EGYPTIAN TREASURE TROVE.

Woodville Examiner, Volume XXII, Issue 3872, 11 May 1906, Page 4 (Supplement)

EGYPTIAN TREASURE TROVE.

The excavation in the Valley of the Kings, in Egypt, undertaken by Mr. Theodore M. Ear is, for the benefit of the museum at Cairo and directed by Mr. Quiboll, the Government archaeologist superintending the Theban district, brought to light a treasure of unexampled interest, not only in its historical, but likewise in its social aspect. Setting aside the former view point as being more suited to the studies of archaeologists, and the raptures of the export mind, wo may turn our attention to the ornamental and household furniture discovered, most of which displayed a craftmanohip of extraordinary merit, alabaster vases, delicately worked in high relief, carvings of most graceful lines, statuettes of stone or wood, lavishly gilded, and mummy cases inlaid with gold and bitumen, or covered with stamped and gilded leather. Rut the most extraordinary find centred in the pieces of furniture. The bedstead is fully 3000 years old, but is of beautiful workmanship, and was evidently taken from household furniture in actual use. Tlio bottom -is of braided flax. The three panels of the bed-head on the inside are almost uniform in size with •those on the outside; but the arrangement of the designs is different. They are all of the ■hippopotamus goddess Taurt. Of the two chairs, one, dating hack to 1700 8.C., is almost identical with the Empire style so popular to-day. On the outside of the left arm are figures, ■gilded with Nubian gold, of Bes. On the inside are maid (servants carrying rings of gold. On the inside of the hack appears Queen Tii's daughter SetAmmon, who is twice represented on a throne. Above her is a winged solar ■disc, and a female slave brings her the offering of a golden collar. The legs of tho chair are 'modelled on those of the ox. Tho seat is of interlaced palm fibre. Tho “Louis XVI.” chair of 1700 B.C. ■was probably merely a model for the use of the dead. It was lightly built, and covered with low reliefs in fragile and thinly gilded plaster. On the other side is a gazelle. On the back is the God ■Bes, between two figures of the goddess Tanrt. The cushion is stuffed with goose-feathers. There was also a third chair, which bore a carved figure of SetAmnion, with a cat under her chair,' and on each side a female fan-l>caror. The picture is lined with the Greek fret, piViving intercourse with the Acgan. Perliaps the most curious find of all was the dress of provision basket of remote antiquity. Tho chest is of palm wood and papyrus, 'and is lined inside with papyrus. ' It has two fastenings of string, land a tray with papyrus flaps. There are openings for ventilation. -•-