The Citadel, Cairo, Egypt.

The Citadel, Cairo, Egypt

Continuing my obsession with "then & now's" I have done a series on Islamic Cairo,

for example below the Citadel. First comparing a view from the Description d"Egypt of 1794 with the same view in 2010. On the left is the Mosque of Qani Bay As-Sayfi, the centre the Bab Al-Azab and to the right, partially obscured by a tree is the Mosque of Mohammad Ali which was built between 1832-57.

The second is the  famous David Roberts print compared to photographs taken in 1983 and 2010.

David Roberts 1843, to the left is the Mosque of Qani Bay As-Sayfi [1503] in the centre the Mosque of Mahmud Pasha, [1568], and to the left the gates to the Citadel, built in 1754, the Ottoman style minaret behind is the Mosque of Ahmad al-Katkhuda al-Azab [1697]

1983, how little has changed!

2010

Twenty seven years later, note the "greening"


The third comparison, from a slightly different viewpoint, is between a 19 th. century German photograph, a early 20th. century postcard and today.

Postcard

German Photograph

The Obelisks of the Temple of Luxor

The Obelisks of the Temple of Luxor, Egypt.


The additions by Rameses II to the Temple of Luxor included the First Pylon and Great Court at the northern end of the temple. In front of this Pylon he erected two red granite obelisks with two seated statues of himself. However in 1833 the French obtained permission to remove both, in fact they just took one, and put it in the centre of the Place de la Concorde in Paris. According to Kent Weeks in his book "The Illustrated Guide to Luxor", "the story is told that Josephine bade farewell to Napoleon with the words; "While in Egypt if you go to Thebes, do send me a little obelisk".

The print by David Roberts, drawn some 5 years after the removal of the right hand obelisk

The obelisk today in the Place de la Concorde, Paris

Gustave Flaubert noted in his Travel Notebooks 1850 "how bored it must be in the Place de la Concorde, perched on its pedestal. How it must miss the Nile". Quoted by Paul William Roberts in the anthology "Egypt Through Writers Eyes" edited by deborah Manley & Saher Abdel-Hakim and published by Eland, London

Incidentally the obelisks in London and New York both came from Alexandria, where they had been moved by Cleopatra from Heliopolis, more about this later, inshallah! 

The first Pylon and Obelisk, Luxor, December 2011

An interesting book regarding "where are they now" is "The Rape of the Nile, Tomb Robbers, Tourists, and Archeologists in Egypt" by Brian M. Fagan, published by Charles Scribners' Sons, New York 1975.

Luxor, Egypt. Then and Now

Further blogs from our visit to Egypt for Christmas, a three day trip to Luxor, staying at the charming Jolie Ville Hotel overlooking the Nile. This time "then and now's" with a literary connection and a hint of restitution an the end.


The Colossi of Memnon

The two huge statues of the Pharoah Amenhetep III [1390-1353 BC] were, I feel,  the inspiration for the first lines of the famous poem Ozymandias by Percy Bysse Shelley [1792-1822] The statues are all that is left of the Memorial Chapel of Amenhetep on the West Bank of the Nile at Luxor, previously Thebes.

"I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert....."

They were first illustrated by Frederick Norden in 1737, then, left, in Napoleon's Description d'Egypt in 1793

December 2011

The Ramesseum

To the right of the statues in the far distance can be seen the Ramesseum, the memorial chapel of Rameses II [1279-1213BC] where lies the inspiration for the next lines of Ozymandias, referring perhaps to the fallen bust to the right of the  standing Osirid figures.

".............Near them, on the sand

Half sunk, a shattered image lies, whose frown,

and wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,

Tell that the sculptor well those passion read

Which yet survive, stamped on those lifeless things,

Description d'Egypt, 1798

The Rameseum of El-Kurneh by Francis Frith 1857

David Roberts, 1837/38, with a certain exageration of the statue's features.

December 2011

Below a general view of the Ramesseum by Norden in 1737 with the fallen visage of Ramsess II on the right. The figure on the ground in the middle between the four Osirid statues could the the bust removed by Belzoni mentioned below.

Below the same view today, some 275 years later.

The Younger Memnon now in the British Museum

The upper part of the statue to the right below was carted off by Giovanni Belzoni from the Ramesseum in 1816 and sold to the British Museum were it has pride of place. He published a print showing this carting off titled "Removal of the Younger Memnon in 1816"

Looking carefully you can see how well it would fit, the pyramid shape in the middle of the in situ part perfectly fits the lower part of the bust in the BM, below.

 Should it, or at least a copy, be returned to the temple?   

The Vestibule Gallery with the lower section of the Statue of Rameses II

Close up

Upper section of the Statue of Rameses in the British Museum

The arrival of the statue in London and publication of Belzoni's activities, to much excitement, inspired Shelley's Ozymandias, a Greek rendering of one off Rameses II names; User-Ma'at-Ra. Whether it was this statue or the fallen visage still remaining in the temple, and illustrated above, is a moot point.

The poem continues ;

Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed.
And on that pedestal these words appear
"My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!.
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.   


In his excellent book "The Illustrated Guide to Luxor" Kent R. Weeks states that " Seventeen centuries before Shelley, Diodorus Siculus had wrongly claimed to have seen an inscription on the fallen statue that read:" I am Ozymandias, King of Kings; if any would know how great I am, and where I lie, let him excel in any of my works".

The Old American Cars of Cairo

The streets of Cairo have a surprising selection of period American cars, preserved by the dry climate and total lack of parking controls. The marvellous pink Cadillac still works, so my step son tells me. He has seen it parked in different places, while the others haven't moved for years. Most of the cars have lost their insignia so any identification would be appreciated. Happy New Year!