576 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1893. 



whom they were conceded by the vice roi. Boscawen,* however, 

 gives us to understand that they were worked at a much earlier period 

 by kings of the sixth dynasty (3703 B. C. according to Mariette; 

 2744 B. C. according- to Prof. Lepsius). He describes the quarry as 

 situated in tlie hills to the east of the Syout road, some 10 miles south- 

 east of the plain of Tel-el Amarna, and as being about 250 feet long 

 by 50 feet in width, cut into the face of the hill. It was worked, he 

 says, upon a most regular system, layer after layer being cut away, 

 the product being both " alabaster " and ordinary limestone. The 

 detailed description of this author is as follows: 



"Starting from the quarry is a broad roadway, from 15 to 20 feet wide, crossing the 

 hille into the line of the Siout road, and thence across the plain of Tel el- Amarna to 

 the Nile. This roadway is a wonderful piece of eogiueeriug work. In one place a 

 rapine some 40 or 50 feet is crossed, the roadway being carried across by a solid 

 causeway built by bowlders so arranged on a road basis as to support very heavy 

 weights. The gradients are regulated with great care. 



"This quarry does not seem to have been worked much during the later dynasties 

 of the Middle Empire. The other day the Arabs brought us news of a large 

 niagharah. or quarry, witli inscriptions, situated one day's journey into the desert. 

 So Mr. Newberry and myself started on camels. It was a long, dreary ride across 

 the plain of Tel-el-Amarna, along the Siout road, and across the hills, slightly to 

 the south of Hat-Nub. Here we crossed a number of barren wadies and reached 

 the slopes of a low limestone range, proljably the northern jiortiou of the Jebel- 

 Kaiwlch, and after a hard climb reached the entrance to a large quarry, which was 

 partially blocked with drift and rubbish. It required but a very casual inspection 

 to find that we had struck a very ancient quarry, for on the lintel of the door were 

 a number of inscriptions of King Teta, the founder of the sixth dynasty. The 

 inscriptions on the doorway were very archaic in type, especially the rudely-drawn 

 figures of a dog and a hawk and the portrait of Teta wearing a crown. The entrance 

 chamber of the quarry ran due south for a distance of about 80 feet and then struck 

 XI broad isle running slightly southeast for a distance of about 110 feet. All around . 

 were fragments of beautiful alabaster, of a typo not used for building purposes, but 

 the fine, rich, yellow, close-grained sort, often with brown veins, used for statues, 

 vases, and toilet and sacrificial pots. The walls were covered in many places by rude 

 votive inscriptions, usually painted panels representing a sacrificial scene, with the 

 table of offerings. Some of these are grotesque almost to caricature. The face and 

 limbs are the dark Egyptian red, the robe white, while the grotesque nose of the 

 figure and the green palm branch seem to quite burlesque the scenes near Over the 

 figure is a short hieratic inscrijition. On other walls are dated inscriptions in the 

 reign of Amenemhat II, of the twelfth dyna.sty, and a fine rock-cut tablet of Usertesen 

 III. The king is here represeuted seated on his throne, with his hunting dog by 

 his side. 



"The c[uarry does not seem to have l»een worked after the period of the twelfth dyn- 

 asty. We slept in the quarry that night, and it was indeed about as old and as weird a 

 bedchamber as was ever my fortune to occupy. Bats flew over our heads and blinked 

 at the lamp, and about midnight two foxes, whose home we had usurjied, came to 

 the top of the neighboring hills and barked defiance. * * * The morning was 

 devoted to examining the quarry, and with some interesting results. The alabaster 

 vein was not very thick, but very rich in color, and the method of working seemed 

 to have been to cut out blocks about 4 or 6 feet long and 3 feet in depth and width 

 These were hewn out and roughly dressed with stone hammers and chisels made 



* See Stone, Indianapolis, Indiana, Sept., 1893, i)p. 362-36.5. 



