DISCOVERY IN EGYPT.

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume I, Issue 52, 11 February 1911, Page 2 (Supplement)

DISCOVERY IN EGYPT.

A bronze statuette, much corroded, has been found in Egypt, and appears to be the first discovered specimen of a Hittite deity execut 'd in the round, ft represents a geddess standing upon the back of a lion, whese tongue is protruding and tlse tail turned up. The god-dc-o wears the Chppadocian < r Hittite -style of tiara, and carries in her arms an infant held to the breast. No features of the work denote an Egyptian artist, but all point to Syria, and it is almost a precise copy of the Hittite reliefs upon their ruined palaces at Bogbaz Ker.vi and cNewhere, in which the gods stand upon the backs of animals. The proportions given to the body and the arrangement of the hair are also Syrian, but the shoes have not the upturned toes ns usual with Hittite figures. Should this statuette be accepted ns of Hittite workmanship, »t will give support to the Old Testament statements as to the existence of Hittites in Southern Palestine, and will tend to show that the celebrated Hyksos, or shepherd kings, who reigned for rome centuries in North Egypt, were Hittite's, or of an allied race. If the statuette was brought to Egypt during the early Hyksos period it would be pr-itccJly contemporary with the A wrrato of Joseph.