CATACOMBS OF NECROPOLIS. 389 
has been sriven to an artificial reservoir, into citap. 
VII. 
which the sea has now^ access ; but for what 
reason it has been so called, cannot be ascer- 
tained: it is a bason hewn out of the rock; and 
if it ever were intended for a bath, it was, in all 
probability, a place where they washed the 
bodies of the dead before they were embalmed. 
Shaiu maintained that the Cryptce of Necro- 
polis were not intended for the reception of 
niummies, or embalmed bodies*; in which he 
is decidedly contradicted by the textof iS'^ra^'o^ 
Perhaps he was one of those who had been 
induced to adopt the erroneous notion that 
mummies were placed upright upon their feet 
in Egyptian sepulchres, and therefore was at a 
loss to reconcile the horizontal position of the 
Thecce with his preconceived notions. We shall 
presently have very satisfactory evidence of the 
manner in which embalmed bodies were laid, 
when deposited within these tombs by the inha- 
bitants of Egypt, before the foundation oi Alex- 
andria. The original entrance to them is now 
closed, and it is externally concealed from 
{2) " The Ciypla, &c. were not intended for the reception of 
mummies or embalmed bodies." Shaw's Travels, p. 293. Lond. 1757. 
(3) Kai KOLrayaytii, Tpof ras ra^i^^sla} ru> iiK^m itirmitou. Slrobon. 
Geogr. lib. xvii. p. 1128. Oxon. 1807. 
