Otago Witness Illustrations ARCHAEOLOGICAL DISCOVERY IN EGYPT.

Otago Witness, Issue 2735, 15 August 1906, Page 38

Otago Witness Illustrations

ARCHAEOLOGICAL DISCOVERY IN EGYPT.

Muir and Moodie, photo.

>o> THE SHEPHERD KINGS OR HYKSOS. One of the dim pages of history which has most fascinated theorists has been that of the conquest of Egypt by the shepherd Kings or Hyksos. To the Egyptians themselves (says The Times) it seemed incredible how a swarm of barbarians could dominate their high civilisation. It was to them what the subjugation of the Roman

Empire by the northern barbarians was to Jerome, or even to some modern writers — a hideous anomaly — because they could not understand the laws of decay of nations. To historians the Hyksos have served for many theories, from Josephus, who identified them with the Jews, down to a recent suggestion that they were both Hittites and Etruscans. To obtain some tangible evidences about these people has been one of the main problems of research in Egypt. One purpose of the British school in working at Tel-el-Yehudiyeh this

past winter was to search for any more traces in a site where it was well known that Hyksos scarabs were commonly found. And here it is that Professor Flinders Petrie has excavated an enormous earthwork camp. This camp was constructed before 1500 B.C. by a nomadic people who were entirely ignorant of construction in stone, brick, or even wood, and who trusted entirely to archery for their defence. They had no pottery in common use, and therefore used vessels of leather and of wood. As many graves of the Hyksos age were

found, the earlier inside the camp, the later in a cemetery outside, and as the whole region has produced more scarabs of the Hyksos than of all the other ages of Egypt, it is obvious that the nomads who formed this camp were of this mysterious race. The camp is a great earthen enclosure, quadrilateral with rounded corners, much like many earth camps in other I countries. It is about 1500 ft across, with a bank about 200 ft thick at + he base. , This bank was faced outside with a slope ! of white stucco 70ft or 80ft long, at an '

angle of 35deg to 45deg. We Ua,\e here, evidently, a people in the well-known stage of culture of Central Asian nomads, great archers like the Scythians, Persians, Parthians, or Turcomans, but depending entirely on earthwork for defence. It is probable that this camp now before us is indeed the celebrated city of Avaris, but the details of the identification cannot be entered on here. The cemetery of the Hyksos shows that thy did not use domestic pottery, as they copied the forms already common in Egypt.

This handsome bouquet was composed entirely of orchids, many of them Tare varieties, and maidenhair fern, fittonia, xnaranta and begonia leaves. The orchids and foliage were from Mr David Papworth'a greenhouses, and the bouquet was made by Misa Poole, florist, Wellington. The presentation took place at the Wellington Town Hall on August 2.