And The Name Of The Woman Who Reigned Was The Same As
That Of The Babylonian Queen, Namely Nitocris.
Of her they said that
desiring to take vengeance for her brother, whom the Egyptians had
slain when he was their king and then, after having slain him, had
given his kingdom to her, - desiring, I say, to take vengeance for him,
she destroyed by craft many of the Egyptians.
For she caused to be
constructed a very large chamber under ground, and making as though
she would handsel it but in her mind devising other things, she
invited those of the Egyptians whom she knew to have had most part in
the murder, and gave a great banquet. Then while they were feasting,
she let in the river upon them by a secret conduit of large size. Of
her they told no more than this, except that, when this had been
accomplished, she threw herself into a room full of embers, in order
that she might escape vengeance. As for the other kings, they could
tell me of no great works which had been produced by them, and they
said that they had no renown except only the last of them, Moiris: he
(they said) produced as a memorial of himself the gateway of the
temple of Hephaistos which is turned towards the North Wind, and dug a
lake, about which I shall set forth afterwards how many furlongs of
circuit it has, and in it built pyramids of the size which I shall
mention at the same time when I speak of the lake itself. He, they
said, produced these works, but of the rest none produced any.
Therefore passing these by I will make mention of the king who came
after these, whose name is Sesostris. He (the priests said) first of
all set out with ships of war from the Arabian gulf and subdued those
who dwelt by the shores of the Erythraian Sea, until as he sailed he
came to a sea which could no further be navigated by reason of shoals:
then secondly, after he had returned to Egypt, according to the report
of the priests he took a great army and marched over the continent,
subduing every nation which stood in his way: and those of them whom
he found valiant and fighting desperately for their freedom, in their
lands he set up pillars which told by inscriptions his own name and
the name of his country, and how he had subdued them by his power; but
as to those of whose cities he obtained possession without fighting or
with ease, on their pillars he inscribed words after the same tenor as
he did for the nations which had shown themselves courageous, and in
addition he drew upon them the hidden parts of a woman, desiring to
signify by this that the people were cowards and effeminate. Thus
doing he traversed the continent, until at last he passed over to
Europe from Asia and subdued the Scythians and also the Thracians.
These, I am of opinion, were the furthest people to which the Egyptian
army came, for in their country the pillars are found to have been set
up, but in the land beyond this they are no longer found. From this
point he turned and began to go back; and when he came to the river
Phasis, what happened then I cannot say for certain, whether the king
Sesostris himself divided off a certain portion of his army and left
the men there as settlers in the land, or whether some of his soldiers
were wearied by his distant marches and remained by the river Phasis.
For the people of Colchis are evidently Egyptian, and this I perceived
for myself before I heard it from others. So when I had come to
consider the matter I asked them both; and the Colchians had
remembrance of the Egyptians more than the Egyptians of the Colchians;
but the Egyptians said they believed that the Colchians were a portion
of the army of Sesostris. That this was so I conjectured myself not
only because they are dark-skinned and have curly hair (this of itself
amounts to nothing, for there are other races which are so), but also
still more because the Colchians, Egyptians, and Ethiopians alone of
all the races of men have practised circumcision from the first. The
Phenicians and the Syrians who dwell in Palestine confess themselves
that they have learnt it from the Egyptians, and the Syrians about the
river Thermodon and the river Parthenios, and the Macronians, who are
their neighbors, say that they have learnt it lately from the
Colchians. These are the only races of men who practise circumcision,
and these evidently practise it in the same manner as the Egyptians.
Of the Egyptians themselves however and the Ethiopians, I am not able
to say which learnt from the other, for undoubtedly it is a most
ancient custom; but that the other nations learnt it by intercourse
with the Egyptians, this among others is to me a strong proof, namely
that those of the Phenicians who have intercourse with Hellas cease to
follow the example of the Egyptians in this matter, and do not
circumcise their children. Now let me tell another thing about the
Colchians to show how they resemble the Egyptians: - they alone work
flax in the same fashion as the Egyptians, and the two nations are
like one another in their whole manner of living and also in their
language: now the linen of Colchis is called by the Hellenes Sardonic,
whereas that from Egypt is called Egyptian. The pillars which
Sesostris king of Egypt set up in the various countries are for the
most part no longer to be seen extant; but in Syria Palestine I myself
saw them existing with the inscription upon them which I have
mentioned and the emblem. Moreover in Ionia there are two figures of
this man carved upon rocks, one on the road by which one goes from the
land of Ephesos to Phocaia, and the other on the road from Sardis to
Smyrna.
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