of the Museum in place of M. Grébaut. This will meet with
general approval. He is young and energetic, and the work he
has done in the Caucasus and in Persia has placed him in the
front rank of archaeologists and explorers. Moreover, he is an
engineer, and therefore possesses a practical knowledge which,
in view of the conservation of the ancient monuments of Egypt,
is a matter of prime importance. He has asked the Board of
Public Works for £50,000 in order to secure the building
against fire; it is built of very inflammable material. During
the past summer the museum has been entirely rearranged by him.
Of the rooms in the palace, only some thirty-eight contained
antiquities last winter; now, however, about eighty-five are
used as exhibition rooms, and, for the first time, it is
possible to see of what the Egyptian collection really
consists. On the ground floor the positions of several of the
large monuments have been changed, and the chronological
arrangement is better than it was before. In one large room are
exhibited for the first time eleven fine _mastaba_ stelæ of the
Ancient Empire, (VI. Dyn.) which were brought from Sakkarah
during the past summer; they are remarkable for the brightness
of the colours, the vigour of the figures, and the beauty of
the hieroglyphics. On the same floor are two splendid colossal
statues of the god Ptah which have been excavated at Memphis
the hieroglyphics. On the same floor are two splendid colossal
statues of the god Ptah which have been excavated at Memphis
Page 100 during last summer, and many other large objects from the same
site. In a series of rooms, approached from the room in which
the Dêr el-Bahari mummies are exhibited, are arranged the
coffins and mummies of the priests of Amen which were brought
down from Thebes two years ago. The coffins are of great
interest, for they are ornamented with mythological scenes and
figures of gods which seem to be peculiar to the period
immediately following the rule of the priest-kings at Thebes,
_i.e._, from about B.C. 1000 to 800.
A new and important feature in the arrangement of the rooms on
the upper floor is the section devoted to the exhibition of
papyri. Here in flat glazed cases are shown at full length fine
copies of the 'Book of the Dead,' hieratic papyri, including
the unique copy of the 'Maxims of Ani.' and many other papyri
which have been hitherto inaccessible to the ordinary visitor.
To certain classes of objects, such as scarabs, blue glazed
_faïence_, linen sheets, mummy bandages and garments,
terracotta vases and vessels, alabaster jars, &c., special
rooms are devoted. The antiquities which, although found in
Egypt, are certainly not of Egyptian manufacture, _e.g._, Greek
and Phornician glass, Greek statues, tablets inscribed in
cuneiform from Tel el-Amarna, &c., are arranged in groups in
rooms set apart for them; and the monuments of the Egyptian
Christians or Copts are also classified and arranged in a
separate room.--_Athenæum_, May 14 and Nov. 19.
THE FRENCH SCHOOL AT CAIRO.--M. Maspero analyzed before the
_Acad. des Inscr._ (Oct. 28), the recent work and immediate
prospects of the French School at Cairo. The _Memoirs_ recently
issued show the field that it covers at present. First comes a
fascicule of Greek texts, the mathematical papyrus of Akmim,
explained and commented by M. Baillet; a long fragment of the
Greek text of the Book of Enoch, remains of the apocryphal
Gospel and Apocalypse of St. Peter, reproduced by M. Bouriant.
All these works are of extreme importance for primitive church
history. Arab archæology is represented by memoirs of M.
Casonova on an Arab globe, on sixteen Arab steles, and
especially by M. Burgoin's great work on Arab art in Egypt.
Father Scheil makes an incursion into Assyriology by his
publication of some of the Tel el-Amarna tablets, and in this
connection M. Maspero states that the intention of the school
is to extend their researches to Syria and Mesopotamia and to
include the entire East both ancient and modern. In the
Egyptian domain, besides the Theban fragments of the Old
Testament and the remains of the Acts of the Council of
Ephesos, the notable event is the appearance of the first
fasciculus of the work on _Edfu_ by M. de Rochemonteix. In it a
Page 101 complete temple will be placed before students. The entire
Egyptian religion will be illustrated, in all its
rituals,--ritual of foundation, of sacrifice, of the feast of
Osiris. M. Benedite has commenced in the same way the
publication of the Temples of Philae.--_Revue Critique_, 1892,
No. 45.
The investigations enumerated above are far from being all.
They represent merely the official governmental side of the
work. The learned societies have done a great deal; such as the
Ecole des lettres of Algiers, the management of historical
monuments (Tebessa), and the French School of Rome.
