Saqqara - Serapeum

550yd/500m west of Mariette's House is the Serapeum, with the rock cut underground burial chambers of the Apis bulls. Apis, the sacred bull of the god Ptah, was worshiped in a temple of his own, and after his death was embalmed and buried with great pomp. From the time of Amenophis III, and probably earlier, the Apis tombs consisted of an underground chamber entered by a sloping shaft, over which was a chapel, as in the tombs of high dignitaries. In the reign of Ramesses II Prince Khaemweset constructed a common burial place for all the Apis bulls, consisting of an underground corridor 110yd/100m long flanked on both sides by chambers in which the wooden coffins of the bulls were enclosed. Psammetichus I added, at right angles to this, a much larger and more carefully constructed complex of chambers, which was enlarged at various times down to the Ptolemaic period. Altogether there were some 380yd/350m of corridors, 10ft/3m wide and 18ft/5.5m high. Over these subterranean chambers was built a large temple. The Egyptians believed that, like men, the bulls were united with Osiris after death, and the dead bull was given the name of Osiris-Apis (Egyptian Oser-hapi, Greek Osorapis) and became a kind of god of the dead, known, like Osiris, as "Lord of the Western Land". Great numbers of pilgrims visited the tombs of the bulls and left votive offerings usually small memorial tablets set into the walls of the underground corridors. When the cult of the foreign god Sarapis (Serapis), introduced in the reign of Ptolemy I, became popular in Egypt Sarapis was identified with Osorapis and venerated with him in the ancient temple in the necropolis of Memphis, which came to be known as the Sarapeion or Serapeum.

Opposite the temple built over the burial place of the Apis bulls a second Temple of Osorapis was erected by Nectanebo II. On the walls flanking the path between the two temples were Greek statues, some of which are still in situ, though now covered with sand. The great avenue of sphinxes which ran west from the cultivated land through the necropolis to the Serapeum ended in a semicircular open space adorned with statues of Greek philosophers.

When visiting the Serapeum it is advisable to take a good electric torch, since the lighting system does not always work. The entrance leads into a room of some size, with niches in the limestone walls in which many votive tablets and tombstones of dead bulls were found. Turning right, we come in a few yards to a huge sarcophagus lid of black granite and, some 20yd/18m beyond it (on left) the sarcophagus to which it belonged, almost filling the corridor both perhaps left lying here, on their way to a tomb chamber, when the cult of Apis was abandoned. Near the end of the corridor a lateral corridor goes off on the left towards the main corridor, which runs parallel with the first. The chambers on either side of this corridor, in which the mummies of the Apis bulls were buried in huge stone sarcophagi, average 26ft/8m in height; their pavements and vaulted roofs are faced with Moqattam stone. Twenty of the chambers still contain their sarcophagiof polished black or red granite, each hewn from a single block. They average some 13ft/4m in length by 7.5ft/2.30m in width and 11ft/3.30m in height and are estimated to weigh 65 tons. Many of the lids have been pushed aside; five of them are constructed of separate pieces of stone cemented together. When found the sarcophagi had already been plundered and emptied of their contents, apart from two which still contained a few trinkets and other grave goods. Three of them have inscriptions, one in the name of Amasis, the second in the name of Cambyses and the third in the name of Khabbash, the last native ruler before Alexander the Great's conquest. The finest of the sarcophagi is the last one on the right hand side, to which a flight of steps descends. Of finely polished black granite, it is covered with inscriptions and door shaped ornaments.

Near the east end of the main corridor a side passage 22yd/20m long goes off on the right to another corridor running parallel with the main one (now walled up). Going north from here and stepping over the lid of Amasis's sarcophagus, we return to the vestibule at the end of the entrance passage.

Just north of the Serapeum is a tent where refreshments may be obtained.