Renaissance Website. Click here to complete your worksheet today.
|
Is this Alexander's tomb?!It now appears likely that Ptolemy adapted a vacant tomb that had been prepared by and for the last native Pharaoh of Egypt, Nectanebo II. However, this Pharaoh had fled south to Ethiopia, when Egypt had been invaded by the Persians in 343BC, so he never had the opportunity to occupy his tomb. The site of the prospective tomb was a chapel within the temple complex of the Serapeum in the cemetery area of ancient Memphis at Saqqara. It lay at the end of a mile-long avenue of sphinxes. The Serapeum complex was rediscovered by Auguste Mariette in 1850-1851 by excavating the sands away from the sphinxes one by one. Guarding the entrance to the chapel of Nectanebo II, Mariette discovered an incongruous semicircle of life-size Greek statues of poets and philosophers, which appear to date to the time of Ptolemy. Some of them can be identified, including Pindar, whose house and descendants Alexander had saved at Thebes, Homer, who was Alexander's favourite poet, and Plato, who had been the mentor of Alexander's tutor, Aristotle. Could these statues have been erected to honour Alexander's tomb?
Ms. NobleWorld History, Hedrick Middle School, Medford, Oregon Categories
|