EL-KARGEH.--PLASTER BUSTS.--At a meeting of the _Académie des
Inscriptions_, M. Héron de Villefosse exhibited four painted
plaster busts from El-Kargeh, in the Great Oasis, which have
recently been sent to the Louvre by M. Bouriant, director of
the French School at Cairo. They have been taken from the lids
of sarcophagi; but the peculiarity about them is that the heads
were not in the same plane with the body, but as it were erect.
The features have been modelled with extraordinary
verisimilitude; the eyes are of some glassy material, in black
and white; the hair was modelled independently, and afterwards
fitted to the plaster head; the painting is in simple
colours--various shades of red for the skin, and black or brown
for the hair. M. Héron de Villefosse maintained that they were
certainly portraits. The physiognomy of one is Jewish; another
recalls a bronze head from Cyrene in the British Museum, which
Fr. Lenormant considered to be of Berber type; the third might
be Syrian, and the fourth Roman. The date is probably about the
time of Septimius Severus. M. Maspero declared that he had
never seen anything of the kind in any museum.--_Academy_, July
9.
These busts have been placed on exhibition at the Louvre, in
the _Salle des fresques_.--_Chron. des Arts_, 1892, No. 28.
According to a writer in the _Temps_, two are Greeks, one
Syrian and one a Jew. The Greeks are blond with straight hair;
the others have dark brown curly hair. All are bearded. The
drapery is white.--_Chron. des Arts_, 1892, No. 30.
The department of Greek and Roman antiquities at the Louvre has
also received from M. Bouriant two funerary inscriptions found
in the necropolis dating from the second century A.D. One is
Latin, tha other Greek.--_Chron. des Arts_, 1892, No. 32.
CHATBI (NEAR).--NECROPOLIS.--M. Botti has discovered between
Chatbi and Ibrahimieh a Roman necropolis of the first or second
century A.D.. at a depth of fourteen metres. It is excavated in
soft calcareous stone and its chambers and corridors are
Page 102 reached by a rock-cut staircase.
The bodies are both laid on the floor and placed in jars. They
were intact.--_Chron. des Arts_, 1892, No. 30.
EL-QAB.--Mr. Taylor has been excavating here for the Egypt
exploration fund, in continuation of the previous year's work.
Prof. Sayce reports, after Mr. Taylor's departure (_Acad._,
March 12), that more of the foundations of the old temple which
stood within the temple were then visible than the preceding
year. The fragmentary remains show that among its builders were
Usertesen (xii dyn.), Sebekhotep II (xiii dyn.), Amenophis I
and Thothmes III (xviii dyn.) and Nektanebo I (xxx dyn.) In one
of the tombs Nofer-Ka-Ra is alluded to as (apparently) the
original founder of the sanctuary.
GEBELEN.--TEMPLE OF HOR-M-HIB.--Prof. Sayce writes. "On the
voyage from Luxor to Assuan I stopped at Gebelon, and found
that the Bedouin squatters there had unearthed some fragments
of sculptured and inscribed stones on the summit of the
fortress built by the priest-king Ra-men-kheper and queen
Isis-m-kheb to defend this portion of the Nile. On examination
they turned out to belong to a small temple which must once
have stood on the spot. The original temple, I found, had been
constructed of limestone by Hor-m-hib, the last king of the
xviii dynasty, and brilliantly ornamented with sculpture and
painting. Additions had been made to the temple, apparently by
Seti I.; since besides the stones belonging to Hor-m-hib, there
were other fragments of the same limestone as that of which the
temple of Seti at Abydos is built, and covered with bas-reliefs
and hieroglyphs in precisely the same delicate style of art.
Eventually a building of sandstone had been added to the
original temple on the west side by Ptolemy VII Philometor. It
may be noted that Ra-men-kheper used bricks burnt in the kiln
as well as sun-dried bricks in the construction of the
fortress, as he also did in the construction of the fortress at
El-Hibeh.--_Academy_, March 12."
HAT-NUB.-THE EARLY QUARRY.-This interesting quarry has been
recently discovered by Mr. Griffith. Mr. Petrie writes: Allow
me to note that in this quarry, described by Mr. Griffith
(_Academy_, Jan. 23), and situated ten miles southeast of El
Tell in this plain, the main quarry does not contain any name
later than the vi Dynasty. The tablet in the thirtieth year
being of Pepi II (Nefer-ka-ra), and mentioning the _sed_
festival in that year, this might refer to the Sothiac festival
of 120 years falling in that year, and so be important as a
datum. There are seven painted inscriptions of Pepi II,
containing about fifty lines in all. There are also a great
number of incised graffiti.--_Academy_, Feb. 20.
