NOTES AND REFERENCES
- Obelisk literature is voluminous. Unless otherwise stated, information on obelisks still in Egypt is drawn from Habachi (the most accessible modern study, though there is still much value in older works such as Gorringe), and on those outside from Iversen, the leading study. But the dimensions and weights given in the various sources often differ widely; I have adopted those that seem the most authoritative. W. Krebs, "Das Gewicht der Obelisken in Rom", Das Altertum, Vol. 13 (1967), pp. 205–13, provides the only critical estimates, and only for the four major obelisks in Rome.
- Habachi, p. 71; Pliny, Natural History, 36.74; Herodotus, 2.111; Diodorus Siculus, 1.57.5; Pliny, 36.65. The figures given assume that the Royal cubit was used, which is certainly true of the first reference and very probably for the others. If it was the Greek cubit, the largest obelisk would be 212.4 ft; if the Roman, 203.7 ft.
- R. Engelbach, The Problem of the Obelisks (Fisher Unwin, London, 1923), p. 18.
- On its move in AD 11–12 the prefect M. Magius Maximus cut off the apex, intending to replace it with a gilt finial, which he never did (Pliny, 36.67-9). Again the Royal cubit is the likely measure; if it was the Roman cubit the height would be 116.4 ft.
- P. M. Fraser, Ptolemaic Alexandria (Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1972, Vol. 2, pp. 73–4. The inscription on the base of Pompey's Pillar, long a source of argument, has been definitively read by C. Vandersleyen, Chronologie des prefers d'Egypte de 284 a 395 (Collection Latomus, Vol. LV, Brussels, 1962), p. 66 as recording its erection under Diocletian by the prefect Publius in probably 298.
- Ammianus, 16.10.17; 17.4.1, 12–16; he says Constantine intended it for Rome, but the inscription on the pedestal (CIL, VI. i, no. 1163) is clear that he intended it for 'the city of his name', i.e. Constantinople. The same inscription strongly implies that it reached Rome before the revolt of Magnentius in 350.
- Julian, Epistolae, 48. The tenth-century Patria Constantinopoleos (T. Preger, Scriptores Originum Constanti-nopolitanorum (Teubner, Leipzig, 1907), Vol. 2, p. 183) says of the Strategium: 'The monolith standing there was a fragment of that standing in the Hippodrome; it was brought from Athens by the Patrician Proclus in the time of the younger Theodosius'. Proclus (or Proculus) was in fact prefect of the city under the elder Theodosius, being executed in 392, and his part in erecting the obelisk is commemorated by the inscription on its pedestal (CIL, 111.1, no. 737). The date of erection is given by Marcellinus Comes, Chronicon (ed. T. Mommsen, Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Auctores Antiquissimi (Weidmann, Berlin, 1894), Vol. XI, p. 62 line 24) under the year 390. The fragment was already in the Strategium by the first half of the fifth century: Notitia Urbis Constantinopolitanae vi.12, in O. Seeck, Notitia Dignitatum (Weidmann, Berlin, 1876). It may well be the same as that reported in the sixteenth century and known as the Priuli obelisk, and conceivably the same as the Graves obelisk recorded in the eighteenth century: see Iversen, Vol. 2, pp. 35–8. The Hippodrome obelisk still has a companion on the spina of the circus. This was put up before the tenth century, and as two are shown on a relief on the south-west of the pedestal of the Hippodrome obelisk it probably also dated to the reign of Theodosius I. But it is built up, not a monolith, and is therefore irrelevant to us.
- An inscription recording this first erection under the prefect C. Cornelius Gallus was formerly on the obelisk shaft: F. Magi, "Le iscrizioni recentamente scoperte sull' obelisco Vaticano", Studi Romani, Vol. 2 (1963), p. 50. H. Volkmann, "Kritische Bemerkungen zu den Inschriften des Vatikanischen Obelisken", Gymnasium, Vol. 74 (1967), pp. 501–8, unconvincingly argues that it was first erected not at Alexandria but at Nicopolis nearby. Roullet, pp. 67–8, suggests that Ptolemy's obelisk was the same as the Vatican one. Both were uninscribed; Ptolemy's had its point removed; the Vatican obelisk has an unusually blunt point where the tooling is different from that on the main shaft (Fontana, pp. 16a-b). If the theory is true, Pompey's Pillar is irrelevant to the discussion. But the difficulty is that Pliny, in whose lifetime the Vatican obelisk came to Rome, treats them as different monuments. If, when Gallus first erected his obelisk, it carried a large finial such as Maximus intended to give Ptolemy's, the apex would need to be neither of the standard shape nor highly polished.
