DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4372#0084
68
that lay upon it, they recommended us to do the same, as a pre-
servative against every ill.
Among these ruins is the modern cemetery of Es Souan, where
women are hired to sit the whole day long howling and groaning,
with little alteration of the s\sv\iv, or ululus, over the tomb of any
one who has left any wealth behind him.
There are several antient wells in the low grounds about Es
Souan, walled within, and with every mark of having been dug
and built with the greatest care. The water in them is in gene-
ral of the same level as that in the river, though it has been re-
marked by the French engineers, that it begins to rise later, and
falls slower. There being no springs in Egypt, the water is fur-
nished either by the canals, or these wells, which are particularly
abundant in the Sharkyeh, or province east of the Delta. In
some indeed the water is always brackish, in consequence of the
nitrous quality of the soil, particularly when an old well has
been long disused; but by use it sweetens and becomes pala-
table.
The Granite Quarries* of Syene have been long celebrated, and
sufficient vestiges of them are still preserved, to render it credi-
ble that they furnished the materials for the colossal monuments
of Egypt f. They are scattered about, at the foot of the moun-
tains
* The neighbourhood of these quarries was one among a variety of causes of the
populousness of Syene; as the poor could never fail finding employment in them.
t It would seem as if our modern mineralogists had mistaken the precise character
of the stone to which Pliny (1. xxxvk c. 8.) has applied the term Syenites.—Syenite
is now said to be a species of Granite, made up of quartz, feldspar, and hornblende,
with or without mica, aggregated in different proportions, supposed to be posterior to
Granite. Whereas it is plain that the Roman naturalist intended to designate by this
term the common red Granite, found in abundance about Syene, and of which the
different
that lay upon it, they recommended us to do the same, as a pre-
servative against every ill.
Among these ruins is the modern cemetery of Es Souan, where
women are hired to sit the whole day long howling and groaning,
with little alteration of the s\sv\iv, or ululus, over the tomb of any
one who has left any wealth behind him.
There are several antient wells in the low grounds about Es
Souan, walled within, and with every mark of having been dug
and built with the greatest care. The water in them is in gene-
ral of the same level as that in the river, though it has been re-
marked by the French engineers, that it begins to rise later, and
falls slower. There being no springs in Egypt, the water is fur-
nished either by the canals, or these wells, which are particularly
abundant in the Sharkyeh, or province east of the Delta. In
some indeed the water is always brackish, in consequence of the
nitrous quality of the soil, particularly when an old well has
been long disused; but by use it sweetens and becomes pala-
table.
The Granite Quarries* of Syene have been long celebrated, and
sufficient vestiges of them are still preserved, to render it credi-
ble that they furnished the materials for the colossal monuments
of Egypt f. They are scattered about, at the foot of the moun-
tains
* The neighbourhood of these quarries was one among a variety of causes of the
populousness of Syene; as the poor could never fail finding employment in them.
t It would seem as if our modern mineralogists had mistaken the precise character
of the stone to which Pliny (1. xxxvk c. 8.) has applied the term Syenites.—Syenite
is now said to be a species of Granite, made up of quartz, feldspar, and hornblende,
with or without mica, aggregated in different proportions, supposed to be posterior to
Granite. Whereas it is plain that the Roman naturalist intended to designate by this
term the common red Granite, found in abundance about Syene, and of which the
different