A Collection of Curious Travels and Voyages, Volume 2 · Observations 2 · Section 4 – Section 5
A Deſcription of the third Pyramid, out of Mr. Belon and Greaves.
AMongſt many modern Writers, none deſerves to be placed before Bellonius, or rather before P. Gillius. For Thuanus makes the other to have been a plagiarius, and to have publiſhed in his own name the obſervations of P. Gillius, a man very curious, and inquiſitive after Truth, as appears by his Typography of Conſtantinople, and his Boſphorus Thracius, to whom Bellonius ſerved as an Amanuenſis: The third Pyramid is much leſs than the former two, but is a third part greater than that which is at Rome, near the Mons teitaceus, as you paſs to St. Pauls in the Oſtian way. It is ſtill perfect, and no more corrupted, than as if it had been newly built: For it is made of a kind of Marble, called Baſaltes, or Aethiopick Marble, harder than Iron it ſelf.
It will be in vain to repeat the Traditions and Deſcriptions of ſeveral others; all which by a kind of Confederacy agree in the ſame Tale for the ſubſtance, only differing in ſome circumſtances: So that I ſhrewdly ſuſpect that Diodorus hath borrowed moſt of his Relation from Herodotus; and Strabo and Pliny from Diodorus, or from them both; and the more learned Neotericks from them all. For elſe how can it be imagined they ſhould ſo conſtantly agree in that, which if my Eyes and Memory extreamly fail me not, is moſt evidently falſe? And therefore I have a ſtrong jealouſie, that they never came near this third Pyramid; but that they did, as I have obſerved all Travellers in my time in Aegypt to do, fill themſelves ſo full, and as it were ſo ſurfeit with the ſight of the greater and fairer Pyramid, that they had no Appetite to be Spectators of the reſt, where they ſhould only ſee the ſame Miracle (for the Pyramids are all of the ſame figure) the farther they went, decreaſing, and preſented as it were in a leſs Volume. Or if they did view this, it was quaſi per tranſennam, very perfunctorily and ſlightly; and that through a falſe and coloured Glaſs; for they have miſtaken both in the quality of the Stone and colour of the Pyramid. I begin with Herodotus, who by a notable piece of Forgetfulneſs, if it be not a foreign in the Copies, makes the dimenſions of each of the ſides, in the Baſis of this, to be three hundred feet, and yet want but twenty of the firſt Pyramid, to which he aſſigned before eight hundred feet; an Impoſſibility in Arithmetick; and therefore it will be no Preſumption to correct the place, and inſtead of foreign, to write foreign. I know not how to palliate or excuſe his other Error, where he makes this Pyramid to be built as far as to the middle of it, with Aethiopick Marble. If this ſort of Marble be ferrei coloris, as it is deſcribed by Pliny, and granted by Diodorus and Strabo, both of them expreſſing the colour to be black, and the latter bringing it from the remoteſt Mountains of Aethiopia, where the Marble hath the ſame Tincture and Colour with the Inhabitants, then can this relation of Herodotus no way be admitted; for the whole Pyramid ſeems to be of clear and white Stone, ſomewhat choicer and brighter than that in either of the two other Pyramids. And therefore I wonder that Diodorus, Strabo, and Pliny, and amongſt latter Authors Bellonius, Gillius, and ſeveral others, ſhould have all follow'd Herodotus, when with a little pains and circumſpection, they might have reformed his, and their own errour. It may perhaps be alledged in their defence, that they mean the Buildings within are erected with black and Aethiopick Marble; and yet if this be granted, ſince there is no entrance leading into this, no more than is into the ſecond Pyramid, what may be within depends upon the uncertainty of Tradition or Conjecture, both which are very fallible; though it cannot be denied, but that cloſe by this, on the Eaſt ſide of it, there are the ruines of a Pile of Building, with a ſad and dusky colour, much like that we deſcribed in paſſing to the ſecond Pyramid, which might be the ground and occaſion of this Error. I cannot excuſe the Ancients, but Bellonius or Gillius (for it is no matter which of them owns the relation, when both of them have erred) are far more inexcuſable, becauſe it might have been expected from them what Livy ſuppoſes, Novi ſemper ſcriptores, aut in rebus certius aliquid allaturos ſe, aut ſcribendi arte rudem vetuſtatem ſuperaturos credunt. Whereas theſe on the contrary have depraved what hath been in this particular with Truth delivered by the Ancients; for whereas Herodotus and Diodorus equal the ſide of the baſis to three hundred feet, and Pliny extends it to three hundred ſixty three, theſe make it only a third part greater than the Pyramid at Rome of C. Caeſtius, near the Mons teſtaceus. So that either they have much enlarged that at Rome, or ſhrunk and contracted this; for the Pyramid at Rome, exactly meaſured on that ſide which ſtands within the City, is compleatly ſeventy eight feet Engliſh in breadth, to which if we add a third part of it, the reſult will be an hundred and four; which ſhould be equal to this Aegyptian Pyramid in the notion and acception of Bellonius.
Of the reſt of the Pyramids in the Lybian Deſart.
I Have done with theſe three Pyramids, each of them being very remarkable, and the two firſt reckoned amongſt the Miracles of the World. The reſt in the Lybian Deſart lying ſcattered here and there, are (excepting one of them) but leſſer Copies, and as it were Models of theſe: And therefore I ſhall neither much trouble my ſelf nor the Reader with the deſcription of them. Though to ſpeak the truth, did not the three firſt, ſtanding ſo near together, obſcure the luſtre of the reſt, which lye far ſcattered, ſome of them were very conſiderable. And therefore I cannot but tax the omiſſion of the Ancients, and the inadvertency of all modern Writers and Travellers, who with too much ſupineneſs have neglected the deſcription of one of them; which in my Judgment is as worthy of memory, and as near a Miracle as any of thoſe three which I have mentioned. And this ſtands from theſe South and by Weſt, at twenty miles diſtance, more within the Sandy Deſart, upon a rocky level like theſe, and not far from the Village whence we enter the Mummies. This as the Venetian Doctor aſſured me, and as I could judge by conjecture at a diſtance, hath the ſame dimenſions that the firſt and faireſt of theſe hath, Graduations or Aſſents without, and of the ſame colour like that, (but more decayed, eſpecially at the top) and an entrance into it on the North ſide, which is barred up within; and therefore whatſoever is ſpoken of the firſt, in reſpect of the exteriour figure, is applicable to this. Bellonius exceeds in his computation of the number of them, who thus writes: Above an hundred others are ſeen diſperſed up and down in that Plain. I could not diſcover 20. And long ſince Ion Almatoug in his Book of the Miracles of Aegypt, reckons them to be but 18: There are in the Weſt ſide no more famous buildings than the Pyramids, the number of them is 18; of theſe there are three in that part which is oppoſite to Foſtat (or Cairo.)