EGYPT, AND SYRIA. 137 
Egypt, I was always informed that they had not been difco- 
vered till within the laft thirty years, when a fon of Shech Ha- 
mam, a very powerful chief of the Arabs, who governed all the 
South of Egypt from Achmim to Nubia, caufed four of them 
to be opened, in expectation of finding treafure. 
They had probably been rifled in very antient times ; but 
how the memory of them fhould have been loft remains to be 
explained. One of thofe which I vifited exactly anfwers Dr. 
Pococke's defcription ; but the other three appear materially 
different from any of his plans. It is therefore pofTible that 
fome of thofe which he faw have been gradually clofed up 
by the fand, and that the fon of Hamam had difcovered 
others. 
They are cut into the free-ftone rock, in appearance upon one 
general plan, though differing in parts. Firft, a paffage of fome 
length ; then a chamber ; a continuation of the firft pafTage 
turns abruptly to the right, where is the large fepulchral cham- 
ber, with a farcophagus of red granite in the midft. 
In the fecond part of the pafTage of the largeft are feveral 
cells or receffes on both fides. In thefe appear the chief paint- 
ings, reprefenting the myfteries, which, as well as the hierogly- 
phics covering all the walls, are very frefh. I particularly ob- 
ferved the two harpers defcribed by Bruce ; but his engraved 
figures feem to be from memory. The French merchants at 
Kahira informed me that he brought with him two Italian 
T artlfts ; 
