Imatges de pàgina
PDF
EPUB

TRANSLATED FROM THE

GREEK,

WITH NOTES,

BY THE REV. WILLIAM BELOE.

IN FOUR VOLUMES.

VOL. II.

THE THIRD EDITION.

LONDON:

Printed by Luke Hansard & Sons, near Lincoln's-Inn Fields; for

LEIGH AND SOTHEBY; J. WALKER; R. LEA; J. NUNN;

J. CUTHELL; LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME,

& BROWN;

AND J. FAULDER.

KF23272 14449215

HARVARD UNIVERSITY LIBRARY OCT 1 1940

11. Sayles

BOOK II.

EUTERPE

CONTINUED.

CHAP. II.

HE name of Sesostris 179, who lived after these

THE

monarchs, claims our attention. According to the priests, he was the first who, passing the Arabian gulf in a fleet of long vessels, reduced under his authority the inhabitants bordering on the Erythrean

179 Sesostris.]-See Bouhier's Chronological Account of the Kings of Egypt from Maris to Cambyses, according to which Maris died in the year of the world 3360, and was succeeded by Sesostris in 3361.

- Diodorus Siculus makes this prince posterior to Maris by seven generations; but, as Larcher justly observes, this writer cannot be entitled to an equal degree of credit with Herodotus. Sesostris has been differently named: Tacitus calls him Rhampses; Scaliger, both Rhamesses and Ægyptus. He is named Sesostris in Diodorus Siculus; Sesosis in Pliny, &c.-T.

[blocks in formation]

Erythrean Sea. He proceeded yet farther, till he came to a sea, which on account of the number of shoals was not navigable. On his return to Ægypt, as I learned from the same authority, he levied a mighty army, and made a martial progress by land, subduing all the nations whom he met with on his march. Whenever he was opposed by a people who proved themselves brave, and who discovered an ardour for liberty, he erected columns in their country, upon which he inscribed his own name, and that of his nation, and how he had here conquered by the force of his arms; but where he met with little or no opposition, upon similar columns 180 which he erected, he added the private parts of a woman, expressive of the pusillanimity of the people.

CIII. Continuing his progress, he passed over from Asia to Europe*, and subdued the countries of

180 Upon similar columns, &c.]-Diodorus Siculus relates the same facts, with this addition, that upon the columns intended to commemorate the bravery of the vanquished, Sesostris added the private parts of a man.-T.

Nous ignorons si les Hermès caracterisés par la nature feminine, et erigés par Sesostris dans les pays qu'il avoit conquis sans resistance, avoient été figurés de la même manière; ou si, pour indiquer le sexe, ils avoient un triangle, par lequel les Ægyptiens avoient coûtume de le désigner.— Winkelmann.

* Grobert, above cited, thinks that Sesostris must undoubtedly have vanquished Italy. Any one, says he, that

will

of Scythia and Thrace 18. Here I believe he stopped *, for monuments of his victory are dis-. covered thus far, but no farther. On his return, he came to the river Phasis; but I am by no means certain whether he left 18 a detachment of

his

will be at the trouble of comparing the physiognomy and manners of the people of Calabria with those of the Ægyptians, will easily believe this to have been the fact.

181 Thrace.]-According to another tradition preserved in Valerius Flaccus, the Getæ, the bravest and most upright of the Thracians, vanquished Sesostris; and it was doubtless to secure his retreat, that he left a detachment of his troops in Colchis.

[ocr errors]

Cunabula gentis

Colchidos hic ortusque tuens: ut prima Sesostris
Intulerit rex bella Getis: ut clade suorum

Territus, hos Thebas patriumque reducat ad amnem
Phasidis hos imponat agris, Colchosque vocari
Imperet.

Larcher.

Among the arguments adduced by Robertson against the probability that Sesostris conquered India, the following is much entitled to attention:

It is remarkable that Herodotus, who inquired with the most persevering diligence into the ancient history of Egypt, and who received all the information concerning it which the priests of Memphis, Heliopolis, and Thebes, could communicate, although he relates the history of Sesostris at some length, does not mention his conquest of India. That tale, it is probable, was invented in the period between the age of Herodotus and that of Diodorus Siculus, from whom we receive a particular detail of the Indian expedition of Sesostris. -Robertson on India, p. 336.

I have little scruple in avowing my belief that almost the whole of the story of Sesostris is fabulous.

182 Whether he left, &c.]—Pliny assures us, though I know not on what authority, that Sesostris was defeated by the Colchians.-Larcher.

« AnteriorContinua »