Skip to Content  Walk like an Egyptian: Tut at the Science
Museum; 'An Idiot Abroad'  Max Sparber with Anubis statue Photo
by Coco Mault Max Sparber with Anubis statue  Standing sentry in
a corner of Landmark Plaza in downtown St. Paul, between the St.
Paul Hotel and Landmark Center, is a 26-foot-tall statue of the
Egyptian god Anubis. One imagines the nearby statues of F. Scott
Fitzgerald and Lucy from the Peanuts cartoon have spent the past
three months, since the jackal-headed god's arrival, staring at
it in wonder, as Anubis himself watched the days grow colder and
the snow come in, and thought to himself, "What did I do to
deserve this?" Well, Anubis has been fulfilling a function that
dates back to the American circus, when a daredevil would arrive
in town a few weeks in advance of a show and do something
remarkable, such as bury himself alive, and this would drum up
interest in the forthcoming tent and three rings. Anubis, of
course, did not need to bury himself alive. Being Anubis, and
weighing 26 ton