Page 103
HAWARA.--MUMMY PORTRAITS.--Among the most important discoveries
of the year is that by Dr. Brugsch, of three mummy portraits in
the desert of Hawara. These were found, uncoffined, and buried
at a very slight depth below the surface.
The first is that of a woman: the portrait is brilliantly
executed in tempera, on canvas, and is the most ancient of
paintings on canvas known, for its date cannot be fixed later
than the first century B.C.
The next portrait was on the mummy of a man but instead of a
painting on canvas is a relief in stucco, gilded. The features
are carefully reproduced, as are the beard and whiskers.
The third mummy was provided with a beautifully executed
portrait on wood which is one of the best examples of ancient
painting, though not so rare as the other, for ancient
portraits painted on wood have long been known.--_Biblia_,
V.P.
HELIOPOLIS.--M. Philippe, the Cairo dealer in antiquities, is,
with permission from the Gizeh Museum, carrying on excavations
at Heliopolis, which have brought to light some tombs of the
Saïtic period.--_Academy_, Nov. 12.
KOM-EL-AHMAR.--"At Kom el-Ahmar, opposite El-Qab, I visited two
recently-discovered tombs, which contain the cartouches of
Pepi, and are in a fairly perfect condition. The walls are
covered with delicate paintings in the style of those of
Beni-Hassan, and explanatory inscriptions are attached to them.
The early date of the paintings and inscriptions makes them
particularly interesting. The tombs are still half buried in
the sand, and only the upper part of the internal decoration is
visible."--PROF. SAYCE, in _Academy_, April 2.
MEIR.--The authorities of the Gizeh Museum have, on the
suggestion of Johnson Pasha, caused excavations to be made at
Meïr, near Deirut, in Upper Egypt, which have already resulted
in the discovery of some tombs of the XI dynasty. It is
intended to continue these excavations.--_Academy_, Nov. 12.
MEMPHIS.--DISCOVERIES BY M. DE MORGAN.--At a meeting of the
_Acad. des Inscr._ Prof. Maspero communicated the result of the
excavations on the site of Memphis by M. de Morgan. He has
discovered among the ruins of the temple of Ptah a number of
monuments of importance. First, a large boat of granite,
similar to that in the museum at Turin, on which the figures
are destroyed; next, several fragmentary colossi of Rameses II,
and in particular two gigantic upright figures, dedicated by
this king, of Ptah, the god of Memphis, enshrouded in
mummy-wrappings and holding a sceptre in both hands; lastly,
some isolated figures, arranged in a court or a chamber. The
Page 104 importance of this discovery, said Prof. Maspero, will be
realised when we bear in mind that we possess no divine image
of large size, and that the very existence of statues of gods
in Egyptian temples has sometimes been denied.--_Academy_,
Sept. 17.
SEHEL.--THE TENTH DYNASTY.--Prof. Sayce reports that he has
been finding evidences of the little-known X dynasty in the
immediate neighborhood of the First Cataract. "Mr. Griffith and
Prof. Maspero have shown that certain of the tombs at Siût
belonged to the period when this dynasty ruled in Egypt. I have
now discovered inscriptions which show that its rule was
recognized on the frontiers of Nubia.
"An examination of the position occupied by the numerous
inscriptions on the granite rocks of the island of Sehêl have
made it clear to me that we must recognize two periods in the
history of the sanctuary for which the island was famous.
During the second period the temple stood on the eastern slope
of an eminence where I found remains of it two years ago. As I
also found fragments of it bearing the name of Thothmes III on
the one hand, and of Ptolemy Philopator on the other, it must
have existed from the age of the XVII dynasty down to Ptolemaic
times. Throughout this period the inscriptions left by pious
pilgrims to the shrine all face the site of the temple. So also
do a certain number of inscriptions which belong to the age of
the XII and XIII dynasties. But the majority of the
inscriptions which belong to the latter age, like the
inscriptions which are proved by the occurrence of the names of
Antef and Mentuhotep to be of the time of the _xi_ dynasty,
face a different way. They look southward.
"This winter I have come across a large number of inscriptions
on the mainland side of the channel which look northward, that
is, towards the island. A few of these inscriptions are of the
time of the XII dynasty, but the greater number belong to the
XI dynasty, and one is dated in the forty-first year of
Ra-neb-kher. It would seem, therefore, that at the epoch when
they were inscribed on the rocks the sanctuary of Sehêl stood
either in the middle of the southern channel of the river or
upon its edge.
