Rameses II was the Pharaoh who ordered all the Israelite babies killed and it was his daughter who found the baby Moses in the bulrushes and saved his life.Rameses’s hobby was building temples and statues of himself.He had this temple cut out of the rocky cliff and these huge statues of himself made on the front.The one to the left is the best preserved.Little remains of the next figure.That funny thing on his chin is a beard.
No.32-3TEMPLE OF ABOU SIMBEL（阿布辛贝神庙）【中文阅读】
我上幼儿园时，用黏土捏过一个鸟窝，里面有圆圆的鸟蛋，上面栖息着一只鸟。你可能也做过类似的东西吧。那就是雕刻，但那时我并不知道。
等我稍微长大一点后，我在冬天堆雪人，拿扫把当枪，用煤块做眼睛。那也是雕刻，虽然我当时并不知道。
等我长大一点后，我常从半熟的面包片上揪下软的部分，再捏成一只小狗的模样，有脑袋，有尾巴，还有脚。那就是雕刻，尽管我还是不知道。连我妈也不知道。她还以为我在糟蹋食物，要把我关进厨房。
所以我从小就是个雕刻家，只不过十二岁以后就不再是了。但别的孩子没有停止，他们从小到大都在做雕刻。譬如有个男孩曾在厨房里用一块黄油雕出一头狮子，然后放在餐桌上。他后来长大了，成了一名伟大的雕刻家。他的名字是卡诺瓦。后面我会作介绍。
早在世界之初，人类就开始雕刻。但早期的雕刻作品和绘画非常相似。艺术家们首先在一些平滑的东西上画画，再把线条刻深。即使把画放在室外，也不怕风吹雨打。这种绘画或雕刻叫做“陷浮雕”。
接着，雕刻家们开始打磨作品的边角，削掉多余的背景，使作品立体化。这种雕刻叫做“浅浮雕”或“低浮雕”。你口袋里或许就揣着一件低浮雕，只是浑然不知。一个便士、一枚五分镍币、一角硬币或任何刻有图像的钱币，都是低浮雕。
紧接着，雕刻家们进一步打磨作品边缘，去掉更多多余的背景，使雕刻更立体化。这种雕刻叫做“深浮雕”或“半圆雕”，因为这种浮雕有一半已经脱离背景了。
后来，雕刻家们把整个背景都去掉，使作品完全独立。这种雕刻叫做“圆雕”——可以从各个角度来欣赏。我们在公园、广场或博物馆可以看到这类人物或动物雕像。
早在基督诞生之前，埃及就有艺术家在他们宏伟的建筑墙壁上雕刻陷浮雕了。图为埃及的一座神庙大门，你可以看到上面刻满了这类浮雕。浮雕上的人有坐着的，有站着的，看上去可能都很奇怪。能讲讲原因吗？事实上，除了几处特别奇怪的地方外，所有这些埃及雕刻或陷浮雕都露出两处明显的错误。不知有没有看出？请看第一处：人物的脚和脸都直接朝向侧边，但肩膀却朝正面。当然，现实中没人真的像这样：肩膀朝前，头和脚则朝向侧面。所以第一处错误就是人物呈扭曲状。第二处错误是眼睛。所见的是侧脸，不是正面，但眼睛却呈正面状。埃及所有的浮雕上都有同样奇怪形状的眼睛和扭曲的身躯。肩膀和眼睛虽呈正面，但其他部位，像臀部、腿、脚都呈侧面。
但是，在这些人物身上还能看到其他一些奇怪的现象。虽然雕刻上的男女贵为国王和王后，但他们却穿戴极少，甚至赤脚。这是因为埃及是个炎热的国家。甚至今天，有些气候炎热的国家，不论贫富贵贱，上到皇子王孙下到贫民乞丐都不穿鞋袜。我曾到这样一个热带国家参加一次晚宴，宴会上所有的女士和绅士们都光着脚丫。这些女士和绅士们衣着华丽，佩戴昂贵的珠宝首饰，赤脚从这桌走到那桌，看起来的确让人觉得奇怪。
但是，为了弥补穿戴的不足，就使这些埃及雕像佩带了很多头饰——是王冠而不是普通帽子。这些王冠都别有寓意。王后戴的王冠像鸟。这鸟是一只专食死尸的秃鹰。王冠上有两枚兽角，中间夹着月亮。国王戴的王冠叫做双层王冠。
这些图像都是陷浮雕。下面介绍的浮雕，叫做“浅浮雕”或“低浮雕”。这是伊西斯女神的坐姿雕像。她是古埃及著名的女神。她戴了一枚头饰，从画中可以清楚地看到她眼睛的形状和头饰上的花纹。她右手握着一根象征王后身份的权杖，看起来就像扑克牌上的那样。她左手拿着一个叫“尼罗河栓”的奇怪物品。
在这画周围有一些奇怪的设计，就是在本书第一部分介绍的象形文字，还记得吗？
至于高浮雕，我要从埃及另一座神庙——阿布辛贝神庙正面的四座巨雕进行介绍。它们几乎都脱离了背景，但又不完全。这些雕像非常庞大，像巨人，像猛犸。要是真人站在旁边，抬手也只能够到小腿的一半高。埃及人喜欢雕刻巨像。我们还会注意到，这些巨像坐姿僵硬：上身直挺，双脚平放在地，双手平摊在膝。这些雕像是同一位国王——拉美西斯二世，也叫拉美西斯大帝。尽管他是最残酷的君主之一，但他仍然是埃及最伟大的国王。
拉美西斯二世就是那位下令杀死所有以色列男婴的法老。然而也正是他的女儿看见了芦苇里的婴儿摩西，救了他。阿美西斯喜欢建造神庙，刻自己的雕像。他把阿布辛贝神庙建在悬崖峭壁上，在庙前雕刻了自己的巨像。左边那座雕像保存最好，可旁边的那座却所剩无几了。雕像下巴上最有趣的那个东西是胡须。
GIANTS AND PYGMIES
巨像和小雕
THE Egyptian sculpture in the full round was usually giant size，as tall as a house，or the other extreme—tiny statues only an inch or so high.The statues of their kings and important people，the Egyptian sculptors usually made of giant size—colossal.They thought a statue the size of an ordinary man or woman was not nearly big enough for a king or a queen.
