DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.6638#0035
TELL ROTAB.
25
largest I saw in Egypt, being more than 16
inches long, which indicates the time of the
Eighteenth and Nineteenth Dynasties.1 The
ground having risen inside, the enclosure was
perhaps not sufficiently high, and the inhabi-
tants were compelled to build another. They
did not, however, take pains to build the second
wall as well as the first; they merely took the
old bricks and put them roughly together,
making it considerably wider than at first. On
the eastern side, they built it partly on the
old enclosure and partly on the soil, which is
there perfectly clean sand. On the southern
side, they built it on the sand inside the old
wall, which is still perfect, and where one sees
a recessing of the brick-work which must have
been a pathway used for the defence. Curiously,
the eastern side is made of bricks of two different
descriptions, the upper ones being made of the
ordinary Nile mud, while the lower are of a
kind of bluish sand which has become as hard
1 Petrie, The Domestic Remains of Ancient Egypt, p. 16.
as the mud. These last are even larger than
the upper ones, for they exceed 17 inches in
length. On the west side, where the original
enclosure seems to have been destroyed, the
workmen or soldiers who built the second wall
made up for good workmanship by great thick-
ness.
The whole place indicates a camp, probably
of late Roman time. It must have been one of
the military stations posted along the course of
the canal leading to the Red Sea, and it may
have been another of the garrisons mentioned
in the " Notitia Dignitatum." From the
quantity of sling stones which are on the Tell,
one may gather that it was a camp of slingers.
No Roman inscription was found. The map
shows all the trenches and pits which I made
at Tell Rotab. Further excavations might
lead to the discovery of some inscribed
fragment, but it would be quite fortuitous ;
and there are no external indications to direct
the excavator to one place rather than to
another.
E
25
largest I saw in Egypt, being more than 16
inches long, which indicates the time of the
Eighteenth and Nineteenth Dynasties.1 The
ground having risen inside, the enclosure was
perhaps not sufficiently high, and the inhabi-
tants were compelled to build another. They
did not, however, take pains to build the second
wall as well as the first; they merely took the
old bricks and put them roughly together,
making it considerably wider than at first. On
the eastern side, they built it partly on the
old enclosure and partly on the soil, which is
there perfectly clean sand. On the southern
side, they built it on the sand inside the old
wall, which is still perfect, and where one sees
a recessing of the brick-work which must have
been a pathway used for the defence. Curiously,
the eastern side is made of bricks of two different
descriptions, the upper ones being made of the
ordinary Nile mud, while the lower are of a
kind of bluish sand which has become as hard
1 Petrie, The Domestic Remains of Ancient Egypt, p. 16.
as the mud. These last are even larger than
the upper ones, for they exceed 17 inches in
length. On the west side, where the original
enclosure seems to have been destroyed, the
workmen or soldiers who built the second wall
made up for good workmanship by great thick-
ness.
The whole place indicates a camp, probably
of late Roman time. It must have been one of
the military stations posted along the course of
the canal leading to the Red Sea, and it may
have been another of the garrisons mentioned
in the " Notitia Dignitatum." From the
quantity of sling stones which are on the Tell,
one may gather that it was a camp of slingers.
No Roman inscription was found. The map
shows all the trenches and pits which I made
at Tell Rotab. Further excavations might
lead to the discovery of some inscribed
fragment, but it would be quite fortuitous ;
and there are no external indications to direct
the excavator to one place rather than to
another.
E