ANCIENT RELICS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 74, Issue 139, 15 June 1931, Page 7

ANCIENT RELICS

INTERESTING DISCOVERIES CITY OF SHEPHERD KINGS LONDON, June 4. Two thousand years B.C. a woman lost a gold bird-shaped ornament in a muddy, cobbled street in Tel-el-Ajjul, the city of the Shepherd Kings. Sir Flinders Petrie, an eminent British archaeologist, picked it up during his excavations of the site of the ancient city and is now exhibiting it in London. Sir Flinders explains that Tel-el-Ajjul proves that tho Shepherd Kings were not nomads living in tents, as supposed, but occupied a brick-built fortress-like city of 50 acres in edtent, 20 times the size of ancient Troy, It stood on a hill dominating the estuary and harbourage and was the key city of the international road between Palestine and Egypt., along which Anzacs advanced during tho Great War. It included a sft tunnel, 500 ft long, running from the gateway and cmerg ing on the plain, for use either to assist escape or for attack on besiegers. The excavations reveal that, the master of the house was buried with his asses, sometimes four of them. The kings wore proud of their huge horses. Some of these horses, whose skulls were 22 inches long, also received careful burial. When malaria destroyed Tcl-el-Ajjul, the kings built a new city on the site of Gaza. Twenty fresh tombs, including those of Royal personages, have been unearthed near Gaza pyramids. Among the discoveries is the skull of a daughter of King Noserra. Ytiip-ad year*