610 Wilkinson's Manners and Customs 



Egypt, the garden and the fields were both watered by the shadoof, or by 

 buckets carried on a yoke across the shoulders ; but there is no appearance of 

 their having used any hydraulic machine similar to the Persian wheel, now so 

 common in the East ; nor do the sculptures represent the foot machine men- 

 tioned by Philo, which is supposed to be referred to in the sacred writings 

 (Deut. xi. 40.), ' Egypt .... where thou sowedst thy seed, and wateredst 

 it with thy foot, as a garden of herbs.' Some think that this alludes to the 

 mode of stopping the small watercourses with mud, by the foot, and turning 

 off the water into another channel, still adopted in their gardens and fields." 

 {Ibid., vol. ii. p. 5.) 



" Besides the date and dom trees, there were the sycamore fig, pome- 

 granate, olive, peach, almond, persea, nebq or sidr (Rhamnus arabica Forsk.), 

 mokhayh or myxa (Cordia MyxaZ/.), Rharoob (Ceratonia Siliqua L. or locust 

 tree), and some others; and among those which bore no fruit, the most remarkable 

 were, the tamarisk (Tamarix gallica),and a^w/(Tamarix orientalis.Fors/(\), Cas- 

 sia fistula and C. Senna, the Palma Christi or castorberry tree, myrtle, the sant, 

 or acanthus, mimosa, or Acacia nilotica, the sagid ( Acacia Segal), fituch (Acacia 

 farnesiana), tulh (Acacia gummifera), libbckh,{ Acacia Libbeck, Mimosa Libbeck 

 £.), and several other mimosas, besides many trees now only known in the 

 desert, or in the more southerly region of Ethiopia. But I confine myself 

 for the present to the produce of the garden, in connexion with their festivities 

 and domestic wants. 



" So fond were the Egyptians of trees and flowers, and of gracing their gar- 

 dens with all the profusion and variety which cultivation could obtain, that 

 they even exacted a contribution of rare productions from the nations which 

 were tributary to them, and foreigners from distant countries are represented 

 bringing plants among the presents to the Egyptian king. They carried this 

 love for them still further, and not only painted the lotus and other favourite 

 flowers among the fancy devices of their walls, and on the furniture of their 

 houses, on their dresses, chairs, and boxes, on their boats, and, in short, what- 

 ever they wished to ornament, but they appear, from Pliny, to have composed 

 artificial flowers, which received the name ' Egyptiae ; ' if, indeed, we may be 

 allowed to consider these similar to the ' Hybernae' he afterwards describes. 

 And it is not improbable that they, like the Romans in their town houses, 

 had representations of gardens, or the rich blossoms of favourite flowers, 

 painted on the stuccoed walls. Wreaths and chaplets were likewise in com- 

 mon use among the Egyptians at a very early period ; and, though the lotus 

 was principally preferred for these purposes, many other flowers and leaves 

 were employed, as of the chrysanthemum, acinon, acacia, strychnus, persoluta, 

 anemone, convolvulus, olive, amaricus, xeranthemum, bay tree, and others ; 

 and Plutarch tells us that, when Agesilaus visited Egypt, he was so delighted 

 with the chaplets of papyrus sent him by the king, that he took some home 

 when he returned to Sparta." (p. 184.) 



" The god of gardens was Khem, supposed to answer to the Grecian Pan. 

 The garden was also under the special protection of Ranno, a goddess fre- 

 quently represented in the form of an asp, or with a human body and an asp's 

 head. In the sacred sculptures of Egyptian temples, we have frequently the 

 representation of a king breaking up the soil with a hoe, in the presence of 

 this god with an asp's head." (p. 185.) 



Egyptian Villas. — The Egyptians are said to have paid less attention to 

 their houses than to their tombs ; but this seems to have arisen from the 

 latter having reached us in more perfect repair than the former. 



" Besides the town houses, the Egyptians had extensive villas, which, with 

 a very commodious mansion, contained spacious gardens, watered by canals 

 communicating with the Nile. They had also tanks of water in different 

 parts of the garden, which served for ornament, as well as for irrigation when 

 the Nile was low ; and on these the master of the house occasionally amused 

 himself and his friends by an excursion in a pleasure-boat kept for the pur- 

 pose. But, like the Orientals of the present day, or like people of the conti- 



