Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1919-11-13
pierced stone grating or clere-story
remains of which may be still seen."
Grandeur In Its Columns

remains of which may be still seen."
Grandeur In Its Columns
The grandeur of the great hall
lies in its wonderful columns. Even
to-day, mass of broken bits, they
glow with decorative color and awe
py the suggestion of their immen-
slty. Twelve of them, colored and
shaped after the form of a budding
lotus, formed the central avenue and
reached a height of SIS feet. They
had diameter of eleven feet, a cir
cumference of 33, and one hundred
men could stand together on the
enormous surface of each bud or
bell-shaped capital.
The great hall has its legends,
too. One, that recalls Irving's Head
less Horseman, clusters about the
monumental doorway Of the south
which closes the Avenue of Rams
and leads to the Temple of Khon-
son. At this place a dwarf, with a
big head and crooked legs and wear
ing a formidable beard, is supposed
to walk about in the mists of the
evening, but takes to the air IN the
surrounding places.
Seti l was not the first builder of
the Temple Of Karnak; he was one
of many restorers of the building,
which came into existence eleven
hundred years before his time and
was reared by Amenemhat 1 of the
Twelfth Dynasty. During the reign
of the Hyksos kings the temple met
with disaster and for centuries was
left uncared for. In the Eighteenth
Dynasty Thothmes III reared new
| doors and towers, and his son,
! Amenhotep II, had inscribed the
walls and the southern gate.
The inscriptions found on the
walls of the Temple of Karnak, es-
pecially the great hall, constitute
one of its charms as we'll as being
the source of great historical and
artistic interest. Many of these de-
| scribe incidents in the life of it's two
great builders. Rameses II and his
| father, Seti I. One gives the text of
peace treaty, possibly the first of
, its kind in the world, which was
\ made by Rameses II with the
Hittites in the twenty-first year of
his reign. 1t testifies to his hu-
manity and diplomacy, as do his
monuments to his love Of art and
tho immense wealth of his kingdom.
Another is a prayer of Rameses II
| to his father:
Awake, raise thy face to
| heaven, behold the son, my
| father. Seti, thou who art like
god. Thou restest in the
deep like Osiris, while I rule,
like Ra, among men. Thou
hast entered the realm Of
| heaven. Thou art joined to the
sun and moon. When the sun
| rises thine eyes behold his
| splendor; when it sinks in the
earth thou art in it's train. But
| I obtain by prayer the breath of
| life at thy waking thou glorious
one. praise thy numberless
names day by day, who love my
father. I will be guided by thy
| virtue. Come. speak to the
| great. sun god Ra, for me, that
! he may grant me length of
days. My heart beats for thee,
and so long as 1 live will be
| guard of the honor of thy name.
| A Triumph of Art
Rameses II had his prayer grant
ed, for he lived to be more than 100
and built wonderful temples and
I buildings that were not only The
| glory of his own reign, but of all
those that followed. AS long as art
lives the name of the Pharaoh
Rameses II will shed its glory upon
it. His tomb at Thebes, the Ea-
1 messeum which he built, holds, ac-
cording to Robert Kitchens, first
place among the monuments OF
Egyptian art for both dignity and
beauty of mass and detail" The
great hall which he completed in
memory of his father Is considered
by Breasted "the greatest colonnaded
hall ever erected in the history oi
architecture"
mo words" he continues, "car
convey the sense of imposing. evei
| overwhelming majesty that over.
comes the beholder, who follows fol-
the first time the forms of these
soaring giants as they rise agains
the bright Egyptian sky. looking
down through the vast and roofiesi
architraves."
Color, decorative, color, glorifiet
i the great buildings of Egypt; 4
warmed those of classic Greece. an(
made Italy and the Orient the rem
devious of the painter-the mai
who loves tho suns paint spots ant
J splashes them on canvas and OF
. buildings. 1t sang at San Francisco
. because Jules Guerin had beeI
stepped In the beauties of Old Worl'