ARTHUR E. P. WEIGALL
Travels in the Upper Egyptian
Deserts
Travels in the Upper Egyptian
Deserts
BY
ARTHUR E. P. WEIGALL
CHIEF INSPECTOR OF UPPER EGYPT, DEPARTMENT
OF ANTIQUITIES
AUTHOR OF 'A REPORT ON THE ANTIQUITIES OF
LOWER NUBIA,' 'A CATALOGUE OF THE WEIGHTS
AND BALANCES IN THE CAIRO MUSEUM,' 'A GUIDE
TO THE ANTIQUITIES OF UPPER EGYPT,' 'DIE
MASTABA DES GEMNIICAI' (WITH PROFESSOR VON
BISSING ETC. <...> Some of the chapters in this book have appeared as
articles in 'Blackwood's Magazine.' The various journeys here
recorded have been made in the ordinary course of the work of
inspection, and have been reported in the usual official manner. <...> These less technical descriptions have been written in leisure
hours, and the illustrations here published are selected from a
large number of photographs and drawings rapidly made by the
wayside. <...> The journey to Wady Hammamât and Kossair was
made in the company of three painters, Mr Charles Whymper,
Mr Walter Tyndale, and Mr Erskine Nicol, to whom my thanks
are due, as also they are to Mr John Wells, with whom I
travelled to Gebel Dukhân. <...> I KNOW a young man who declares that after reading a
certain explorer's description of a journey across the burning
Sahara, he found to his amazement that his nose was covered
with freckles. <...> The reader will perhaps remember how, on some
rainy day in his childhood, he has sat over the fire and has read
sea-stories and dreamed sea-dreams until his lips, he will swear,
have tasted salt. <...> Alas, one's little agility in the art of narration is
wholly inadequate for the production, at this time of life, of any
such phenomena upon the gentle skins of those who chance to
read these pages. <...> Were one a master-maker of literature, one
might herewith lead the imaginative so straight into the
boisterous breezes of Egypt, one might hold them so entranced
in the sunlight which streams over the desert, that they would
feel, wherever they might be seated, the tingling glow of the
sun and the wind upon their cheeks, and would hold their hands
to their eyes as a shelter from the glare <...>
Travels_in_the_Upper_Egyptian_deserts.pdf
ARTHUR E. P. WEIGALL
Travels in the Upper Egyptian
Deserts
Стр.1
Travels in the Upper Egyptian
Deserts
BY
ARTHUR E. P. WEIGALL
CHIEF INSPECTOR OF UPPER EGYPT, DEPARTMENT
OF ANTIQUITIES
AUTHOR OF 'A REPORT ON THE ANTIQUITIES OF
LOWER NUBIA,' 'A CATALOGUE OF THE WEIGHTS
AND BALANCES IN THE CAIRO MUSEUM,' 'A GUIDE
TO THE ANTIQUITIES OF UPPER EGYPT,' 'DIE
MASTABA DES GEMNIICAI' (WITH PROFESSOR VON
BISSING ETC.
EDINBURGH AND LONDON 1909
Стр.2
PREFACE.
Some of the chapters in this book have appeared as
articles in 'Blackwood's Magazine.' The various journeys here
recorded have been made in the ordinary course of the work of
inspection, and have been reported in the usual official manner.
These less technical descriptions have been written in leisure
hours, and the illustrations here published are selected from a
large number of photographs and drawings rapidly made by the
wayside. The journey to Wady Hammamât and Kossair was
made in the company of three painters, Mr Charles Whymper,
Mr Walter Tyndale, and Mr Erskine Nicol, to whom my thanks
are due, as also they are to Mr John Wells, with whom I
travelled to Gebel Dukhân. I am Indebted to Prof. Sayce and Mr
Seymour de Ricci for several notes on the Greek inscriptions at
Wady Abad. On some of the journeys I was accompanied by
Mahmoud Effendi Rushdy and Mahmoud Effendi Muhammed,
Inspectors of the Department of Antiquities, whose assistance
was valuable.
ARTHUR E. P. WEIGALL.
LUXOR,
UPPER EGYPT.
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CONTENTS
I. THE EASTERN DESERT AND ITS INTERESTS.....................2
II. TO THE QUARRIES OF WADY HAMMAMÂT...................22
III. THE RED SEA HIGHROAD...................................................51
IV. THE IMPERIAL PORPHYRY QUARRIES. .........................79
V. THE QUARRIES OF MONS CLAUDIANUS. ......................101
VI. THE TEMPLE OF WADY ABÂD.........................................126
VII. A NUBIAN HIGHWAY.........................................................157
1
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I.
THE EASTERN DESERT AND ITS
INTERESTS.
I KNOW a young man who declares that after reading a
certain explorer's description of a journey across the burning
Sahara, he found to his amazement that his nose was covered
with freckles. The reader will perhaps remember how, on some
rainy day in his childhood, he has sat over the fire and has read
sea-stories and dreamed sea-dreams until his lips, he will swear,
have tasted salt. Alas, one's little agility in the art of narration is
wholly inadequate for the production, at this time of life, of any
such phenomena upon the gentle skins of those who chance to
read these pages. Were one a master-maker of literature, one
might herewith
lead the imaginative so straight
into
the
boisterous breezes of Egypt, one might hold them so entranced
in the sunlight which streams over the desert, that they would
feel, wherever they might be seated, the tingling glow of the
sun and the wind upon their cheeks, and would hold their hands
to their eyes as a shelter from the glare. The walls of their
rooms would fall flat as those of Jericho; and outside they
would see the advancing host of the invaders — the sunshine,
the north wind, the scudding clouds, the circling eagles, the
glistening sand, the blue shadows, and the rampant rocks. And
the night closing over the sack of their city, they would see the
moonlight, the brilliant stars, the fluttering bats, the solemn
owls; and they would hear the wailing of the hyænas and the
barking of the dogs in the distant camps. If one only possessed
the ability, one might weave such a magic carpet for those who
knew how to ride upon it, that, deserting the fallen Jericho of
their habitation, they would fly to the land of the invaders
which they had seen, and there they would be kept as spellbound
and dazzled by the eyes of the wilderness as ever a child
was dazzled by a tale of the sea.
But with this ability lacking it is very doubtful whether
the reader will be able to appreciate the writer's meaning; and,
2
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