G6 
the ground to that level of 9 feet 4 inches. Raineses, according to Lepsius, 
reigned from 1394 to 1328 b.c., and if we suppose the statue to have been 
erected in the middle of his reign, i.e. in 1361, we have between a.d. 1854 
and that time 3,215 years, during which the above depth of 9 feet 4 inhces of 
sediment was accumulated ; and, supposing that no disturbing cause had 
interfered with what may be termed the normal rate of deposition in this 
locality, and of which there is no evidence, we have thus a mean rate of 
increase within a small fraction of 3j inches in a century.” 
In this way Mr. Horner determined the first step in his 
problem, the mean rate of the deposition of Nile mud at 
the base of the statue. At a depth of 39 feet from the sur- 
face a fragment of burnt brick was obtained. This enables 
Mr. Horner, as he supposes, to determine a period at which 
civilized man inhabited the valley of the Nile. 
“ In a large majority of the excavations and borings,” says Mr. Horner, 
“ the sediment was found to contain, at various depths, and frequently at the 
lowest, small fragments of burnt brick and pottery. In the lowest part of 
the boring of the sediment at the colossal statue in the year 1854, at a 
depth of 39 feet from the surface of the ground, consisting throughout of 
true Nile sediment, the instrument brought up a fragment of pottery, 
now in my possession. It is about an inch square and a quarter of an 
inch in thickness, the two surfaces being of a brick-red colour, the interior 
dark grey. This fragment, having been found at a depth of 39 feet, if 
there be no fallacy in my reasoning, must be held to be a record of 
the existence of man 13,371 years before a.d. 1854, reckoning by the 
before-mentioned rate of increase in that locality of 3| inches in a century, 
11,517 years before the Christian era, and 7,625 years before the beginning 
assigned by Lepsius to the reign of Menes, the founder of Memphis ; of 
man, moreover, in a state of civilization, so far, at least, as to be able to 
fashion clay into vessels, and to know how to harden it by the action of a 
strong heat. 
“ In the pit marked No. 6 in the ground-plan, at page 62, which was 354 
yards north of the colossal statue, at a distance of 330 yards from the river, 
fragments of pottery were found at a depth of 38 feet from the surface of the 
ground. 
“ Fragments of burnt brick and of pottery have been found at even 
greater depths in localities near the banks of the river, 10 and 16 miles below 
Cairo. In the boring of Sigiul, described in page 64, under the number 26, 
fragments of burnt brick and pottery were found in the sediment brought up 
from between the 45th and 50th foot from the surface ; and in the boring at 
Bessousse they were brought up from the lowest part, viz., 59 feet from the 
surface, but in this case in sand, the lowest sediment containing fragments of 
brick and pottery being at a depth of about 48 feet. I have also learned, 
from a communication with which I have been favoured by M. Linant de 
