^0' 



NA TURE 



[AlKIL 28, 1910 



jun., Prof. Maciver has been enabled to initiate a 

 programme of archaeological exploration in Egypt 

 which, if continued, will, under the leadership of this 

 most competent archaeologist, undoubtedly result in 

 interesting and important discoveries. 



Prof. Maciver has chosen for the scene of his work 

 a portion of the Nile valley which has hitherto seemed 

 most unpromising, the barren Nubia that lies between 

 the first and second cataracts. The nature of the 

 country, in which the river flows practically through 

 desert, with only the narrowest fringe of cultivation 

 along its banks, seemed to deny the possibility of any 

 important ancient centre having been established there, 

 and the temples that were erected by the river-side 

 seemed to be the memorials more of Egyptian imperio- 

 religious pride than of real civilising energy. There 



liminary tour of his Nubian district, which resulted 

 in the publication of a careful and detailed report on 

 the archaeological probabilities and possibilities of 

 Nubia. Then the Survey Department started a 

 thorough and comprehensive exploration of the whole 

 district (including excavations under the direction of 

 Dr. Reisner and Mr. Firth, which began its labours 

 at Shellal, and is now slowly working southwards). 



Independent explorers were also summoned to the 

 work. Prof. Garstang, of the University of Liverpool, 

 carried out a season's work at Koshtamneh which 

 was productive of interesting results. Unluckily, it 

 has remained a atra^ \iyi)p.(vov. Prof. Garstang was 

 drawn aside from the comparatively dull antiquities 

 of Nubia to the more beautiful trophies to be found 

 in the necropolis of Abydos, but he has now turned 



Nubian Castle near Amada : Period of Thothmes III. View looking from the North-eas; Coiner. From ' Areika. 



is little doubt that no serious attempt to seek for 

 remains of antiquity in this region would have been 

 made even now had it not been for the fact that the 

 proximate raising of the level of the Aswan Dam 

 threatened the drowning of the ancient banks for a 

 considerable distance upstream, and the consequent 

 destruction of any historical evidence that might be 

 buried near them. The attention of the Service des 

 Antiquites, the archaeological branch of the Egyptian 

 Public Works Department, was at once directed to 

 the necessity of saving such historical evidence so 

 far as possible, and the director-general of the Service, 

 Sir Gaston Maspero, K.C.M.G., commenced the 

 organisation of a general archaeological campaign in 

 Nubia. Mr. A. E. Weigall, the inspector of antiquities 

 for Upper Egypt and Nubia, undertook a pre- 

 XO. 2 1 13, VOL. 83] 



again southwards, to the Sudan, and time may yet 

 bring him back to assist the researches of Mr. Firth 

 and Prof. Maciver in Nubia. Prof. Maciver was last 

 in the field, but has already made most interesting 

 finds, which are described in "Areika," the volume 

 under review. Assisted by Mr. C. Leonard Woolley, 

 he has explored the region between Korosko and 

 Amada, known as El Righa or Areika, which gives 

 its name to the book. Here he has carried out three 

 excavations; first, that of the castle of a Nubian chief 

 of the time of Thothmes IIL, near Amada; secondly, 

 that of a neighbouring cemetery of earlier date ; 

 thirdly, and most important of the three, that of 

 a cemetery of Roman date at Shablul, opposite 

 Korosko. 



The Nubian chief's castle is a queer conglomera- 