- Pliny, 36.70-1; Strabo, 17. 1.27.
- Pliny, 36.71-3; for modern investigations into the sundial, E. Buchner, Die Sonnenuhr des Augustus (Mainz, 1982).
- A bilingual inscription on one of the bronze feet records the move to Alexandria, with the names of the prefect P. Rubrius Barbarus and the architect (i.e. engineer) Pontius: A. C. Merriam, The Greek and Latin Inscriptions on the Obelisk-Crab (Harper, New York, 1883).
- Dated by the hieroglyphic inscription, though no ancient author mentions the obelisk.
- Ammianus, 17.4.16; Notitia Urbis Romae and Curiosum urbis Romae, edd. R. Valentini and G. Zucchetti, Codice Topografico della CUM di Roma (R. Istituto Storico Italian°, Rome, 1940), Vol. I, p. 183 line 10 and p. 149 line 1. The date is deduced from the fact that Pliny (c.60) does not mention them, and that Nerva (d. 98) was the last occupant of the Mausoleum. Domitian (81–96) is the most likely emperor to have put them up.
- F. Benoit, Arles (Rey, Lyon, 1927), p. 61; L. A. Constans, Arles Antique (Bibliothéque des Ecoles frangaises d'Athénes et de Rome, Paris, 1921), pp. 327–8; Gorringe, p. 141; Dibner, p. 55. The obelisk is uninscribed, and there is no literary evidence on it. The suggested date is that of A. W. van Buren, "Obeliskos", in Pauly-Wissowa, Real-Encyclopädie der classischen Altertumwissenschaft (Metzler, Stuttgart, 1937), Vol. 17, col. 1713.
- Ammianus, 17.4.16, is the only ancient author to mention it, and says only that it was post-Augustan. Its hieroglyphic inscription is a poor copy of that on the Popolo obelisk.
- The site of the Tomb of Antinous is not known; but if it was a true tomb (not a cenotaph) it would not have been in the city itself. P. Derchain, "A propos de l'obélisque d'Antinous", ed. J. Bingen et al., Le Monde grec: Homages a Claire Preaux (Editions de l'Université de Bruxelles, 1975), pp. 808–13, thinks it was at Hadrian's Villa at Tivoli; E Nash, Pictorial Dictionary of Ancient Rome (Zwemmer, London, n.d.), Vol. 2, p. 130, thinks it was adjacent to the later Circus Varianus, and that the obelisk was never moved in ancient times.
- Descriptio XIV Regionum, in Valentini and Zucchetti, op. cit. (13), Vol. 1, p. 251.
- For the smaller ones in Rome, Italy and Istanbul see Iverson; Roullet, pp. 73, 76; van Buren, op. cit. (14), cols. 1711–12; S. B. Platner and T. Ashby, A Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome (O.U.P., London, 1929), p. 370; in Alexandria, Fraser, op. cit. (5), Vol. 1, pp. 265–6, Vol. 2, p. 84; at Antioch, Marcellinus Comes, op. cit. (7), p. 102 line 23; on the Jordan, ed. P. Geyer, Itinera Hierosolymitana (Tempsky, Vienna, 1898), p. 166.
- Until recently the standard work on Egyptian quarrying, transport and erection was Engelbach, op. cit. (3). Now, however, see Henri Chevrier, "Techniques de la construction dans l'ancienne Egypte: II—Problèmes poses par les obelisques", Revue d'Egyptologie, Vol. 22 (1970), pp. 15–39. See also Habachi, pp. 15–37, Dibner, pp. 8–12.
- C. V. Solver, "The Egyptian Obelisk-ships", Mariners' Mirror, Vol. 26 (1940), p. 246. He also illustrates (Fig. 4, p. 248) an actual sledge, now in Cairo Museum, which because of the positions of the mortises for uprights seems to be designed to carry a small obelisk. It measured 13.8 by 2.6 ft.
- See a long debate on obelisk ships, mainly between G. A. Ballard and C. V. Solver, in Mariners' Mirror, Vol. 6 (1920), pp. 204–73, 307–14; Vol. 11 (1925), pp. 438–9; Vol. 12 (1926), pp. 221–3; Vol. 26 (1940), pp. 237–56; Vol. 27 (1941), pp. 290–306; Vol. 33 (1947), pp. 39–43, 158–64. See also W. Krebs, "Einige Transportprobleme der antiken Schiffahrt", Das Altertum, Vol. 11 (1965), pp. 86–101.
