advanced, and great men who strove to bring about an improvement in justice arose above the generality of mankind; when the ruling class became differentiated from the other classes; when it was found necessary to root out certain popular customs--then, in addition to the original collection of precedents, there arose law of a higher form: law that stood above precedent, that altered custom, and opened up new roads to justice. Great codes of law have not been compilations only; they have led justice into new paths. Originally a law was looked upon as an inviolable command of God, as unalterable and eternal; its interpretation alone was earthly and transitory. As years passed, men learned to recognise that laws themselves were transitory; and it became a principle that later enactments could alter earlier rules. The relations of later statutes to already established law, and how the laws of different nations influence one another, are difficult, much-vexed questions for the solution of which special sciences have developed--transitory and international law. Judgment and law are intimately concerned with justice, the conception of right as evolved from the double action of life and custom. To this development of justice is united an endeavour of the state or government not only to further welfare by means of the creation and administration of law, but also to take under its control civilising institutions of all sorts. This was originally a feature of justice itself; certain practices inimical to civilisation were interdicted and made punishable offences. Already in the Middle Ages systems of police played a great part among governmental institutions, especially in the smaller states. Subsequently the idea was developed that not only protection through the punishment of crime, but also superintendence of and promotion of the public weal, should be administered by law; and thus the modern state developed with its policy of national welfare. With this arose the necessity for a sharper distinction to be drawn between justice and the various actions of an administration; and thus in modern times men have come to the system--based on Montesquieu--of the separation of powers and independence of justice.

Justice varies according to the development of civilisation, and according to the function that it must perform in this development; in like manner every age creates its own material and spiritual culture. Every poet is a poet of his own time.

[Sidenote: Right Way to View History]

The notion of natural right, however unhistorical it was in itself, characterised a period of transition in so far as it enabled men to form a historical conception--a conception of what might be: for, by contrasting actual with ideal justice, we are enabled to escape the bonds of the opinions of a particular time, and to look upon such opinions and views objectively and independently. Yet it is certainly a foolish proceeding to consider an ideal, deduced principally from conceptions and opinions of the present, to be a standard by which to measure the value of historical events of all times, sitting in judgment over the great names of the past with the air of an inspector of morals. The office of the historian as judge of the dead is quite differently constituted. Every age must be judged in accordance with the relation which it bears to the totality of development; and every historical personage is to be looked upon as a bearer of the spirit of his day, as a servant of the ideas of his time. Thus it is quite as wrong to pronounce moral censure on the men of history, as it is wrong to judge an era merely according to its good or evil characteristics. A period must be estimated according to what it has either directly or indirectly accomplished for mankind.

[Sidenote: Conception of a United World]

There are common factors of civilisation shared by nations themselves, through which many contradictions disappear. The religious civilisations of Christianity, Mohammedanism, Judaism, Buddhism and Confucianism have been the determining factors of the intellectual and emotional life, even influencing the course of events, in vast regions. And thus it is also comprehensible that in the judicial life of nations there is an endeavour for a closer approach, and also the existence of equalising tendencies. In spite of countless variations in detail, there is a certain unity of law in the entire Mohammedan world; and although the hope of establishing the unity of Roman canonistic law over the whole of Christendom has not been realised none the less it was a tremendous idea: that of a universal empire founded on the Roman law of the imperators, and placed under the rule of the German emperor, thus ensuring the continuance of the law of the Roman people--an idea that swayed the intellects of the Middle Ages up to the fourteenth, even to the fifteenth century, and according to which the emperor would have been the head of all Europe, the other sovereigns merely his vassals or fief-holders. This idea, once advocated by such a great spirit as that of Dante, has, like many others, passed into oblivion; and in its place has arisen the conception of independent laws of nations. Yet the original idea has had great influence: it has led to a close union of Christian peoples; it opened a way for Roman law to become universal law, although, to be sure, English law, completely independent of that of Rome, has grown to unparalleled proportions as a universal system, entirely by reason of the marvellous success of the English people as colonists. Likewise international commerce will of itself lead to a unification of mercantile, admiralty, copyright, and patent law.

