140 OBSERVATIONS ON EGYPTIAN ETHNOGRAPHY, 
chiefly directed to Africa, and especially to the valley of the Nile; a region which they 
have invaded and more or less occupied from the earliest times, through the reigns of 
the Pharaohs, Ptolemies, and Caesars, down to a recent period of our own era. What 
language can be stronger than that of Juba, (about the commencement of our own era,) 
that the inhabitants of the valley of the Nile, from Phila to Meroé, were not Ethiopians, 
but Arabs? So, also, in the days of Strabo, half the population of Coptos itself was made 
up of the same people. 
The cranial resemblances between the Arabs and ancient Egyptians impressed me 
forcibly from the commencement of my inquiries; which last I have been able to prose- 
cute in a more satisfactory manner by means of a series of Arab skulls, obtained in Egypt 
by Mr. Gliddon. I subjoin outline drawings of five of them, in order that the reader may 
judge for himself. 
= ib Ze ZB / 
a) 
These skulls are all adult, and though comparatively small, give a mean internal ca- 
pacity of eighty-four cubic inches, which is above the Egyptian average. The analogy, 
however, is greater in form than in size, as may be observed by comparing the above out- 
lines with several of the embalmed heads from the catacombs, and especially that figured 
Plate VI., Fig. 7. In fact, the resemblance between the Egyptian and Arab head is so 
striking, that nothing but a faithful study of the monuments has satisfied me that the 
two nations were primitively distinct from each other; and that what I at first believed to 
be the Austral-Egyptian conformation, is no other than the Egyptian itself. Some very 
ancient paintings, copied by Rosellini from the temple decorations at Beyt-el-Walee, in 
Nubia, appear, also, to pertain to the Arab physiognomy. (Plate XIV., Figs. 19,20.) In 
these the yellowish-red complexion indicates, we might suppose, some affinity with the 
Egyptian nation, while the small, pointed beard, and sharp, prominent face, point to the 
Arabian stock of nations. Their name reads Tohen on the monuments; and they pertain 
to the age of Rameses IL., and illustrate the conquests of that monarch 1579 years before 
Christ. 
Without entering into a philological discussion, it is worthy of remark, that the Gheez 
or Ethiopic language, the oldest of the known tongues of Abyssinia, is directly allied to 
the Arabic and Hebrew. The period of its introduction into Africa is unknown, though 
it probably dates far beyond our era. Moreover, among the ruins recently discovered at 
Hasan Ghordb, (170 miles east of Aden,) at Sanaa, and at other places in Yemen, inscrip- 
tions have been abundantly found in the old Ethiopic tongue, which, in the opinion of 
the late Professor Gesenius, is a modification of the parent Hemyarite language. 
These few facts, with others which will be adduced hereafter, go to prove that the 
Egyptian people must have been more or less blended with the Arabian race; nor can 
