History of Egypt, Chaldæa, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria in the Light of Recent Discovery | Page 6

flint or chert, like those of the Neolithic ancestors of the Egyptians, and
the continued use of a stone knife for this one purpose only is a very
interesting instance of a ceremonial survival. We may compare the
wigs of British judges.
[Illustration: 014.jpg FLINT KNIFE]
We have no specimen of a flint knife which can definitely be asserted
to have belonged to an embalmer, but of the archaistic flint weapons of
the XIIth Dynasty we have several specimens. They were found by
Prof. Petrie at the place named by him "Kahun," the site of a XIIth
Dynasty town built near the pyramid of King Usertsen (or Senusret) II
at Illahun, at the mouth of the canal leading from the Nile valley into
the oasis-province of the Payyum. These Kahun flints, and others of
probably the same period found by Mr. Seton-Karr at the very ancient
flint works in the Wadi esh-Shêkh, are of very coarse and poor
workmanship as compared with the stone-knapping triumphs of the late
Neolithic and early Chalcolithic periods. The delicacy of the art had all
been lost. But the best flint knives of the early period--dating to just a
little before the time of the Ist Dynasty, when flint-working had
attained its apogee, and copper had just begun to be used--are
undoubtedly the most remarkable stone weapons ever made in the
world. The grace and utility of the form, the delicacy of the fluted
chipping on the side, and the minute care with which the tiny serrations
of the cutting edge, serrations so small that often they can hardly be
seen with the naked eye, are made, can certainly not be parallelled
elsewhere. The art of flint-knapping reached its zenith in Ancient Egypt.
The specimen illustrated has a handle covered with gold decorated with
incised designs representing animals.
The prehistoric Egyptians may also fairly be said to have attained

greater perfection than other peoples in the Neolithic stage of culture,
in other arts besides the making of stone tools and weapons. Their
pottery is of remarkable perfection. Now that the sites of the Egyptian
prehistoric settlements have been so thoroughly explored by competent
archæologists (and, unhappily, as thoroughly pillaged by incompetent
natives), this prehistoric Egyptian pottery has become extremely well
known. In fact, it is so common that good specimens may be bought
anywhere in Egypt for a few piastres. Most museums possess sets of
this pottery, of which great quantities have been brought back from
Egypt by Prof. Petrie and other explorers. It is of very great interest,
artistically as well as historically. The potter's wheel was not yet
invented, and all the vases, even those of the most perfect shape, were
built up by hand. The perfection of form attained without the aid of the
wheel is truly marvellous.
The commonest type of this pottery is a red polished ware vase with
black top, due to its having been baked mouth downward in a fire, the
ashes of which, according to Prof. Petrie, deoxidized the hæmatite
burnishing, and so turned the red colour to black. "In good examples
the hæmatite has not only been reduced to black magnetic oxide, but
the black has the highest polish, as seen on fine Greek vases. This is
probably due to the formation of carbonyl gas in the smothered fire.
This gas acts as a solvent of magnetic oxide, and hence allows it to
assume a new surface, like the glassy surface of some marbles
subjected to solution in water." This black and red ware appears to be
the most ancient prehistoric Egyptian pottery known. Later in date are a
red ware and a black ware with rude geometrical incised designs,
imitating basketwork, and with the incised lines filled in with white.
Later again is a buff ware, either plain or decorated with wavy lines,
concentric circles, and elaborate drawings of boats sailing on the Nile,
ostriches, fish, men and women, and so on.
[Illustration: 017.jpg (right) BUFF WARE VASE, Predynastic period,
before 4000 B.C.]
These designs are in deep red. With this elaborate pottery the Neolithic
ceramic art of Egypt reached its highest point; in the succeeding period

(the beginning of the historic age) there was a decline in workmanship,
exhibiting clumsy forms and bad colour, and it is not until the time of
the IVth Dynasty that good pottery (a fine polished red) is once more
found. Meanwhile the invention of glazed pottery, which was unknown
to the prehistoric Egyptians, had been made (before the beginning of
the Ist Dynasty). The unglazed ware of the first three dynasties was bad,
but the new invention of light blue glazed faience (not porcelain
properly so called) seems to have made great progress, and we possess
fine specimens at the beginning of the Ist Dynasty. The prehistoric
Egyptians were also