Then the idea of an international league must develop, arising from the idea of the unity of Christian nations. We have advanced a great distance beyond the time when every foreigner was considered an enemy, and when all foreign phenomena were looked upon as strange or with antipathy. Rules for international commerce are developed; state alliances are entered into for the furtherance of common interests and for the preservation of peace. Many tasks which in former times would have been executed by the empire are now undertaken by international associations; and the time for the establishment of international courts of arbitration for the adjustment of differences between states is already approaching.

[Sidenote: Common Interests of Mankind]

It also seems probable that states will unite to form political organisations, wholly or partially renouncing their separate positions. Thus nations will be replaced by a federal state, and a multitude of unifying ideas which would otherwise be accomplished with difficulty will come to easy realisation. Federal states were already in existence during the times of patriarchal communities: an especially striking example is that of the admirably constituted federation of the Iroquois nations.

[Sidenote: Universal Transmission of Culture]

The vision of no man may pierce through to the ultimate end of the processes of history, and to advance hypotheses is a vain endeavour--quite as vain as it would be to expect Plato to have foretold the life of modern civilisation or the imperial idea of mediæval times, or Dante to have foreseen modern industrialism or the character of industrial peoples. To-day we are more certain than ever that no process of development, however simple it may have been, has ever taken place according to a fixed model; all developments have had their own individualities according to place and to time. Thus we must forego discussion of the future.

However, there is another point of view. Development of nations as well as of individuals leads either to progress or to decay. No people may hope to live eternally; and how many acquisitions already gained will be lost in the future it is impossible to say. If a nation declines, it either becomes extinct or is annihilated by another state; it becomes identified with the newer nation, and disappears with its own character; thus its civilisation may also disappear. This is a serious possibility. It is the Medusa head of the world’s history which we must face--and without stiffening to stone.

[Sidenote: Influence of Peoples on One Another]

There is one truth, however, the knowledge of which fills us with hope for the future: it is the fact that the results of development and civilisation are often transfused from one people to another, so that a given development need not start again from the very beginning. This is owing to the capacity which races have for absorbing or borrowing civilisations. Absorption of culture is by no means universal; it does not prevent the occasional disappearance of civilisation, for every civilisation has before it at least the possibility of death. Nevertheless the transmission and assimilation of culture is constantly taking place. There are various ways in which it may be brought about. A conquering nation may bring its own civilisation with it to the conquered; culture is often forced upon the latter by coercive measures. The conquerors may acquire culture from the vanquished; or assimilation of culture may come about without the subjection of a people, through the unconscious adoption of external customs and internal modes of thought. Finally, culture may be borrowed consciously from one nation by another, the one state becoming convinced of the outward advantages and inner significance of the foreign civilisation.

In this way the problem of development becomes very complicated; many institutions of vanished races thus continue to live on. Certainly the race that acquires a foreign civilisation must, among other things, be so constituted in its motives and aspirations as to lose the very nerves of its being, its very stability, in order that, intoxicated with the joy of a new life, all traces of its past existence may be allowed to break up and disappear. On the other hand, many a promising germ of culture possessed by a vigorous people may come to grief, owing to the influence of acquisitions from without. But, in return, a race that knows how to assimilate foreign culture may obtain a civilisation of such efficiency as it would never before have been capable of attaining, by reason of the fact that its power is established on a recently acquired basis, and because it has been spared a multitude of faltering experiments.

[Sidenote: Progress Goes on For Ever]

Civilisation may be mutually obtained from reciprocal action, nations both giving and taking. Such a relation naturally arises when states enter into intercourse with one another, when they have become acquainted with one another’s various institutions and are able to recognise the great merits of foreign organisations and the defects of their own. Especially the world’s commerce, in which every nation wishes to remain a competitor, compels towards mutual acceptance of custom and law; no nation desires to be left behind; and each discovers that it will fall to the rear unless it borrow certain things from the others. Such reciprocal action will be the more effective the more like nations are to one another, the better they understand each other, and the more often they succeed not only in adopting the outward forms, but in absorbing the principles of foreign institutions into their own beings.

Thus we may hope that even if the nations of to-day decay and disappear, the labour of the world’s progress will not be lost; it will constantly reappear in new communities which may rejoice in that for which we have striven, and which we have acquired by the exertion of our own powers.