"On the island side of the channel there are a good many
inscriptions which are shown by the weathering of the
hieroglyphs to be older than the age of the XI dynasty. Indeed,
the inscription of an Antef is cut over one of them. They all
present the same curious forms of hieroglyphic characters, and
contain for the most part titles and formulæ not met with in
the later texts. Moreover, they are not dedicated like the
Page 105 later texts to the divine trinity of the Cataract, Khnum,
Anuke, and Sati, but to a deity whose name is expressed by a
character resembling an Akhem seated on a basket. Mr. Wilbour
and I first noticed it last year.
"One of the early inscriptions contains a cartouche which reads
Ra-nefer-hepu, the last element being represented by the
picture of a rudder. Now Mr. Newberry and his companions at
Beni-Hassan have discovered that one of the groups of tombs
which exist there is of older date than the time of the XII
dynasty. In this group of tombs occurs the name of a lady who
was called Nefer-hepu. She must have been born in the reign of
Ra-nefer-hepu, and will consequently belong, not to the age of
the XI dynasty, but to that of one of the dynasties which
preceded it.
"That this dynasty was the X is made pretty clear by the
inscriptions on the mainland side of the channel I have
described. Here I have found inscriptions of the early sort
mingled with those of the XI dynasty in such a way as to show
that they cannot have been widely separated in age. Moreover,
in one of them, the name of Khatî is associated with that of
Ra-mer-ab; and Khatî is not only a name which characterises the
XI dynasty, but it was also the name of the owner of one of the
tombs at Siût, which Mr. Griffith has proved to belong to the
time of the X dynasty. We were already acquainted with the name
of Ra-mer-ab from a scarab; and two years ago Mr. Bouriant
obtained a bronze vase which gave the double name of Ra-mer-ab
Kherti. Kherti is a king of the X dynasty. By the side of the
inscription which contains the name of Ra-mer-ab, I found
others with the names of Ra-mer-ankh and Ameni. That Ameni was
a king of the X dynasty has already been suspected.
"The inscriptions I have copied this winter, therefore, have
not only given us the names of some kings of the X dynasty, one
of them previously unknown; they have also shown that the power
of the dynasty was acknowledged as far south as the Cataract.
Moreover, they indicate that the government must have passed
from the X to the XI dynasty in a peaceful and regular manner."
SHAT-ER-RIGALEH.--Prof. Sayce writes: I have visited the
famous "Shat er-Rigâleh," the valley a little north of Silsilis
and the village of El-Hammâni, in which so many monuments of
the XI dynasty have been discovered by Messrs. Harris,
Eisenlohr, and Flinders Petrie. To these I have been able to
add another cartouche, that of Ra-nofer-neb, a king who is
supposed to belong to the XIV dynasty. His name and titles have
been carved on the rock at the northern corner of the entrance
into the valley by a certain Ama, a memorial of whom was found
by Mr. Petrie in the Wadi itself (_A Season in Egypt_, pl. XV.
No. 438). Mr. Spicer, whose dahabiyeh accompanied mine,
Page 106 photographed the inscriptions in which Mentuhotep-Ra-neb-kher
of the XI dynasty is mentioned, as well as the one which
enumerates the names of three kings of the XVIII dynasty,
Amenophis I, Thothmes I, and Thothmes II. One of the
inscriptions of Mentuhotep is dated in the thirty-ninth year of
the king's reign. The epithet _mâ-kheru_ "deceased" is attached
only to the cartouche of Amenophis I, not to those of the other
two kings, proving that they reigned
contemporaneously.--_Academy_, March 12.
TEL EL-AMARNA.--EXCAVATIONS BY MR. PETRIE.--Mr. Petrie
communicates the following report to the _Academy_: "During the
last four months I have been excavating at this place, the
capital of Khuenaten. Past times have done their best to leave
nothing for the present--not even a record. The Egyptians
carried away the buildings in whole blocks down to the lowest
foundations, completely smashed the sculptures, and left
nothing in the houses; and the Museum authorities, and a
notorious Arab dealer, have cleared away without any record
what had escaped the other plunderers of this century. I have
now endeavoured to recover what little remained of the art and
history of this peculiar site, by careful searching in the
town. From the tombs I am debarred, although the authorities
are doing nothing whatever there themselves, and the tomb of
Khuenaten remains uncleared, with pieces of the sarcophagus and
vessels thrown indiscriminately in the rubbish outside."
