August, 1904.] 



KNOWLEDGE & SCIENTIFIC NEWS. 



185 



The Dolls of the Tombs 



The Bervi Ha.sa.n Excava.tions. 



Bv the kindness of Mr. John Garstang', director of the 

 Beni Hasan I£xca\ ations, we are able to reproduce 

 some photog;raphs of the extraordinarily inlerestint; 

 models and the fascinating- dolls which Iiave been found 

 by him in the excavated tombs of Beni Hasan. Our 

 thanks arc also due to the Council of the .Vnthropo- 

 logical Institute, in whose journal, J\Iii>i, ^^av, 1903 

 and July, 1904, the photographs have already appeared. 

 These models, placed in their rocky tombs 4,000 years 

 ago, were recently exhibited at the -Society of .\nti- 

 ciuaries' Rooms, Burlington House, and proved witliout 

 doubt the most attractive archaeological exhibition of the 

 year. Some of the models have been shown in London 

 before, and Princess Henry of Battcnberg was an 

 interested visitor, not at Burlington House alone, but at 

 the excavations themselves in Egypt. The attraction 

 of the dolls is of a double kind. It lies not only in the 

 knowledge that they are the handiwork of 4,000 years 



string Dolls. Tomb 420. 



ago, or that they represent the life of those times as 

 well as the probable superstition that the presence of 

 such dolls in tombs ensured for the human body buried 

 there the company, assistance, and service of slaves, 

 .soldiers, and equipment in the Paradise where the soul 

 had gone ; but it is to be found also in the extraordinary 

 vividness of the df)lls themselves. They are sometimes 

 rudely carved, but they are always lifelike. There arc 

 dolls in granaries and dolls in war-galleys — wonderful 

 dolls these, with a world of expression in their glaring 

 eyes, though the eyes are only two dashes and a dot — 

 and a w-ondcrful vigour in the way their wooden arms 

 strain at the sweeps. You can almost hear the yell of 

 the steersman and the crack of his whip. Then there 

 are dolls baking, kneading, butchering ; and a wooden 

 bullock with meek legs bound together is ready 

 decorated for the .sacrifice. The wooden priests stand 

 near with wooden gestures of uplifted piety. In one 

 galley the dolls are pla3'ing chess ! Then there are 

 dolls of historic interest ; the dolls that point to a 

 Libyan irruption and a renaissance of new ideals in the 

 art of dolls ; and a beautiful wooden portrait doll, with 

 an archaic smile on his well-cut lips and determination 

 writ plainly on his jaws and fist. Lastly, there are the 

 real dolls of that forgotten day, dolls that were made of 

 string and had curly locks of threaded beads — such 



were the dolls that little Xoith-IIetep or .\ycsha played 

 with 4,000 years ago. 



Of the exc:ivations, Mr. (iarslang writes : — " It was 

 early in December, 1902, that excavations commenced 

 in the vicinitv of Beni Hasan. The site is on the east 

 bank of the Nile, where the river approaches somewhat 

 closely to the limestone cliffs lh:it bound the \allev, 

 some fourteen miles southward fiimi Mini.i, a great 



i;.iat of Twenty Oars. Tomb 116. 



town of Middle l^gypt. The site has long been famous 

 for its long gallery' of Middle Empire tombs, which are 

 hewn in the living rock, well up the slope. These are 

 decorated in their interior with scenes, painted with 

 realism upon the dressed surface of the walls, which 

 are the more interesting in (hat they represent, in many 

 cases, incidents of daily life in the home and in ihe 

 fields, as well as the rites perl.-iining to the dead, in the 

 age to which they belong, more than 2, coo years n.c. 

 Historically they belong to the feudal period of Ivgypt, 

 when the Government was in the hands of powi-iful 

 chieftains — hereditary owners of the soil, and they 

 bridge over the intervening years during \\lii<li the 

 monarchy slowly regained its authority, and was finally 

 re-established by Amenemhat III. 



These great rock-hewn chambers, for 1I10 most jiart, 

 indicate the burial places of these feudal lords, whose 

 great sarcophagi were placed in small recesses at the 

 foot of deep square shafts within them. It might have 

 been suspected that the court officials of these great 

 chieftains, who kept up regal pomp, would seek burial 

 in the same vicinity ; and that the tf)mb furniture and 

 burial deposits placed with them might illustrate more 

 fullv the civilisation and culture of the age : such was, 



The Making of Beer. Tomb 116. 



indeed, the quest of this expedition. The necropolis 

 w-as discovered ranging along the face of the cliff, just 

 below the famous gallery ; and 887 tombs were found 

 and excavated during the two years' work. The pre- 

 sence of these was already indicated, indeed, by the 

 numerous open mouths of shafts sunk in the lime- 

 stone. 



The first tomb discovered and entered gave an indica- 



