Howard-Vyse, Richard William Howard: Operations carried on at the Pyramids of Gizeh in 1837: with an account of a voyage into upper Egypt, and Appendix (Band 2) (London, 1841)

74

OPERATIONS CARRIED ON AT GIZEII.

upon which the hark was tolerably fresh, some twigs, that
would almost bend, Tibni (or dried forage), part of an
old basket, and a rag of coarse linen, were found in the
passage.

From what we had seen, it appeared that the passage
had been forced ; that an excavation had been carried up
from it into the superstructure at the end of the masonry;
that it had been reopened at no very remote period; and
that, notwithstanding the unaccountable mystery which
prevailed about it, the upper part of the passage had
subsequently been visited as far as the stones had been
piled up. The Arabic characters afterwards found in the
interior of this pyramid were similar to those in the Fifth,
and most probably to the inscription discovered by Mr.
Belzoni in the Second, and they seem, together with the
diagrams inscribed over the entrances of the Seventh and
Eighth, to prove that all these monuments were visited
nearly about the same time by Mahometans. It is sur-
prising, therefore, that any uncertainty should have existed
respecting the entrance of the Third Pyramid, and much
more so, that the two chasms should have been under-
taken with so much labour and expense by the Mame-
lucs before the lower part of the pyramid had been
examined; for the entrance was chiefly concealed by the
masses of stone and rubbish occasioned by these works.2
These considerations influenced my researches, and they
seem, also, to have misled many other explorers, who,
instead of examining the lower part of the building,
sought for the entrance in the pit, and in the exterior

2 A few of these blocks were removed by Mr. Belzoni, who appears
to have guessed with great exactness the position of the entrance.