The region of main interest is the palace; and the only way to
recover the plan was by baring the ground, and tracing the
bedding of the stones which are gone. For this I have cleared
all the site of the buildings, and in course of the work
several rooms with portions of painted fresco pavements have
been found. One room which was nearly entire, about 51 by 16
feet, and two others more injured, have now been entirely
exposed to view, and protected by a substantial house, well
lighted, and accessible to visitors, erected by the Public
Works Department. With the exception of a pavement reported to
exist at Thebes, these are the only examples of a branch of art
which must have been familiar in the palaces of Egypt. The
subjects of these floors are tanks with fish, birds, and lotus;
groups of calves, plants, birds, and insects; and a border of
bouquets and dishes. But the main value of these lies in the
new style of art displayed; the action of the animals, and the
naturalistic grace of the plants, are unlike any other Egyptian
work, and are unparalleled even in classical frescoes. Not
until modern times can such studies from nature be found. Yet
this was done by Egyptian artists; for where the lotus occurs,
Page 107 the old conventional grouping has constrained the design, and
the painter could not overstep his education, though handling
all the other plants with perfect individuality. That
Babylonian influence was not active, is seen by the utter
absence of any geometrical ornament; neither rosettes or stars,
frets or circles, nor any other such elements are seen, and
perhaps no such large piece of work exists so clear of all but
natural forms. Some small fragments of sculptured columns show
that this flowing naturalism was as freely carried out in
relief as in colour.
Of the architecture there remain only small pieces flaked off
the columns. By comparing these the style can be entirely
recovered; and we see that both the small columns in the
palace, and those five feet thick in the river frontage, were
in imitation of bundles of reeds, bound with inscribed bands,
with leafage on base and on capital, and groups of ducks hung
up around the neck. A roof over a well in the palace was
supported by columns of a highly geometrical pattern, with
spirals and chevrons. In the palace front were also severer
columns inscribed with scenes, and with capitals imitating
gigantic jewellery. The surface was encrusted with brilliant
glazes, and the ridges of stone between the pieces were gilt,
so that it resembled jewels set in gold. An easy imitation of
this was by painting the hollows and ridges, and the crossing
lines of the setting soon look like a net over the capital. We
are at once reminded of the "net work" on the capitals of
Solomon, and see in these columns their prototype.
This taste for inlaying was carried to great lengths on the
flat walls. The patterns were incrusted with coloured glazes,
and birds and fishes were painted on whole pieces and let into
the blocks; hieroglyphs were elaborately carved in hard stones
and fixed in the hollowed forms, black granite, obsidian, and
quartzite in white limestone, and alabaster in red granite. The
many fragments of steles which have come from here already, and
which I have found, appear to show a custom of placing one
stele--with the usual adoration of the sun by the king and
queen--in each of the great halls of the palace and temple.
These steles are in hard limestone, alabaster, red granite, and
black granite. I have found more steles on the rocks on both
sides of the Nile, and have seen in all eight on the eastern
and three on the western cliffs.
The history of this site, and of the religious revolutions, is
somewhat clearer than before. Khuenaten came to the throne as a
minor; for in his sixth year he had only one child, and in his
eighth year only two, as we learn from the steles, suggesting
that he was not married till his fifth year apparently. On his
marriage he changed his name from Amenhotep IV (which occurs on
Page 108 a papyrus from Gurob in his fifth) to Khuenaten (which we find
here in the sixth). A scarab which I got last year in Cairo
shows Amenhotep (with Amen erased subsequently) adoring the
cartouches of the Aten, settling his identity with Khuenaten.
In a quarry here is the name of his mother, Queen Thii, without
any king; so she was probably regent during his minority, and
started this capital here herself.
The character of the man, and the real objects of his
revolution in religion and art, are greatly cleared by our now
being able to see him as in the flesh. By an inexplicable
chance, there was lying on the ground, among some stones, a
plaster cast taken from his face immediately after his death
for the use of the sculptors of his funeral furniture; with it
were the spoilt rough blocks of granite _ushabtis_ for his
tomb. The cast is in almost perfect condition, and we can now
really study his face, which is full of character. There is no
trace of passion in it, but a philosophical calm with great
obstinacy and impracticability. He was no vigorous fanatic, but
rather a high bred theorist and reformer: not a Cromwell but a
Mill. An interesting historical study awaits us here from his
physiognomy and his reforms. No such cast remains of any other
personage in ancient history.