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A History of Art in Ancient Egypt, Vol. 2 (of 2)

Note 144 — Chapter II · (continued 2)

Walter Armstrong translation

The Italians call them guglie, needles, and the Arabs micellet Faraoun, Pharaoh's needles. The obelisks now in London and New York respectively, which were taken by the Romans from the ruins of Heliopolis, in order to be erected in front of the Cæsareum at Alexandria, were known as Cleopatra's Needles. Herodotus only used the expression, ὀβελός. Ἐν τῷ τεμένει ὀβελοὶ ἑστάσι μεγάλοι λίθινοι (ii. 172; also ii. 111).

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