JOSEPH KOHLER

THE SEVEN WONDERS OF ANCIENT CIVILISATION

From the French of Victor Hugo

By HAROLD BEGBIE

=The Temple of Diana at Ephesus speaks:=

The sun standeth in the high places of the mountains,
Full of brightness and mirth is the dawn.
But my loveliness is not shamed by him,
Neither is it dimmed;
For, behold and consider well, the sun is not more than thought.
That which yesterday I was, to-morrow I shall be:
I live: I wear upon my brow the moving ages and the spirit of man,
And genius, and art:
These things are more wonderful than the sun.

Senseless is the stone in the earth,
And the granite is not more than the formless night;
The alabaster knoweth not the dayspring,
Porphyry is blind,
And marble is without understanding;
But let Ctesiphon pass,
Or Dædalus, or Chresiphon,
And fix his eyes, full of the divine flash,
Upon the ground where the rocks slumber,
And lo, they awake, they tremble, they are stricken with
understanding;
The granite, lifting some vague and troubled eyelid,
Struggleth to behold his master:
The rock feeleth within himself the breathing of the unhewn statue,
The marble stirs in the midnight of his darkness,
Because that he is aware of the soul of a man.
The buried alabaster desireth to rise up from the grave,
Earth shudders, it trembleth violently,
It feels upon it the will of a man;
And behold, beneath the gaze of him who passeth with creation in
his eyes,
From the deeps of the sacred earth
The sublime palace comes forth and mounts upward.

=When she has made an end, the Gardens of Babylon sing their laud of Semiramis:=

Glory to Semiramis,
Who reared us up on the arches of the great bridges
Whose span outraceth time.
This great queen was wont to delight herself beneath our floating
branches;
In the midst of the ruin of two empires
She laughed in our groves,
She was happy in our green places;
She conquered the kings of far countries,
And when the man had humbled himself before her,
Lo, she would go upon her way,
She would come hither,
She would sigh gleefully under our branches,
Very pleasantly would she lie down on the skins of panthers.

=And after the Gardens have sung, there is heard the voice of the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus:=

I am the monument of a heart that knew itself infinite;
Death is not death beneath my dome of blue,
Beneath my dome, death is victory,
Death is life.
Here hath death so much of gold and of precious stone
That he boasteth himself thereof;
Behold, I am the burial which is a pageant,
And the sepulchre which is a palace.

=Then, like a great thunder, the voice of Jupiter:=

I am the Olympian,
The lord of the muses;
All that which hath life, or breath, or love, or thought, or growth.
Groweth, thinketh, liveth, loveth, and breatheth in me.
The incense of supplication which rises to my feet
Trembles with terror and affright;
The slope of my brow doth touch the axis of the world;
The tempest speaketh with me before he troubles the waters;
I endure without age;
I exist without pang;
Unto me one thing only is impossible--
To die.

=After Jupiter, from the island of Pharos sounds the voice of the great Lighthouse:=

In the midst of the mighty waters
I tarry for the ceasing of the centuries.
Sostratus the Cnidian built me,
He built me that there might be thrown
Across the rolling waters,
And through the darkness where lurketh destruction,
A rebuke to the lovely vanity of the stars.

=After the Lighthouse, the Colossus at Rhodes:=

I am the true Lighthouse.
Rhodes lies at my threshold.
Before the steadfast gaze of my unsleeping eyes
Winter maketh white the mountains.
I behold the deep waters in their cavernous mists;
I am the sentinel whom none cometh to relieve;
I look forth upon the coming of the night,
And upon the coming of the dawn
I behold the lifting of the mists,
I behold the terror of the sea,
With the immense dreaming of Colossus.

=And last speaks the Pyramid of Cheops:=

The desert, spread like a table, lieth beneath my foundations.
Lo, from some mysterious gateway of the night
I lift unto heaven my stair of terror,
And out of the darkness itself seemeth it that I am builded.
The sphinxes dropped their broods in the caverns;
The centuries went by; the winds passed sighing;
And Cheops said again: I am eternal!

=Then, after a profound silence, the creeping worm of the sepulchre lifteth up his voice:=

I say unto you Buildings that ye rise, and arise still more!
Set ye up a stone above a stone,
Above cities lift yourselves up, O temples!
Lift up yourselves, like Babel!
Column above column;
Higher and yet higher;
Let palaces arise upon the hollow places
And let nothingness be fastened upon the foundations of night!

