Conquest of Egypt.
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way.[1] Alexander introduced a garrison into Pelusium, and ordering the men in the ships to sail up the river as far as the city of Memphis,[2] he went in person towards Heliopolis,[3] having the river Nile[4] on his right. He reached that city through the desert, after getting possession of all the places on the march through the voluntary surrender of the inhabitants. Thence he
- ↑ Curtius (iv. 29) says that Mazaces surrendered to Alexander treasure to the amount of 800 talents, nearly £200,000.
- ↑ Memphis, the capital of Egypt, is called in the Hebrew Bible, Noph. In Hosea ix. 6 it is called Moph. The Egyptian name was Mӗnoph, of which both Moph and Noph are contractions. The name signifies place of Ftah, the Egyptian name for Vulcan. Memphis stood on the west bank of the Nile, and is said by Herodotus (ii. 99) to have been founded by Menes. It had a circumference of fifteen miles. Its numerous temples were famous and are mentioned in the poems of Martial, Ovid, and Tibullus. It never recovered the devastation committed by Cambyses, who was exasperated by its resistance. The rise of Alexandria as the capital under the Ptolemies, hastened the decline of Memphis. At Gizeh, near Memphis, are the three great pyramids, being of the height respectively of 460, 446, and 203 feet. Not far off are six smaller ones. Near the second pyramid is the Sphinx, cut out of the solid rook, which was probably an object of worship. Cf. Apollodorus, ii. 4.
- ↑ Heliopolis is known in Hebrew as On, which is an Egyptian word meaning Sun. It is mentioned in Gen. xli. 45, 50; xlvi. 20. In Ezek. XXX. 17, it is called Aven, which is the same word in Hebrew as On, with a variation of the vowels. In Jer. xliii. 13 it is called Beith-Shemesh, which in Hebrew means House of the Sun, a translation of the Egyptian name. The Greeks called it Heliopolis, City of the Sun. The great temple of the Sun and its priesthood are described by Herodotus and Strabo. There are still remaining a beautiful obelisk of red granite nearly 70 feet high, and the brick wall of the temple 3,750 feet long by 2,370 feet broad. Cf. Apollodorus, ii. 4.
- ↑ The word Nile never occurs in the Hebrew Bible; but that river is called Yeor (river). In Amos viii. 8 it is called Yeor Mitsraim, the river of Egypt; but it is usually called simply Yeor, the river. In Isa. xxiii. 3 the corn of Egypt is called the harvest of Yeor, or the Nile. In like manner Avon, Ganges, Rhine, mean river. The Greek name Neilos, or Nile, means a bed with a stream, and was originally applied to the land of Egypt, as the valley of the Nile. It rises in the lake Victoria Nyanza, and has a course of 3,300 miles. In Isa. xxiii. 3 and Jer. ii. 18 the Nile is called Shichor (turbid). In Homer (Odys., iv. 477, etc.) the river is called Egypt as well as the country. Cf. Ammianus, xxii. 15.
