CHAPTER XI.
Thebes; its People, Temples, and Tombs—Close of the Nineteenth Dynasty.
In an inscription on the walls of the rock-temple
at Abu-simbel, Rameses is represented
as saying to the god Ptah, 'I have cared for
the land to create for thee a new Egypt, such
as it existed in the olden times,' and he specially
mentions the splendid sanctuary he had
built for that deity in Memphis. And not at
Memphis alone, but everywhere throughout the
land, from the city of Rameses in the north
to the wonderful rock-temples of the south,
we can see the magnificent traces left by the
hand of this mighty sovereign. In Thebes
itself, he added a grand court to the temple of
Luxor founded by Amenhotep III. of the preceding
dynasty. This temple was connected
by an avenue of sphinxes with the still more
magnificent 'great Temple of Amen,' the
