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Memphis was the capital of Egypt founded
by Menes, the king who made the unity between the Upper Egypt
with the Lower Egypt, in 3100 BC. The city’s original name was
Ineb-Hedj, which means ‘the White Wall’; during the Middle
Kingdom the city`s name was Ankh-Tawy (That Which Binds the Two
Lands). Memphis is the Greek translation of the Men-nefer,
meaning ‘the good place’. At the beginning, Memphis area was
created as a fortress but the city became the religious and
administrative center of Egypt, as well as one of the ancient
world's most important cities. The god worshipped in Memphis was
a pagan one called Ptah, identified with Vulcan and Hephaistos.
Around Mit Rahina (a small village) can be seen the fractions of
Memphis which are in fact some ruins of the Ptah temple, a
temple that it is possible to had been a very large one. The
ruins were excavated from 1908 to 1913 and include a colossus of
Ramses II, made from red granite, and the Alabaster Sphinx. This
statue is made from one single alabaster piece, has 80 tones, it
is long of 24 feet and high of 13 feet. Although the city had
numerous gardens, palaces and temples, today only a few ruins
remained from the old city. There also some texts papyrus about
Memphis, found in different areas from Egypt which have details
about the city. It seems that the Egyptian old capital
disappeared because of the Muslim conquerors` invasion of the
city, in 641, when the capital was moved from Memphis to Fustat,
a part of Cairo. On the Saqqara plateau is the Memphis` ancient
necropolis that can be visited by public, as well as the
sculptures museum. The necropolis has pyramids, temples,
beautiful funerary monuments, rock tombs and adorned mastabas. |
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