Ye are like smoke,
Therefore exalt yourselves with the clouds!
Set not an end to your boasting!
Mount up, mount up, for ever!
Lo, in the dust beneath your feet I crawl and wait.
Small am I, O mighty ones,
And yet I say unto you,
From the going down of the sun to his rising up,
From all the corners of the earth,
Everything which hath substance and which hath being,
The thing which is sorrowful,
And the thing which is glad,
Descend unto me.
And I only have strength, and I only endure for ever,
For behold, I am death.

The Hanging Gardens have been attributed to Semiramis, although
Nebuchadnezzar is also said to have built them to please one of his
wives, who, coming from a hilly country to Babylon, in the midst
of a vast and barren plain, sighed for some reminder of the leafy
beauty of her old home. The gardens, built in the form of a square
extending some 700 feet on each side, rose to a great height in
terrace upon terrace supported by massive pillars. A remarkable
hydraulic system kept their multitudinous plants and trees in
almost perpetual verdure.
]

For six thousand years the Pyramids have thrown their shadow across
the sands of Egypt. The stone of which they are built would make a
great wall from Cairo to New York; the white marble which covered
them would have built more king’s palaces than Egypt has had need
of. The building of the Great Pyramid employed 100,000 slaves for
30 years, and the geometrical perfection of it is a marvel to this
day. Khufu, or Cheops, who built the Great Pyramid--probably as his
tomb--reigned about 4700 B.C., so that the pyramid is more than
three times as old as the Roman Empire.
]

This famous monument of antiquity was erected in the year 354 B.C.
to the memory of King Mausolus of Caria by his widow Artemisia,
at Halicarnassus, the beautiful Greek city-colony on the shores
of the Ægean Sea. Some idea of its size will be gathered from the
fact that it was surrounded by an esplanade which measured over
three hundred feet on each side, while its total height was nearly
a hundred and fifty feet. The statue existed almost intact until
the fourth century of our own era, and was finally destroyed in the
Middle Ages by the Turks.
]

This short-lived achievement of ancient art dated from about 300
B.C. It was the largest of a hundred statues to the sun-god raised
in the island of Rhodes, any one of which, said Pliny, would have
made famous the place where it stood. Dedicated to Apollo, who was
thought to have delivered Rhodes from Demetrius Poliorcetes, it was
made from the engines of war which that besieger left behind. One
finger of it was larger than an ordinary statue. An earthquake in
224 B.C. destroyed it, but even in its broken and fallen state it
was long the wonder of Rhodes.
]

“Great is Diana of the Ephesians.” Her temple was burned down in
356 B.C., and subsequent to that year the great temple famed in
history was erected by the Ionians. It is said to have taken 220
years to construct, and measured about 400 feet in length and 200
feet in width, while it contained no fewer than 127 Ionic columns
nearly 65 feet high. The temple was despoiled by Nero and destroyed
by the Goths in 262 A.D., but some of its ruins still remain.
]

The world-famous statue of Jupiter was the work of the great
sculptor Phidias. It measured 43 feet in height above the base.
The body of the god was carved from ivory, and the drapery was of
solid gold. No other statue of such magnitude, of such artistic
perfection, or of such precious material, has been known to
history. Among the ruins of the temple are still to be seen the
remains of the black marble mosaic on which the statue stood.
]

On the island of Pharos, close to Alexandria, stood the famous
lighthouse erected by Ptolemy Philadelphus about 280 B.C.
Constructed of white marble, in a series of vast stages of vaulted
masonry, it reached the height of 520 feet, and in its summit
burned night and day, an immense beacon fire of wood, which could
be seen 30 miles at sea. The lighthouse was gradually destroyed
by earthquakes and the action of the sea, but existed in some
condition to the end of the 13th century.
]

THE RISE OF CIVILISATION IN EGYPT

BY PROFESSOR FLINDERS PETRIE

In looking back to the beginning of civilisation in any country, we have to deal with the physical changes which the land has undergone, and to consider the conditions which promoted or hindered the advance of its inhabitants. The nature of a country largely rules the nature of its people, both bodily and mentally; and it may even be true that, if sufficient time be given, the same character and structure will always be produced by equal conditions.