- A. A. Vasiliev, "Imperial Porphyry Sarcophagi in Constantinople", Dumbarton Oaks papers, Vol. 4 (1948), pp. 3–5; Paulus Silentiarius, Descriptio S. Sophiae, 625–7, in Patrologiae Cursus Completus, Series Graeca, Vol. 86.2 (J. P. Migne, Paris, 1865), col. 2143. One might ask why porphyry was not sent down to the port of Myos Hormos, a much shorter overland distance, and shipped via Suez and Trajan's Canal to the Nile. The answer lies in the prevailing northerly winds, reefs and pirates which made the Red Sea an unattractive route that was normally avoided if possible (N. H. H. Sitwell, Roman Roads in Europe (Cassell, London, 1981), p. 177).
- Pliny, 36.67-8. The works of Callixenus, who wrote in the late third century BC, are almost entirely lost. If this really was an ancient obelisk (as Pliny says, though uninscribed) it was presumably left unfinished in the quarry. It has been objected that it cannot have come from Aswan because there is no canal approaching the quarries there; but it could have been brought to a point near the river, and Phoenix's canal been no more than a short basin.
- Hero, Mechanics, 3.11 (edd. L. Nix and W. Schmidt (Teubner, Leipzig,1900)).
- Pliny, 36. 69–70.
- Chronographus Anni CCCLIIII, in MGH, AA (note 7), Vol. ix (1892), p. 145 lines 16–18. The height given corresponds to a modern 84.9 ft, an exaggeration of some four feet. Cedrenus, 1.302 (ed. I. Bekker, Corpus Scriptorum Historiae Byzantinae, Bonn, 1838) gives an almost verbatim account in Greek, but adds 50 sailors and omits the name Acatus; which in fact was hardly the ship's name, since it is the standard Greek word for a merchant galley, with sail but basically rowed (Casson, pp. 159–60). A galley would have a better chance than a round-bellied sailing ship of navigating all the way to Rome, especially after discharging the rest of the freight at Ostia; but to hold so large a cargo the ship would be truly monstrous by any contemporary standards, and even if it was a galley and part-empty it could not make it up the Tiber.
- L. Casson, "Harbour and River Boats of Ancient Rome", Journal of Roman Studies, Vol. 55 (1965), p. 32 note 10.
- A modius of wheat was about 14.7 lb: H. T. Wallinga, "Nautika (1): the Unit of Capacity for ancient Ships", Mnemosyne, Vol. 17 (1964), pp. 13, 24; K. Hopkins, "Models, Ships and Staples", in P. Garnsey and C. R. Whittaker (edd.), Trade and Famine in Classical Antiquity, Cambridge Philological Soc., Supp. Vol. 8 (1983), p. 102. Casson, p. 189 note 25, ignores the chronographer and confuses the weight of the Lateran obelisk (no. 2) with this one (no. 5).
- Lucian, Navigium, 5.
- Josephus, Vita, 15; Acts of the Apostles, 27.37.
- Suetonius, Claudius, 20.3.
- Pliny, 16. 201–2.
- Pliny, 36.70.
- O. Testaguzza, Portus: Illustrazione dei Porti di Claudio e Traiano (Julia Editrice, Rome, 1970), pp. 105–20, reckons the whole hull was identified, 341 ft long overall, 295 ft on the waterline, and 66.5 ft in beam, with the mast about 3 ft diameter set 108 ft from the bow. By contrast, the Isis was 182 ft long by something over 45 ft in beam. Casson, pp. 189–90, however, though he accepts the identification of the bow is not convinced about the stern and starboard side, and hence about the dimensions alleged. He is probably right; and a mast 3 ft in diameter is far smaller than Pliny says was used and than practice would demand.
- Ammianus, 17. 4.13.
- Casson, pp. 107–115.
- Pliny, 36.70.
- CIL, VI.i, no. 1163.
- Ammianus, 17.4.14. The remains of an ancient quay have been found at Vicus Alexandri: J. Le Gall, Le Tibre, fleuve de Rome dans rantiquite (Presses Universitaires de France, Paris, 1952), p. 202.
- Athenaeus, 5.204c-d. Despite K. D. White, Greek and Roman Technology (Thames & Hudson, London,), p. 112, there is no other certain record of ancient dry docks.
