[Illustration: Fig. 99.]

[Illustration: Fig. 100.]

[Illustration: Fig. 101.]

[Illustration: Fig. 102.--Two Nile-gods, bearing lotus flowers and libation
vases.]

[Illustration: Fig. 103.--Dado decoration, hall of Thothmes III., Karnak.]

[Illustration: Fig. 104.--Ceiling decoration, from tomb of Bakenrenf
(Bocchoris), Sakkarah, Twenty-sixth Dynasty.]


Ancient tradition affirmed that the earliest Egyptian temples contained
neither sculptured images, inscriptions, nor symbols; and in point of fact,
the Temple of the Sphinx is bare. But this is a unique example. The
fragments of architraves and masonry bearing the name of Khafra, which were
used for building material in the northern pyramid of Lisht, show that this
primitive simplicity had already been abandoned by the time of the Fourth
Dynasty. During the Theban period, all smooth surfaces, all pylons, wall-
faces, and shafts of columns, were covered with figure-groups and
inscriptions. Under the Ptolemies and the Caesars, figures and hieroglyphs
became so crowded that the stone on which they are sculptured seems to be
lost under the masses of ornament with which it is charged. We recognise at
a glance that these scenes are not placed at random. They follow in
sequence, are interlinked, and form as it were a great mystic book in which
the official relations between gods and men, as well as between men and
gods, are clearly set forth for such as are skilled to read them. The