[Sidenote: Civilisation 10,000 Years ago]

[Sidenote: How we can Fix the Date]

From historical records, and the cemeteries that have been examined, it appears that the beginning of a continuous civilisation in Egypt must be set as far back as about 10,000 years ago, or 8000 B.C. The question then is how far the condition of the country at that age was similar to that now seen? The present state is quite new, geographically speaking, as the deposit of mud by the Nile, providing a suitable soil, is only a matter of a few thousand years. The accumulation of deposit is about 5 in. in a century (4·7 at Naukratis, 5·1 at Abusir, 5·5 at Cairo); and the depth of it is not less than 26 ft., and varies in different places down to 62 ft. The lower depths are, however, often mixed with sand beds, and do not show the continuous mud deposit; hence the average depth of 39 ft. is too large, and if we accept 35 ft., it will certainly be a full estimate. At the average rate of deposit, this would be formed in 6,000 years. But, on the other hand, the deposit may have been slower at the beginning, and hence the age would be earlier. Also, the full depth may be greater, owing to some borings hitting on ground which was originally above the river. Hence the extreme limits of age of Nile deposit in different positions are perhaps 7,000 to 15,000 years, and probably about 10,000 years may be a likely age for the beginning of continuous Nile mud stratification. Hence it is clear that the start of the civilisation was about contemporary with the first cultivable ground.

[Sidenote: Stone Age in Egypt]

[Sidenote: The First Dwellers in the Land]

Earlier than the Nile deposits there must have been some rainfall, enough to keep up the volume of the river, and to prevent its slackening, so as to deposit its burden. We must picture, then, the country as having enough rainfall for a scanty vegetation in the valleys, while the Nile flowed down a mighty stream, filling the whole bed as it now does in flood, and bearing its mud out to the sea, except in some backwaters which were shoaling up. Such a land would support a small population of hunters, who followed the desert game and snared hippopotami in the marshes. The Nile had been in course of recession for a long period before it began to rise again by filling its bed. The gravels high above the present Nile contain flints flaked by human work; much as in Sinai such flakes are found, deep in the filling of the valleys which belong to a pluvial period. Yet after the Nile had retreated down to the present level, man appears to have been still in the Palæolithic stage, as freshly flaked, unrolled flints have been found at the lowest surface level of the desert. As the country, while drying up, and before mud deposits were laid down, would have only been suited for occupation by hunters, it seems probable that Palæolithic Man had continued in Egypt until the beginning of the Nile deposits--that is to say, till the beginning of the continuous civilisation as discovered in the cemeteries.

BUSHMAN TYPE. On turning to the remains of the earliest burials, we find that in many cases female figures of the Bushman--or more precisely Koranna--type, were placed in the graves; while at the same time long, slender figures of the European type are also found. The inference is that the Palæolithic race of the Koranna type was known to the earliest civilised race in Egypt, and that they were being expelled and exterminated, as only female figures are found--representing captive slave women--and even these soon disappear. Thus it would seem that Egypt, as an almost desert region, before the formation of the cultivable mud flats, was the last home on the Mediterranean of the hunters who continued in the Palæolithic stage. The physical type of the figures which we can attribute to this earliest population has the Bushman characteristics of fatness of the thighs and hips, with a deep lumbar curve; and a line of whisker covers the jaws of the female figures, akin to the fur on the bodies of women on the Brassempouy and Laugerie-Basse ivory carvings. This indicates that they belonged to a cold climate, and had not been developed in Egypt. As, however, man had certainly dwelt in the Nile valley for long ages, this northern indication points to a comparatively recent invasion from a colder to a warmer climate, such as has been the rule throughout historical times.

[Sidenote: Time Without Dates]

PREHISTORIC PERIOD. The beginning of the continuous civilisation of the country must be placed at about 8000 B.C. The written history extends back to the first dynasty, and places that at 5500 B.C., and this is checked at the sixth, twelfth, and eighteenth dynasties by records of the rising of Sirius, and of the seasons in the shifting year, which agree to this dating in general. For the length of the prehistoric age before these written records there is no exact dating. But, as in a given district of Egypt, where all the desert has been searched, the prehistoric graves are about as numerous as those made during the six thousand years of the historic time, at least 2,000 or 3,000 years must be allowed. The amount of change in every kind of production during this age is considerable; and as we can trace two cycles of civilisation, which usually occupy about 1,500 years each in the later times, it is likely that 2,500 years is too little rather than too long a period. As no definite scale of years can be used, the dating of the graves of this age is treated as a matter of sequence. From a careful statistical classing of the pottery, it is practicable to put about a thousand of the fullest graves into their original order; this series is then divided into 50 equal parts, and these are numbered from 30 to 80. Thus, sequence date 30 is the earliest type of graves yet found, and S.D. 80 is of the age of Mena, the founder of the first dynasty. The sequence dates are given below for each stage of the prehistoric times.

