PUNCH IN EGYPT

Evening Post, Volume CXVIII, Issue 78, 29 September 1934, Page 27

PUNCH IN EGYPT

When Joseph was a cupbearer in Egypt lie may have passed an idle hour in gazing on a puppet show, as we : sometimes watch the antics of Punch and Judy at the seaside. Marionettes hnvo buen discovered in Egyptian tombs as well as in Etruria, proving the great antiquity of this form of entertainment. Three elaborate puppets have just been found among rubbish in the shaft of a tomb near the.pyramid of Sesostris at Lisht. Tho tomb was of the twelfth dynasty, and other objects in tho rubbish heap wero certainly of that period, so there is no doubt that tho.ricw finds arc over 5000 years old. They aro three figures, two inches high, and they represent little men dancing and clapping their hands. Ono of the little men had apparently grown horns, while the expression on their faces is as lively as a Chinoes artist over achieved. Indeed, at first sight one would say that they came, from tho Far East. Mounted on small pedestals they fit loosely into an ivory slab, and both pedestal and slab are pierced with holes through which strings can bo threaded and pulled to make'tho figures dance. These three ivory dwarfs are now in the Cairo Museum, and the honour of finding them belongs to Mr, Lansing of the Metropolitan Museum of New York. I