MEMPHIS, an ancient city, and the royal resi-
dence of the kings in the Higher Egypt; distant from
the Delta to the south 15 miles, according to Pliny.
Called also Moph and Noph, in scripture.
Though this city is now so completely ruined, that
authors greatly disagree concerning its situation; yet
Strabo informs that in his time it was the most mag-
nificent in Egypt, next to Alexandria. It was called
the capital of the country; and there was an entire
temple of Osiris, where the Apis or sacred ox was
kept and worshipped. In the same place was an apart-
ment of the mother of the ox; a very magnificent
temple of Vulcan; a large Circus or space for fight-
ing bulls; and a great Colossus in the middle of the
city, which was thrown down. There was likewise a
temple of Venus, and a Serapium in a very sandy
place, where the wind heaps up hills of sand very dan-
gerous to travellers; together with a number of
Sphinxes, the heads of some of them only being vi-
sible, the others covered up to the middle of their
body. The same author likewise informs us, that in the
front of the city there were many lakes; and that it
contained a number of palaces, at that time in ruins.
These buildings, he said, formerly stood upon an emi-
nence: they lay along the side of the hill, stretching
down to the lakes and groves, 40 stadia from the city.
There was likewise a mountain in the neighbourhood,
on which were a great number of pyramids, with the
sepulchres of the kings, among which were three re-
markable, and two of them accounted wonders of the
world. From this description, Mr Bruce concludes
that the celebrated capital of Egypt stood in the place
where the villages of Metrahenny are now situated; in
opposition to Dr Shaw's opinion, who thinks it was
situated at Geeza or Gifa.
Mr Savary has also shown, that Gifa was not the si-
tuation of the ancient Memphis. This flood, he says,
on the western bank of the Nile, on the spot where
the village of Memph now stands, which still preserves
the name. Large heaps of rubbish are still to be seen
there; but the Arabs have transposed to Cairo the
columns and remarkable stones, which they have dis-
posed, without taste and without order, in their
mosques and public buildings. This city extended as
far as Saccara; and was almost wholly encompassed by
lakes, part of which are still subsisting. It was ne-
cessary to cross them to convey the dead to the se-
pulchre of their fathers. The tombs, hewn out of
the rock, were closed up with stones of a proportion-
able size, and covered with sand. These bodies, em-
balmed with so much care, preserved with so much
respect, are torn from the monuments they repose in,
and sold without decency to strangers by the inhabi-
tants of Saccara. This place is called the plain of mam-
mels. There too we find the well of the birds, into
which one descends by means of a rope. It leads to
subterraneous galleries, filled with earthen vases, con-
taining the sacred birds. They are rarely met with en-
tire, because the Arabs break them in hopes of find-
ing idols of gold. They do not conduct travellers in-
to the places where they have found more precious ar-
ticles. They even close them up carefully, reserving
to themselves some secret passages by which they de-
scend. In a journey into Egypt made by the duke
de Chaulnes, he advanced very far into these winding
labyrinths, sometimes crawling, and sometimes scram-
bling, on his knees. Informed by Mr Edward Wort-
ley Montague, who has carefully visited Egypt, he ar-
rived at one of those passages which had an opening
shut up from without by branches of the date-tree in-
terwoven, and covered with sand. He remarked there
some hieroglyphics in relief, executed in the highest
perfection. But the Arabs resisted every offer he made
them to permit him to take drawings of them, or to
mold them, in order to preserve their form. The duke
de Chaulnes is of opinion that these hieroglyphics,
sculptured with so much art that the objects they re-
present may be discovered at the first sight, might pos-
sibly furnish the key of the others, whose contours are
simply expressed, and form a sort of alphabet of this
unintelligible language. Several pyramids are distin-
guishable
Menage || Menander. Menander guishable along the mountains which bound Saccara on the west, the greatest part of which appear as lofty as those of Gisa. See PYRAMIDS.