As female figures of the Bushman type are found in the very
earliest Egyptian graves, it is thought that this race was native
to the country and was gradually expelled by the first civilised
people. The photograph illustrates one of the figures taken from a
grave.
]

EARLIEST BURIALS. The earliest graves found are shallow circular hollows on the desert, about 30 in. across, and a foot deep. The body lies closely doubled up, wrapped in goat-skins. There are very few objects placed with these burials; a single cup of pottery, red, with black top; rarely, a slate palette for grinding face-paint; and, in one grave, a copper pin to fasten the goat-skin. Pottery was in a simple stage, and weaving was quite unknown. These graves are classed as sequence date 30.

The pottery of the first period of Egyptian civilisation is
characterised by raised white lines on a red body, and from the
fact that it closely resembles the pottery of the Kabyle people,
who live in North Africa to-day, it is thought the first Egyptian
civilisation may have come from the west. These examples are before
7000 B.C.
]

[Sidenote: Civilisation Emerging from the Mists]

FIRST CIVILISATION. The next period is that of the white patterns on red (S.D. 31 to 34). This use of lines of raised white slip is the same as on the present Kabyle pottery, and the patterns are so closely alike on the ancient and modern that this forms a strong evidence for a Western connection of the people. In this period the main lines of the civilisation become clearly marked. The fine flint chipping with delicate serrated edges; the polished red pottery, of circular and of fancy forms; the tall round-bottomed stone vases; the slate palettes for face-paint, of animal forms and of rhombic shape; the use of sandals; the ivory combs with animal figures; the disc-shaped mace-head--all of these were in use with the white cross-lined pottery, and stamp the general type of the beginning of the civilisation. We have before us a settled population, with strong artistic taste in handicraft, but not in copying Nature; with patience for very long and skilful work, and probably organised, therefore, under chiefs who commissioned such labour; yet with sufficient general demand for fine things to have raised hand pottery to its highest level; with strong beliefs about a future life, as shown by the uniform detail of the position of the body and the nature of the offerings in the grave; with the arts of spinning and weaving; fairly clothed, as shown by the use of sandals; fighters, with finely-made and treasured weapons; with the use of personal marks for property--altogether much in the stage which we now see in the highest races of the Pacific or Central Africa.

EASTERN INVASION. This civilisation had lasted for a few centuries when we see a change come over it. On searching the types of pottery we see many new forms arising from S.D. 38 to 43, while many older types disappear between S.D. 40 and 44. These changes serve to stamp the point of the change, but it is in other respects that the differences are most visible. The black-topped pottery, red polished, and fancy forms of pottery cease to develop after 43, whereas the decorated pottery, with brown line patterns on buff ware, is scarcely known till 40, and the late class of pottery begins at 43. In the stone vases the forms of tall tubular shape, with handles, cease at 40, and the barrel forms begin at 39, and are dominant by 42. In flint work the various new types begin from 39 to 45; the disc mace dies out about 40, and the pear-shaped mace begins at 42. In the slate palettes old types vanish and new ones arise from 37 to 42. The same is seen in ivories. Foreign intercourse was increased, as silver (from Asia Minor?), lazuli (from Persia?), serpentine and hæmatite (from Sinai?) all come into use from 38 to 40. In copying Nature, the steatopygous figures of the Bushman type are only found before 38, and human figure amulets are known from down to 44. Animal figure amulets begin in 45. Multiple burials in graves are common down to 40, and continue till 43; only single burials are known later.