- There was at Portus the so-called darsena, a rectangular basin some 787 by 131 ft., which seems excessively large for a dry dock; and its entrance, at 30 ft. wide, was too narrow for a large ship. It was probably a barge dock: Testaguzza, op. cit. (34), pp. 173–4.
- Ammianus, 17. 4.14.
- G. Goetz (ed.), Corpus Glossariorum Latinorum (Teubner, Leipzig, 1888), Vol. ii, p. 475 line 21, defined as trahea; Pollux, Onotnasticon, vii. 190–1 (ed. E. Bethe (Teubner, Leipzig, 1931), Vol. 2): 'The timbers of the slipway which are put underneath and on which the ships are dragged out are called rollers. What are called charnulci are machines by which the cradles are dragged'. The word means 'dragged on the ground'.
- 'Received likewise from the same the price of iron removed . . . from the chamulcus constructed to facilitate the erection of the divine colossal statue of our Lord the Emperor Severus Alexander': Berliner Griechische Urkunden (Aegyptische Urkunden aus den kg1. Museen zu Berlin) (Weidmann, Berlin, 1898), Vol. ii, no. 362.6 line 44; ibid. (1912), Vol. iv, no. 1028 lines 22, 24, contains a brief reference to nails for making chamulci.
- e.g. Iversen, Vol. 2, p. 15; Bruns, pp. 47–51. The arched colonnade behind the obelisk is either the Mangana Gate near the Hippodrome or the starting boxes for the races.
- The Vatican obelisk pedestal rested on travertine steps on top of mass concrete 26 ft square, of uncertain depth but not stepped outwards; the obelisk base was 9.2 ft square. That in the Gardens of Sallust sat on a red granite plinth about 8.2 ft square on top of a pozzolana mass some 15.2 by 16.4 ft, again of unknown depth; the obelisk base was 4.25 ft square: F. Castagnoli, "Ii Circo di Nerone in Vaticano", Rendiconti della Pontificia Accademia Romana di Archeologia, Vol. 32 (1959–60), pp. 107, Fig. 7 and 115, Fig. 17; Platner and Ashby, op. cit. (18), p. 268; Iversen, Vol. 1, p. 140.
- Pliny, 36.68. 'Astragal', like the Latintalus that it translates, is an anklebone; the word is nowadays applied regularly, if not always accurately, to such feet whatever their shape. Magi, p. 490, thinks that the feet were cuboids; but since the Vatican obelisk had feet in the form of anklebones, there is no reason to doubt that Ptolemy's did too.
- Iversen, Vol. 1, p. 60.
- Bruns, pp. 15–16 and Abb. 8–9.
- Fontana, pp. 14b, 16a. Magi, p. 492, reproduces the only photograph ever taken of them. The precise location, nature and degree of the crushing cannot now be seen, being masked by sixteenth-century ornaments.
- E. Platner et al., Beschreibung der Stadt Rom (Cotta, Stuttgart and Tubingen, 1842), Vol. III. iii, p. 208; Iversen, Vol. 1, p. 72; G. Lugli, Roma Antica: il centro monumentale (Bardi, Rome, 1946), p. 604, reproduces a mosaic depicting the obelisk with ball feet.
- Iversen, Vol. 1, Figs. 130, 127, 120.
- Gorringe, pp. 12, 14, 75, 114, Merriam, op. cit. (11), p. 7. The crabs are in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
- Iversen, Vol. 1, p. 91 and Fig. 67.
- Iversen, Vol. 1, Figs. 41–2.
- Iversen, Vol. 1, p. 48, Fig. 16 b, c.
- RouIlet, p. 95, Figs. 91–2; E. Nash, "Obelisk und Circus", Romische Mitteilungen,Vol. 64 (1957), p. 239: Iversen, Vol. 1, p. 178.
- The position of the feet is established by a detailed drawing made before the move: Magi, p. 492.
- J. 13. A. Le Bas, L'Obelisgue de Luxor (Carilian-Goeury, Paris, 1839).
- For a convenient summary of the moving of these two obelisks, see R. A. Hayward, Cleopatra's Needles (Moorland, Buxton, 1978); for the New York obelisk the horse's mouth is Gorringe.
- Fontana is probably the first post-classical instance of an engineer publishing a monograph on a major project. His book being extremely rare, it is easier to consult the good summary in W. B. Parsons, Engineers and Engineering in the Renaissance (M.I.T., Cambridge Mass., 1968), pp. 157–67, or that in Dibner, pp. 20–43.
