Reply #3: Thanks! The comments are priceless. Seriesly!

[onager]

Anonymous said...

Not Egyptian

Atlantean

Learn!

May 20, 2008 1:35 PM
Anonymous said...
Indeed ,I'm with ya...;Atlantean probably.....maybe Mongol or Olmec,numerous civilisations have reached space ....400 000 000 years of civilisation on Planet Earth,i've learned.....Greetings to the best of Mankind.....LOVE and LIGHT

May 20, 2008 3:09 PM
Anonymous said...
OBVIOUSLY TOLTEC...THEY USED "BEAM ME UP" TECHNOLOGY TO BUILD THEIR SKYSCRAPERS.

As usual, I don't have enough of these little guys...

:rofl:

Well, being in Egypt, I naturally have to spout off about this. The "statue" in that photo looks oddly familiar, and I suspect a Photoshop-chop.

It looks a lot like the huge statue of Ramses II that was just moved fairly recently, from in front of the Cairo train station where it had sat for many years.

The term "Egyptian statue" covers a lot of territory. Naturally the Egyptians just spent tons of money and time carving random big-ass statues. Insert your preferred sarcasm smiley here.

That's just my dumbass way of staying there's no such thing as an "Egyptian statue" out of context. But you knew that.

Usual irrelevant tourist notes: one of my favorite statues is a great big 'un sitting in front of the rebuilt Alexandria Library. It's an Egyptian statue of a Greek (ok, Macedonian) ruler, I think Ptolemy III. I'm impressed because it's a "warts and all" kind of statue. Mr. Ptolemy is noticably chubby (as all the Ptolemies tended to be). He completely lacks the idealized musclature etc. of most Greek "heroic" statues, and certainly of rulers.

Oh, a Greek statue. That reminds me of one other minor point, which I'm sure all you have thought of. If the Egyptians could move a statue to Mars, why were they so frequently conquered? Leaving aside the mysterious Hyksos conquest, why did the tech-savvy Egyptians allow themselves to be ruled by foreigners FOR 2500 FRIGGING YEARS?

Sorry for shouting, but you can look that up. Circa 332 BCE, Alexander The Great cut a deal with the last Pharoah, Nectanebo II. And Nectanebo would be the last Egyptian ruler of Egypt until Gamel Abdel Nasser took over--after the 1952 Revolution.

The Ptolemies eventually called themselves "Pharoah," but for that we can thank the usual suspects--Egypt's professional priesthood, who brown-nosed the Macedonians to protect their own unearned hereditary privileges. The High Priest Maneletho insisted that Ptolemy I be invested as Pharoah, which Ptolemy eventually did after 8 or 10 years of pretending that he was just taking care of Egypt for Alexander The Great's heir. Cough...

Bonus Irrelevant Rant: it was Ptolemy I who decided Egypt needed a new religion, so he invented a god named Serapis.

According to one local legend here in Alexandria, NOBODY worshipped Serapis at first. Everybody knew it was a con job. The Egyptians had their fun traditional gods, and so did the Macedonians. The un-fun god was represented by Alexandria's large Jewish community, but nobody paid him much attention. The philosophers at the Library/Mouseion took an occasional swipe at him, forcing his apologists like Philo Of Alexandria to cobble up weak defenses out of leftover Platonic BS. The Mediating Logos! WTF?

And then--a miracle! Demetrius of Phaleron popped up in Alexandria, in need of a job. He was a tyrant who had been run out of Athens about one step ahead of a lynch mob, at least according to my historical sources. Ptolemy I put him in charge of organizing the Alexandria Library.

Demetrius was a student of Aristotle and obviously a very keen student of human nature. The poor fellow was suddenly struck blind, but was miraculously HEALED after spending one night in Alexandria's heretofore empty and ignored Temple Of Serapis.

That did the trick. A few years later, Serapis was being worshipped all around the Mediterranean.

End rant. It's my weekend and I've just been reminded I need a drink. Or 5.