34 



ARCHEOLOGY. (PALESTINE.) 



with many poor people crowding round him. and 

 the accompanying inscription reads: "The going 

 forth through the land in the early morning to 

 grant the daily favors and listen to the words 

 of the people, without showing any distinction be- 

 tween small and great." The "keeper of the 

 seal*' was associated with the vizier in his state 

 duties, and the two together visited the palace 

 every day to pay their respects to the king. A 

 list "is given of the Government otlicers who had 

 to report to the vixier. He seems to have had 

 supervision of the inland revenue and home 

 olnce. of the hoards of trade and agriculture, the 

 -regulation of canals" and of "the duties of 

 steersmen and pilots on the Nile," of the work- 

 men attached to the Temple of Karnak, of the 

 duties of the minister of the fine arts, etc. In 

 two large set-lies depicting the collection and in- 

 spection of taxes, the commodities subject to 

 duty are enumerated and accurately pictured, a 

 very noticeable feature of the representation being 

 tha't of the heads or ring money of gold paid 

 as tithes. Kach portion of the taxes is brought 

 in by a deputation consisting of the mayor, the 

 registrar, the surveyor, and the scribe. Among 

 the articles are * k 500 pigeons," baskets, and coils 

 of rope. As minister of the fine arts, the vizier 

 had the duty " of inspecting all the handicrafts 

 and teaching each man his duty according to the 

 manner of all occupations.'' Every detail of the 

 work of gold and silver smiths, cabinet-makers, 

 sculptors, and bronze workers is depicted. 



The tomb of Tehuti,, who made the decorations 

 of the great temples of Karnak and of Deir-el- 

 Itahari, is near that of Rekh-ma-Ra, and was ex- 

 plored by the Marquis of Northampton in 1898. 

 This artist was skilled in massive and in deli- 

 cate work, having both executed the great bronze 

 and electrum gates of Karnak, and fabricated 

 the collars and necklaces of the favorites of the 

 king. 



The Egypt Exploration Fund has published the 

 first part of the description of the tomb of Ptah- 

 hetep, and his son Aukh-hetep, of the fifth dy- 

 nasty, at Sakkara, with careful plans and draw- 

 ings by Mr. N. de G. Davies. The tomb is a very 

 large one, with many chambers and corridors, and 

 has the walls decorated with hunting scenes and 

 representations of the pastoral life of the nobles 

 of the period, and of sports and pastimes. The 

 reproductions of decorative work in these paint- 

 ings are mentioned as being especially interesting, 

 and as bearing evidence that Egyptian decorative 

 art derived its inspiration from textile w r ork. 



A book on Greek Ostraka from Egypt and Nu- 

 bia, published by Prof. U. Welchen, contains 1,624 

 inscriptions from clay tablets in Greek, Arabic, 

 etc., brought from Egypt and preserved in the 

 Berlin, Paris, London, Rome, and Turin collec- 

 tions and in various private libraries. These in- 

 scriptions shed light on life in Egypt from B. C. 

 300 to A. i). 700. The Jews appear from them to 

 have been in charge of most of the tax collec- 

 tions in Egypt. The name Jairus, mentioned in 

 the New Testament, occurs in them. Heathen 

 priests are called elders. 



A large number of papyri, including the oldest 

 known texts of Plato, Aristotle, Herodotus, De- 

 mosthenes, Xenophon, Euclid, the Iliad, the Odys- 

 sey, etc., have been presented recently to Ameri- 

 can universities and museums by the Egypt Ex- 

 ploration Fund. Among these are the oldest ex- 

 tant text of St. Matthew, which becomes the 

 property of the University of Pennsylvania, and 

 a text of St. Paul that of Harvard University. 

 The papyri treat of legal, medical, social, and busi- 

 ness matters of almost every kind. A number of 



antiquities, largely from Abydos, were also dis- 

 tributed. 



Among the papyri from the Fayum identified 

 by the explorers and translators of the Graeco- 

 Roman branch of the Egypt Exploration Fund 

 is a copy of the romance The Loves of Chaereas 

 and Callirhoe, by Chariton. It was found, to- 

 gether with documents dated in the reigns of 

 Commodus and Caracalla, and the handwriting 

 corresponds with that of this period, not later 

 than the second century, A. D. It is inferred that 

 a book to be known then at a village in the 

 Fayum must have been written at a much earlier 

 period; while in the uncertainty respecting Chari- 

 ton's date, the dictionaries have assumed that he 

 flourished not earlier than the fifth century. The 

 text, according to the Rev. W. C. Winslow, 

 American representative of the Egypt Exploration 

 Fund, tends to confirm the authority of the Flor- 

 entine text of this work of the thirteenth century ; 

 " and the general result may be said to prove that 

 the copies of the classics made at Byzantium ~ 

 perhaps a thousand years after Greek literature 

 had a place in Western Europe Were "of a remark- 

 ably uncorrupted text." 



The work of the Ernst Sieglin Expedition at 

 Alexandria has been carried on by the architects 

 August Thiersch and Ernst Flechter, and the 

 archeologists, Alfred Schiff and Herrmann 

 Thiersch. The Herren Thiersch, father and son, 

 have been mainly occupied with the remains of 

 the Serapaeum, the foundations of which were par- 

 tially discovered and laid bare by Giuseppi Botti. 

 Results have been obtained which will consider- 

 ably modify earlier speculations. An unexpected 

 find was the discovery of two magnificent sub- 

 terranean burial places (in the quarters Sabbari 

 and Kom-es-Schugafa) richly adorned with wall- 

 paintings. Some sculptured reliefs discovered in 

 the same place are said to give " a new impression 

 of Alexandrian art." 



Palestine. A room in the Government school, 

 just inside of Herod's gate at Jerusalem, has been 

 set aside as a museum for the objects found in 

 the excavations of the Palestine Exploration 

 Fund, and the articles have been numbered and 

 catalogued. In one of the cases are 101 exam- 

 ples of pre-Israelite pottery, and in another 184 

 specimens of Seleucidean ware. Besides these are 

 pottery figurines, gems, tablets, scarabs, and ob- 

 jects of bronze, iron, bone, stone, and glass, and a 

 collection of coins. Although small, this museum 

 is unique in that it contains the only full collec- 

 tion from which the history of Palestinian pot- 

 tery may be studied from pre-Israelite to Roman 

 times. 



A mosaic, described as a work of art of high 

 order, found in March in the grounds of a Jewish 

 colony northward of the city of Jerusalem, near 

 the Damascus Gate, is of heathen design. It bears 

 figures of Orpheus playing the harp, with Pan 

 and a centaur beneath him. A frame or border 

 around this group is composed of ornamentally 

 entwined branches enclosing other figures. Be- 

 neath this are two women around whom is an in- 

 scription in Greek letters "Theodosia" and 

 "Georgia." This is the second mosaic that has 

 been found within a few years in this neighbor- 

 hood ; but others, among which is the map of 

 Palestine, from Madeba, have been found on the 

 other side of the Jordan. 



When, sixteen years ago, the Didache was sub- 

 jected to critical analysis, scholars surmised that 

 the first part of it had been a separate work. 

 They recognized in it the treatise to which patris- 



3 writers often alluded as The Two Ways. 

 This work has recently been discovered, and has - 