- Ammianus, 17.4.15. The text in the passage 'But . . . vertical' is uncertain.
- As does G. Sabbah (ed.), Ammien Marcellin, Histoire (Societe d'Edition "Les Belles lettres", Paris, 1970), Vol. 2, p. 170. Molendaria meta can only mean the tall conical lower stone of the Pompeian mill, not itself rotated; but the simile is apt enough.
- Habachi, p. 148; P. Barguet, "L'Obélisque de Saint-Jean-de Latran dans le temple de Ramses II a Karnak", Annales du Service des Antigun& de l'Egypte, Vol. 50 (1950), p. 271.
- Pliny, 36.74. The standard text, translated, reads: 'The third obelisk in Rome is in the Vatican Circus built by the emperors Gaius and Nero—out of the whole lot it was the only one to be broken in the raising—that was made by Nencoreus . . .' Fontana, p. 16a-b, was the first to claim that Pliny was confirmed by the blunt apex and its distinctive tooling, and by the fact that the obelisk is less tall, in relation to its base dimensions, than others. But the nature of the apex can be explained otherwise (note 8); the obelisk is in fact less squat than a number of complete examples; and Castagnoli, op. cit. (46), pp. 99–100, shows that a simple change of punctuation makes much more sense of Pliny's text: `. . . Gaius and Nero. Out of the whole lot the only one to be broken in the raising was that made by Nencoreus . . .', i.e. an Egyptian obelisk which the Romans did not touch.
- A. J. B. Wace and R. Traquair, "The Base of the Obelisk of Theodosius", Journal of Hellenic Studies, Vol. 29 (1909), pp. 60–9; Bruns, pp. 12–15, 74. See also note 7. The masonry shown at the extreme bottom right of the relief (Figs. 7–8) has been taken to represent the pedestal (Bruns, p. 48); but it is evidently of ashlar and bears no resemblance to the present pedestal, before or after the accident.
- J. B. Ward-Perkins, "Quarrying in Antiquity: Technology, Tradition and Social Change", Proceedings of the British Academy, Vol. Ivii (1971), p. 145.
- Expedition: Habachi, p. 36. Picture of statue: often reproduced, e.g. by Habachi, p. 23. Ramesses' colossi: Flinders Petrie, A History of Egypt, 3rd ed. (Methuen, London, 1925), Vol. 3, pp. 46, 73, 78. Assyrian relief: A. H. Layard, Nineveh and Babylon (Murray, London, 1867), p. 27.
- A. Burford, "Heavy Transport in Classical Antiquity", Economic History Review, 2nd series, vol. xiii (1960), pp. 1–18.
- Vitruvius, 10. 11–14.
- J. J. Coulton, "Lifting in early Greek Architecture", Journal of Hellenic Studies, Vol. 94 (1974), pp. 1–19.
- Ibid., p. 19; J. B. Ward-Perkins, Roman Imperial Architecture (Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1981), p. 118; Ward-Perkins, "Quarrying" (note 67), pp. 141, 144.
- Suetonius, Nero, 31.1; Pliny, 34.45-6; Scriptores Historiae Augustae, Hadrian, 19.12.
- See, for example, D. Buxton, The Abyssinians (Thames & Hudson, London, 1970), pp. 89–90 and pl. 42.
- T. Wiegand, Baalbek ( de Gruyter, Berlin and Leipzig, 1921), Vol. 1 (Text), pp. 35, 54; (Tafeln), Taf. 8–9, 22, 51–3.
- H. Dalton, "Falconet und das Denkmal Peter des Grossen in St Petersburg", in W. Frommel and F. Pfaff (edd.), Sammlung von Vortragen fiir das deutsche Volk (Winter, Heidelberg, 1882), Vol. 8, pp. 166–71. He gives the weight as over 4 million pounds. If he meant Russian pounds, it was over 1612 tons; if Prussian, over 1840 tons. Other sources—e.g. J. Glynn, Rudimentary Treatise on the Construction of Cranes, 2nd ed. (Weale, London, 1854), pp. 14-15—give varying dimensions, and weights that range between 1100 and 1500 tons.
- Coulton, op. cit. (71).
- Vitruvius, 10.2; Hero, Mechanics (note 24), 3.2-8; J. G. Landels, Engineering in the Ancient World (Chatto & Windus, London, 1978), pp. 84–98.
- F. W. Deichmann, Ravenna (Steiner, Wiesbaden, 1974), Kommentar I, p. 218. The weight is often, probably erroneously, put much higher.