DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.5538#0050
30 PHARAOHS, FELLAHS, AND EXPLORERS.
lines of the streets of the ancient city were yet traceable; the
"potters' quarter" was identified; and not only were several
of the potters' kilns found intact, but also the ruins of a pot-
ter's factoiy. This potter, whomsoever he may have been,
did a great trade in scarabs. He made all sorts of things—
miscellaneous amulets, toys, gods, beads, and so forth—but
scarabs were his specialty. The Egyptian scarab is now so
familiar an object in all museums and private collections
that I need hardly describe how these tiny amulets are made
in the shape of a beetle—the backs exactly imitated from
nature, but the undersides engraved, like seals, with an im-
mense variety of devices, such as mottoes, sacred emblems,
ligures of gods and kings, scrolls, animals, fish, flowers, and
the like.(") In the ruins of this old artist's workshops Mr.
Petrie found hundreds of scarabs, finished and unfinished,
hundreds of clay moulds for casting the same, lumps of vari-
ous pigments for coloring the scarabs, and other appliances
of the trade. The scarab-maker's business came somehow
to an untimely end about five hundred and seventy years
before Christ; for the place had evidently been suddenly
deserted, all the good man's stock in trade being left behind.
As the Greek colonists fought at that time on the side of
Apries, the legitimate Pharaoh, when Amasis revolted and
usurped the throne, we may fairly conclude that ISTaukratis
suffered for the loyalty of her inhabitants, and that our
scarab-maker was ruined with the rest of his fellow-citizens.
In another part of the town Mr. Petrie came upon the
remains of a jeweller's workshop, containing a quantity of
lump silver, and a large store of beautiful archaic Greek
coins, fresh from the mint of Athens. These coins had nev-
er been in circulation, and they were doubtless intended to
be made up into necklaces and ear-rings, after a fashion much
admired by the fair ladies of Hellas, and recently revived by
the jewellers of modern Europe.
Most important, also, is the evidence here brought to bear
upon the origin and growth of the ceramic arts of Greece.
Patterns which we had long believed to be purely Greek are
lines of the streets of the ancient city were yet traceable; the
"potters' quarter" was identified; and not only were several
of the potters' kilns found intact, but also the ruins of a pot-
ter's factoiy. This potter, whomsoever he may have been,
did a great trade in scarabs. He made all sorts of things—
miscellaneous amulets, toys, gods, beads, and so forth—but
scarabs were his specialty. The Egyptian scarab is now so
familiar an object in all museums and private collections
that I need hardly describe how these tiny amulets are made
in the shape of a beetle—the backs exactly imitated from
nature, but the undersides engraved, like seals, with an im-
mense variety of devices, such as mottoes, sacred emblems,
ligures of gods and kings, scrolls, animals, fish, flowers, and
the like.(") In the ruins of this old artist's workshops Mr.
Petrie found hundreds of scarabs, finished and unfinished,
hundreds of clay moulds for casting the same, lumps of vari-
ous pigments for coloring the scarabs, and other appliances
of the trade. The scarab-maker's business came somehow
to an untimely end about five hundred and seventy years
before Christ; for the place had evidently been suddenly
deserted, all the good man's stock in trade being left behind.
As the Greek colonists fought at that time on the side of
Apries, the legitimate Pharaoh, when Amasis revolted and
usurped the throne, we may fairly conclude that ISTaukratis
suffered for the loyalty of her inhabitants, and that our
scarab-maker was ruined with the rest of his fellow-citizens.
In another part of the town Mr. Petrie came upon the
remains of a jeweller's workshop, containing a quantity of
lump silver, and a large store of beautiful archaic Greek
coins, fresh from the mint of Athens. These coins had nev-
er been in circulation, and they were doubtless intended to
be made up into necklaces and ear-rings, after a fashion much
admired by the fair ladies of Hellas, and recently revived by
the jewellers of modern Europe.
Most important, also, is the evidence here brought to bear
upon the origin and growth of the ceramic arts of Greece.
Patterns which we had long believed to be purely Greek are