[Sidenote: Invasion from the East]

[Sidenote: What Mythology Says]

The racial changes that are thus indicated by these widespread differences can only be traced by the different products. The white line pottery characteristic of the earliest people is closely like that of the Kabyles, and the similarity of the skull measurements show that there is no bar to accepting the connection with the North African race. But the details of the new people, using animal amulets, a face veil, wavy-handled pottery like that of early Palestine, and the Asiatic silver and lazuli, all point to their coming in from the East. This change may be further linked with the religious traditions. This later mythology taught that Osiris had found the Egyptians in a brutal existence, and he had taught them agriculture, laws, and worship; this appears to be the tradition of the bringing in of cultivation by the earliest civilisation at S.D. 30. His worshippers were allied with those of Isis, who were a kindred tribe. Hence Osiris is said to have married his sister Isis. The myth further shows that this civilisation was attacked treacherously by the tribe who worshipped Set, in confederacy with an Ethiopian queen, and they succeeded in suppressing the worship of Osiris and removing his remains to Byblos in Syria. This seems to agree to the influx of Asiatic influence, about S.D. 40, which we have noticed above. The correction of the calendar from 360 to 365 days, is attributed to the beginning of the civilisation (at S.D. 30) by the myth that Osiris and his cycle of gods were born on the extra five days.

The pottery of the second period of Egyptian civilisation is
rich in representations of prehistoric ships. The vessels are
shown with many oars, and the cabins are placed amidship with a
gangway between. It is gathered from these crude drawings that in
prehistoric times there was a considerable shipping trade along the
coast of Egypt.
]

SECOND CIVILISATION. The second prehistoric civilisation, of which we have traced the Asiatic source, is specially marked by the use of a hard buff pottery, on which designs are often painted in brown outline. The art of these has no connection with that of the early white line designs; the habit of covering figures with cross lines, and the imitation of basket-work, have entirely disappeared; and, on the contrary, the plant, ostrich, and ship designs are quite new.

What, then, were the connections of these people? One indication is gleaned from carvings at the close of the prehistoric age. Two tributaries of the new king of Egypt are shown bearing stone vases of the style of those of the second prehistoric civilisation, S.D. 45-75. They have large pointed noses, and wear pigtails, and another tributary of the same type wears a long robe. Hence we may see that they came from a cold region where stone vases were wrought; and that by the form of the vase they were probably the same people as the later prehistoric stock. Yet, on the other hand, we occasionally find pottery vases of that people in the earlier prehistoric age, so that they must have been in touch with Egypt throughout. The more likely source for them was the mountainous region, where snow sometimes lies, between Egypt and the Red Sea; and certainly this was the source of the rare igneous rocks used for the prehistoric vases.

The general conclusion would be, then, that a people occupying the mountainous region east of Egypt had an independent civilisation, and were in touch with the early prehistoric people of the Nile valley. Then about S.D. 38 they began to push down into Egypt, and fully entered it by S.D. 44, bringing with them various different points of their own civilisation, and expelling the Osiris worship in favour of Set, who was their god. They probably brought in the Semitic elements to the Egyptian language, along with the other Asiatic connections.

[Sidenote: Fleet of Prehistoric Ships]

SHIPPING. Under this new order of things we see much more foreign and maritime connection. The introduction of silver from Asia, of lazuli from Persia, of hæmatite from Sinai, of serpentine from the Arabian desert--all show this. On the vases we see the starfish painted, and one of the most usual decorations was the figure of a great galley or ship. These ships are shown with oars on the pottery vases, and without oars or sails on the tomb paintings. From the proportion of the figures they appear to have been as much as 50 ft, long, and this is confirmed by the oars, which number up to sixty. Neither indication is exact; but the tendency would be to exaggerate the size of the figures, and certainly not to diminish them, and so aggrandise the ship. The shipbuilding in the early history may prepare us for the earlier rise of such work, when we read of Senefru building sixty ships of a hundred feet long in one year.

[Sidenote: What the Ships Were Like]

These prehistoric ships were all of one pattern. Amidships were the large cabins, and there was no poop or forecastle structure, probably because of the want of support fore and aft, the flotation being mainly in the middle. The two cabins were separated by a broad gangway across the boat, and joined above the gangway by a bridge from roof to roof. Lesser cabins projected fore and aft from the main cabins. On the roofs were rails at the corners, so as to secure top cargo without getting in the way of loading it up. In a large ship there was an upper cabin on the hinder main one, a light shelter shaded with branches. From the back of the hinder cabin stood up a tall pole bearing a solid object as a standard, which we shall notice below. At the stern was the steersman seated by an upright post, to which was probably lashed the steering oar, as in the historical boats. In the bows was a low platform, with a rail round it, for the look-out, shaded with branches. The cabins were narrower than the beam, and left free space for rowers on each side.

[Sidenote: Trade in Those Days]