The biggest statue in the world is the Great Sphinx which is near the three great pyramids.It is a huge lion with a king’s head.The Egyptians liked to combine men and animals in this way，but more often they put an animal’s head on a man’s body.A cat’s head or a bird’s head on a man’s body seems to us most unpleasant—a mon-strosity that makes us shudder.But a man’s head on an animal’s body seems only a myth and doesn’t shock us.
The Great Sphinx was supposed to be the God of the Morning and so faces east—always facing the rising sun and gazing at it unblink-ingly as he has done each morning for thousands of years.His nose is as tall as a man.The triangular pieces at the sides of his head are not hair，they are a peculiar hood.
There are many more sphinxes in Egypt，but all much smaller than the Great Sphinx，and these smaller ones usually were arranged，with many of them in a double row，to form an avenue leading up to some temple.
Farther up the Nile，there are two colossal seated figures sitting on thrones side by side，gazing out over the plain.They are called，on account of their colossal size，the Colossi，and each is made out of a single stone.They are weather-beaten and broken，but you do not need much imagination to see in your mind’s eye what they once were.They of course are Egyptian kings—or，rather，two statues of the same king.These two also face the sun as it rises in the east and one of them is called the Vocal Memnon—that is，the singing or sounding Memnon，though Memnon was not the king’s name.His name was Amenhotep.We know the names of few of the old sculptors who made the statues，but we do know the name of this sculptor who made these statues of Amenhotep，for he had the same name as the king.Perhaps he was a slave.When we had slavery in our own country，a slave often used to take the name of his master.
No.33-1THE GREAT SPHINX AND PRRAMIDS（斯芬克斯狮身人面像和金字塔）For some reason that no one has ever perfectly explained，the Vocal Memnon gave forth sounds，perhaps like the tones of a great organ when the sun rose，a hymn to a new day，though the Vocal Memnon did not sing every morning or even every year.When it did sing，it was supposed to be a sign of something—an omen people called it—but an omen of what，no one knows.It is believed that about the time of Christ it was upset by an earthquake and that when it was replaced，it ceased its morning song.It has not sung for nearly two thousand years and some people doubt that it ever did，though people even at the time of Christ used to travel long distances just to hear it sing and were disappointed if it didn’t.Many who did hear it，however，have carved on the base their names and date when they did hear it.So there seems to be little doubt that it did sing once upon a time.Some scientists think the sun’s rays striking the cold stone in the morning wrought some change that made the sound.It is one of the mysteries of which there are so many in Egypt.