Tour the Castle's Top Floor After its First Fifty Years

This ancient curiosity was presented to the National Museum by Sir Richard Wood, British consul general at Tunis, at the instance of Hon. G. P. Heap, United States consul. The mosaic lion has quite a history. The law of Tunis prohibits the removal or sale of any of the national statuary without first obtaining the consent of the government. The Arabs, who formerly derived much profit from the sale of such articles, did so in a secret manner. One night during Sir Richard Wood's residence there, in 1873, an Arab chief came to him and said that for a certain compensation he would bring him something of great value. The consul general agreed to the chief's proposition, and the latter said that he would bring him one of the finest mosaics in Africa. On the next night the chief appeared accompanied by a number of men who bore upon their shoulders the mosaic lion which can now be seen at the National Museum. The image is seven feet square, and on the different sides are represented wild beasts of several varieties. This image was stolen from the temple of Astarte, erected in Carthage by the Romans. But a small portion of this temple now remains. The image was taken from the floor of the temple by the Arabs, who, in their greedy haste, disfigured it in such a manner that it was necessary to have certain portions remade by the artisans at the Museum. The lion is probably the most ancient mosaic in this country, supposed to be two thousand years old, and is valued at $25,000.

Egyptian Deities, Osiris and Isis.

Osiris is represented in Egypt in two characters, either as a mummy with a cap, in which he is called Omnophris, the " Revealer of Good," and corresponds to Bacchus; or as a man, green colored, wearing a conical cap with green feathers, in which character he is called Pethempamentes, the "Dweller in Lades," and corresponds to Pluto. Isis, the wife of' Osiris, "a female with a crown on her Plead," corresponds to Ceres or Proserpine. Osiris and Isis were, according to Herodotus, the only gods worshipped over the whole country. The originals of these casts of dark green basalt are in the Museum of Boulak.

Marble Sphinx, from Cairo, Egypt.

The idea of the Sphinx as an object of art seems to have been that of a combination of animal forms not found in nature, for the purpose of impressing the mind with mysterious terror, mingled with a feeling of repose. There were six different kinds of' Sphinxes in Egypt. They were usually placed in pairs at the entrance to temples, but sometimes great numbers were arranged in long avenues.

The Tanis Stone.

One of the most interesting articles in this department is the cast of the Tanis stone, on which is a trilingual inscription obtained from some excavations made at Tanis, on the eastern or Pelusiac branch of the Nile, and belonging to the Museum of Egyptian Antiquities at Cairo. The original in the Museum of Boulak-a decree of Canopus in Hieroglyphic, Demotic, and Greek-is a block six feet high, two and a half feet broad, and a foot thick, with the top arched. One side is occupied partly by hieroglyphic inscriptions, together with a Greek translation of the same, while a portion of the left side is occupied with an equivalent inscription in the Demotic character. This stone occupies a position in Egyptology similar to that of the " Rosetta stone," except that it is much more perfect, and will probably aid much in deciphering the hieroglyphics.

Return to start of the Top Floor of the Castle's Main Hall in 1886