Discover the Wonders of Ancient Egypt
Cairo
The Pyramids
Standing on the plateau of Giza, the Pyramids of Cheops, Khefren and Mycerinus are the last remaining “Wonder” of the Ancient World. Most imposing of all, Cheops' great pyramid covers 13 acres, took 100,000 slaves and 20 years to build.
Work on its construction could progress only when the Nile was in flood, allowing heavy stone blocks to be floated on wooden barges to the site of the edifice. Some 2,300,000 blocks, averaging 2½ tons in weight, were used in its completion. The Pharaoh Cheops' mummified body and burial treasures (long since removed by vandals) were entombed within the monument over 4,000 years ago.
The Sphinx
Obscure guardian of the desert plain and the royal tombs of Ancient Egypt, the symbolic Sphinx remains a great riddle in Egyptology. Its lion body would seem to denote courage; its human face perhaps representing a Pharaoh's divine wisdom.
There are many such statues in Egypt; but the one at Giza, a stone's throw from the Pyramids, has special significance. Many centuries ago the young Thothmes IV, not yet crowned, took noontime shelter in its shadow. He dreamed that the Sphinx spoke to him as a father, promising to make him King over all Egypt if he would clear away the encroaching sands of the desert.
Thothmes immediately had the Sphinx repaired, and built an alabaster temple (a portion of which is still intact) at its base.
Museum of Antiquities
The Museum, justly famed pantheon of Egyptian art, is a magnet for the scholar and amateur alike. Impressive relics of the great Dynasties reach their apex in the treasures taken from the tomb of young Pharaoh Tutankhamen.
A whole civilisation stands recreated here — statues of the King in hunting and court attire, chairs, beds, weapons, and toilet articles. And, in a steel-barred inner room of the Museum, lies Tut's innermost mummy case of flawless design and the exquisite golden death mask.
The Great Mosques
Cairo, city of a thousand minarets, may well be proud of some of the finest mosques in all Islam. Perched on the Citadel of Saladin, at Cairo's eastern edge, the Alabaster Mosque has walls of alabaster, priceless carpets and exquisite chandeliers.
Not far away is the austere but superb Sultan Hassan Mosque, dating from the 14th century. Legend says the architect's hands were cut off to prevent him from duplicating this beautiful edifice. These and other architectural marvels stand in the centre of Old Cairo — an exotic Arab world of bazaars and bargaining, fezzes and flowing robes.
Luxor
On the site of ancient Thebes lies the modern city of Luxor — some 325 miles “up” the Nile, south of Cairo. In 1800 B.C., unknown invaders overran the delta of Egypt, forcing the Pharaohs to relocate their capital city.
Thebes became the new centre, flourishing for centuries as the pride of Egypt's “Middle Kingdom”. Ambassadors from the farthest reaches of the then-known world came to marvel at the great temples of Karnak and Luxor, linked by a mile-long avenue of ram sphinxes.
Modern tourists are no less awed by the ruins of these grandiose structures. Across the river in the desert Valley of# the Kings are wonders even more abundant; the Colossi of Memnon, the decorated tombs of the Pharaohs dug into the rock walls of cliffs, and the unique, three-tiered funerary temple of Queen Hatshepsut.
[Produced for the 1967 Spring Cruise departing New York 05 May 1967]