supper at the palace."* The fisherman, delighted with this mark of favour, returned home. Shortly after, the servants, on opening the fish, discovered the ring, and with great eagerness and joy carried it to the king, relating in what manner it had been found. Polycrates, concluding that such a circumstance could only be the effect of Divine interposition, carefully noted down every particular, and sent it to Egypt. Amasis no sooner perused his letter, than he felt convinced it was out of the power of one mortal to deliver another from the fate which awaited him; and that Polycrates, who had been so uniformly lucky, and who had even recovered what he had taken pains to lose, could not terminate his days in tranquillity. He therefore sent a herald to Samos, disclaiming all connection with him for the future, in order that, when any grievous calamity befell Polycrates, he might not have to bewail the misfortunes of a friend. Such is the account given by Herodotus of Amasis's desertion of Polycrates; which took place previous to the difficulties he experienced from the disaffection of his subjects, and the intervention of the Lacedæmonians, and some time before his cruel murder by the treacherous Orætes. † Diodorus ‡, however, assigns a different reason for the conduct * It is not necessary that the fisherman should have eaten at the same table as his royal host. Herodotus uses the expression, "I invite you to supper,' σε επι δείπνον καλεομεν. Many persons are invited to sup at the house of a great man in the East without sitting at table with him. + Herodot. iii. 125. Valer. Max. calls him Orontes, vi. 9. Diod. i. 95. of Amasis. He affirms that the Egyptian monarch was offended with the tyrannical conduct of Polycrates, and foresaw, from the feeling excited against him, both amongst his subjects and foreigners, that his fate was inevitable; and, indeed the flight of many Samians to Crete*, and numerous instances of their discontent and of his oppression, are recorded by Herodotus and many ancient writers. t Polycrates has been represented as a great encourager of learning, and the patron of eminent men, spending great part of his time in the company of persons of talent, among whom were Anacreon and Pythagoras. And his friendship with Amasis enabled him to recommend the latter to that monarch ‡, when he visited Egypt, and to obtain for him those facilities in studying the mysterious sciences and profound secrets of the Egyptians, which few foreigners were permitted to enjoy. Some §, however, deny that his journey was undertaken at the suggestion, or even with the approbation, of Polycrates; and affirm, on the contrary, that Pythagoras abandoned his native country, Herodot. iii. 44. + Valer. Max. vi. 9. "Samos amara servitute (Polycratis) pressa." Plin. xxxvii. 2. Polycrati Samio, severo insularum ac litorum tyranno." Diogenes, Porphyry, Gellius, Eusebius, Diodorus, &c. Pliny says the name of the king who reigned in Egypt when Pythagoras visited it was Senneserteus. Can this have been corrupted from Neit-se, or Se-Neit, "the Son of Neith," which was the cognomen of Amasis, Ames-Neit-se, or Ames-se-Neit? It rather resembles the name Sen-Osiri. Plin. xxxvi. 14. Another reading gives Semneserteus, perhaps mistaken for, or corrupted from, the name of Psammenitus, the son of Amasis. The authors mentioned in a preceding note. being unable to endure the tyranny of his sovereign. Solon also visited Egypt during the reign of Amasis; and being much pleased with the laws of the Egyptians, which, through the liberality of the king, he had every facility of studying, he introduced many of them into the code established by him at Athens. That Amasis was a great encourager of art, we have ample testimony from the monuments which remain, as well as from the statements of ancient writers; and being a native of Saïs, or, as Herodotus affirms, of Siuph, in the Saïte nome, his attention, as is reasonable to suppose, was directed more particularly toward the embellishment of that city. With this view he erected at Saïs a magnificent propylæum in honour of Minerva; a splendid building, far excelling any other of the kind, as well in size and grandeur, as in the quality and magnitude of the stones used in its construction; and before it were placed several large colossi, with a series of immense androsphinxes, which formed the avenue or dromos leading to the main entrance. The propylæum was a large court, open in the centre, and surrounded in the inside by rows of columns, with the usual pyramidal towers in front, forming one of the approaches to the temple of Minerva, in the same manner as the propylæa attached to the temples at Thebes consti *Herodot. i. 30. Thales is said, by Plutarch, in his Banquet of the Seven Sages, to have been in Egypt in the reign of Amasis; and he mentions the improbable story of his showing the Egyptians how to measure the height of the pyramid by its shadow. tute the entrance halls of those edifices.* Portions of the same building, which had been erected by his predecessors, requiring some repairs, Amasis collected for this purpose a quantity of stones of amazing thickness, part of which were brought from the quarries of Memphist, and part from the cataracts of Syene. "But what, in my opinion," says Herodotus, "deserves the greatest admiration, is an edifice of a single stone, brought from the city of Elephantine, a distance of about twenty days' journey. Two thousand men, chosen from the class of boatmen, were employed for the space of three years in transporting it to Saïs. Its external length is twenty-one cubits, its breadth fourteen, and height eight: and in the inside it measures eighteen cubits and twenty digits in length, twelve in breadth, and five in height. It stands near the entrance of the temple; and the reason of its being left in this spot was that the architect, wearied with the tedious duration of the undertaking, had been heard to fetch a deep sigh, while they were employed in dragging it forward; upon which Amasis, who happened to be present, gave orders they should stop, and carry it no further. Some, however, affirm that one of the men while moving it with a lever At Karnak, in Thebes, are some instances of the avenues of sphinxes; they only differ in being criosphinxes, or surmounted with the head of a ram instead of a man. + Herodotus means the mountains opposite Memphis, of the Troici lapidis mons, which he mentions in the same manner on another occasion, when speaking of the canal to the Red Sea. Lib. ii. s. 158. From Elephantine or E'Souan, where the granite quarries may still be seen, to Saïs, is about 700 miles by land. It must have crossed the river once at least. was crushed to death, and that on this account they were ordered to desist. "Amasis made many and magnificent presents to other temples both in Upper and Lower Egypt. At Memphis, he placed a colossal recumbent figure, seventy-five feet long, before the temple of Vulcan; and on the same basement two other colossi of Ethiopic stones, or granite, each twenty feet in height, one on either side of the principal part of the building. There is at Saïs another statue similar to that of Memphis, and lying in the same position: and this prince erected the grand temple of Isis at Memphis, which deservedly claims universal admiration." Many monuments still exist in different parts of Egypt, bearing the name of Amasis, one of which, a red granite monolith, at Tel-et-mai, resembles in form that described by Herodotus as having been brought from Elephantine to Saïs. Thebes and other places also present memorials of the encouragement he gave to architecture and other branches of art; and at the quarries of Syene several inscriptions indicate the removal of granite blocks for the * Strabo says, “Before the dromos of the temple lics a colossus of a single stone; and in this dromos are held the bull-fights." Strabo, lib. xvii. + Probably by the pɛyapov Herodotus means the temple, properly speaking, independent of the outer courts: or the isolated sanctuary in the centre of the temple, which was independent of the inner adytum, as at Luqsor, and the smaller temple of Medeenet Haboo at Thebes. They were very uncommon in Egypt. § I am indebted to Mr. Burton for its dimensions, which are 21 ft. 9 in. high, 13 ft. broad, and 11 ft. 7 in. deep, outside; and 19 ft. 3 in., 8 ft., and 8 ft. 3 in, inside. |